A second drop at Dixton

Monday at Broadway

A bit of a dreary day, but dry enough to work, and especially, paint.

 

 

 

Now that the gala is over and peace has descended on Broadway again, we are taking down the trial fitted boarding so that it can be grooved, and then treated against rotting and painted.

 

 

 

 

Neal has taken down the boards from the first section, after numbering them all, from 1 to 55. There are lots of them, and the same down the other side as well.

On his workmate he has set up a jig, which will enable him to push through each board and that will apply a groove to them.

Mid morning Neal was more than half way up already.

Yours truly, feeling very low after a booster and flu jab on Sunday, gathered up two barrow loads of dagger boards prepared by the Broadway maintenance gang for the last part of the P1 canopy. They all need another application of light stone undercoat, a nice little job up on the centre span.

As it's getting a bit crowded in our centre span workshop, John set up a subsidiary operation under the steps, where the boards removed and grooved by Neal were getting a coat of fungicide on the newly exposed areas.

In other heritage news, these finds from the embankment by the Broadway goods shed are being transferred to the RATS for future exhibition. Most of the items that were uncovered there in several digs were pretty smashed up, but some like these were almost complete. They will have been thrown away at St. James if even slightly chipped, and survived miraculously in the ash when everything was dumped down the slope by the goods shed.

The pint glasses came from the collection of the former landlord of the Bell in at Willersey, where our earliest preservation society meetings were held. They are all stamped 'GWR'.

Tuesday on a rail supply train.

A second rail drop took place on Tuesday, firstly in the Dixton cutting, and then a second half at Manor Lane. It was a great day, especially with a Growler at the head of the train.

 

 

 

We met up in the cutting at Dixton, where the train hauled by 37 215 was already waiting. We had a big logistical problem, in that one of the increasingly numerous road closures has been stuck on the road from Greet to Gotherington. But that's where we wanted to go!

The road closure panel didn't say where exactly the road had been blocked, but we guessed that it was by the new housing estate just north of Gotherington, leaving us the room to turn off at Skew Bridge. And so it was.

Here Walt is just picking up the lifting beam, placed upon the next lot of replacement rail, 14 of them. They're all second hand, but of good quality, and with none of the 'squats' that have been found on ours.

After picking up his lifting beam, Walt soon got into the swing off it and was lifting rails off in pairs. After each pair, the loco would head off for another 60ft.

We had a show of supporters in the guards van (you had to pay during the gala, but if you volunteer, you get your ride for free) and occasionally they suffered for their viewing, as the class 37 struggled to get its 1750Hp on to the rails in a gentle manner, leading to a stop to 5mph speed in the guards van of a fraction of a second.

We dropped off 9 rails at Dixton, which should take us to about 1/5th mile. Very shortly we will be laying these in, with the old ones coming out and taking their place in the cess. A 360 digger to do this is on the horizon for the job.

To take this picture the operator of the little flail seen last week very kindly mowed this area, so that we could take a shot of our special train from above.

The Queen Mary brake can be seen in all its glorious length, being nearly as long as the bogie flat with the rails.

The remaining 5 rails were then taken to Manor Lane. Because of the road closure, the PWay gang, with the exception of Walt in the Telehandler, got into the Queen Mary, and we were soon bowling along the line. Here we are, just passing under 3 Arch Bridge, on the approach to Gotherington.

We then passed through the station itself, with a merry toot to owners Bryan and Savita, who came to salute us on the way back.

We parked the train at the Manor Lane entrance, and waited for Walt. And waited. And waited. After a while a phone call from Andrew in charge confirmed our fears that Walt had been unable to bluff his way through the road closure (in his yellow construction vehicle, after all) and had to go back to Greet, and then the (very) long way round via Teddington Hands. All that in a slow Telehandler, no doubt with a queue of angry cars behind.

Finally we heard the loud clanking of loose forks, as the machine with Walt bounced down Manor Lane. He received a rousing cheer from the assembled gang - it wasn't particularly warm, standing there in the wind, with the coffee in the vacuum flasks reaching dangerously low levels.

Here is Walt in the Telehandler, just coming into our site. The jubilation was short and quick, we wanted to get on with the job.

The first of the 5 rails was dropped off there and then.

The train then moved off to the next drop off point, after another long wait, during which a discussion took place out of sight as to where the roomiest place was to drop the last 4.

The rails were wanted by the foot crossing, but there was no room on top of the embankment there for the Telehandler to reverse, so we decided to drop them off short, and the promised 360 would have to move them along on the day.

We then all piled back into the Queen Mary, the only shelter from a chilly wind, leaving poor old Walt to drive all the way back again, round the road closure. 

The Pway gang was dropped off, with tools, by the spot where we left off in the morning, and where our road transport was parked. You can see that the rails we dropped over two Tuesdays stretch into the distance.

Our final picture shows the PWay train from the side of the cutting. Shortly after snapping the picture, the Growler bellowed and a column of smoke shot out - we missed that moment. Oh well.

It looks like the next PWay activity will be to actually place these rails. In the winter shut down period we will be working on replacing two turnouts as well. It's going to be busy!

 

 

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

A dull day of drizzle, but the damp was good for laying blocks. One is meant to have them really damp, indeed one instruction was to hose them down for an hour before using mortar on them. That proved to be difficult in the summer weather, as they dried out even as you hosed them.

So, a good damp day for the blocks, while the 4 of us wrapped up warm and went to work anyway.

Paul continued with the upper part of the fireplace, while Dave started laying the double row of blocks on the corner nearest the camera, prepped last week.

John was among the baskets of rough blocks, looking for any more dressed stone. Are we getting a bit low with them? It almost feels like it, or is it because we are well over half way up the walls?

 

 

Before Dave could do the double row of blocks, he had to seat the two quoins on the ends.

Here is the corner one, upended, with a bed of mix on the corner. Its opposite number by the door is still loose, will they come out at the same height?

Paul can be seen working on a tricky bit, where the top of the fireplace turns into a chimney flue. The fireplace is oblong, while the steel chimney flue we are going to use is round. How to convert one to the other?

Ideally we would need one of those plates that you get for above a woodburner, a rectangular steel plate with a circular hole in the middle. But we don't have one of those.

Paul here is making a plate out of spare slates. Just after the picture was taken, he abandoned that idea, preferring to raise the square chimney a little higher in bricks.

 

 

The drizzle then got a little more persistent (although a dry-ish day was forecast) so we decided to seek shelter in the tin hut and explore Mrs. Dave's excellent fruit cake with Brandy. If only she would bake some more!

Note how low the cloud has dropped - the ceiling is barely above the valley floor. There'll be no C130s at treetop height today!

Just before lunch, Dave managed to finish off this corner, which he has got very nice and level. We need a lot more backing up, but our chief backer-upper Jules can only come occasionally, and we miss him.

Due to unforeseen circumstances we had to finish early today, but next week looks like similar, warmish weather, so we ought to be able to resume then.

 

 

 

 

An appeal for Bridge 8, the B4632 road bridge at Stanton

This bridge, for which the railway is held responsible, has been the subject of weight restrictions for a number of years now, and as you may know is currently single lane, enforced by a traffic light.

The GWR Trust has now launched an appeal to raise money to repair the bridge, and issued the following appeal letter from which we quote:

You will be aware that there have been temporary traffic lights on Bridge 8 (on the B4632 near Stanton) for a considerable time. This is because we were advised by engineers that there had been some deterioration to the steelwork of the bridge and that a weight limit should be imposed until it is repaired.
When the founding fathers set up Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway (GWSR) and bought the redundant railway line from British Railways, it came with a caveat that GWSR also had to take on legal responsibility to maintain all the bridges which cross the line. For the last forty years, inspection, maintenance and repair of all 46 bridges and 51 culverts has been a major factor in influencing how GWSR raise and spend their funds.
Work on establishing what needs to be done to Bridge 8 was inevitably delayed by the pandemic; we had previously established that when services such as water and gas were laid across the bridge many years ago, the original waterproof decking was damaged and this has allowed water to seep through the earth verges and damage the structural steelwork. Those utility companies responsible have long since been privatised, changed their names, amalgamated and essentially disappeared so it is impossible to pursue them for a remedy. We are left to do it ourselves.
This year, GWSR arranged for the verges to be cleared of vegetation and then be laid with tarmac to waterproof them and hopefully allow the structure to dry out. A scheme of repairs to the structure has been devised but the work needs to be done as soon as possible to avoid further deterioration and GWSR does not have the funds available. Furthermore, the line will have to be closed while the work is being undertaken so GWSR needs to avoid doing it during the running season if at all possible.
There is a window of opportunity to do the work during January and February 2022 so (we are) appealing to you now for your help in raising the £200,000 required in two months. This is a very tight timescale but your response to previous appeals gives me confidence that you will rise to the occasion again. All monies (including Gift Aid, where applicable), will be ring-fenced by GWRT and released to GWSR on submission of invoices for the work.

New tarmac verges to stop water infiltration

The underside of bridge 8, prior to track laying in 2008

A detail of the rust damage caused by water infiltration.

(Pictures with thanks to John Balderstone).

If you are able to help, the GWR Trust would gratefully receive donations via this link:

https://www.gwrt.org.uk/Make_a_Donation/New_Donations.html

Alternatively, you can simply send a cheque payable to GWRT to the Trust here:

Churchward House, Winchcombe Railway Station, Winchcombe, Cheltenham GL54 5LD

The donation can be gift aided to increase its value. If you have already done this with the Trust before, they will have your details, otherwise a form can be downloaded from the donations website above.

 Thank you for your help!