Thursday, 12 December 2024

Digging again.

Saturday, the next storm.

After Bert, was it Dave? No, Darragh... well, we liked the idea of 'Storm Dave', esp. as we have three Daves on the team.

It was a bitter cold and windy Saturday. The Met Office suggested 60mph winds for our area and a temperature of maximum 5 degrees, which would feel like minus 1. Well, that was accurate!

We met in the mess coach for tea and buns, casting anxious eyes outside, to see if the weather would let up, but it never. Brave were those who were willing to trundle backwards into the north westerlies, with nothing but a canvas sheet over their heads.

 

 

 


North westerlies, this way.....






 

Eventually we faced the inevitable, and got up to go to work.

The first job was to load up 5 rubber crossing pads. They are surprisingly heavy - too much even for a group of 4 of us - so the Telehandler had to intervene.

We stood in puddles, and made the best of what our workwear could offer us.

Wanna come and join us?


 

Soon we were on site at Peasebrook, with two vans, the Ranger and the Telehandler. Here there was a dip - once again, in a section only recently professionally tamped - over some distance. This would require numerous lifting jacks, a largish gang and kinder weather.

The wind whipped the raindrops like needles onto our faces.

We decided to do an easier job this time.



 

A few hundred yards further south we were in a very slight cutting, and this already made a difference.

Here was the designated place for a small crossing of rubber pads, to allow the contractor with the remote controlled robo flail to cross to the other side.


After some pushing and shoving - this second hand stuff is never a perfect fit - we got the 4 pads in, and we shovelled some ballast on each side to make a ramp.





We then moved further south still, to a public crossing not far from Stanton Fields. This is where the track changes sides, and this point would make a useful crossing for our vehicles as well, but not at the right angle that there is at the moment. Additional pads would make it useable for us too.



 

 

Yours truly was part of the gang that installed this crossing for the public, back in 2015.

The moment we were finished a jogger appeared from out of the undergrowth and used it! He was the first, and he had perfect timing.




 

We felt that more pads would be better here, so will need to come back for a second session. By now it also started to get dark.

This could be seen from the waiting Santa train that we met in Winchcombe station on our return.


There was one benefit from the cold weather - a good steamy picture.


Once more the valiant enginemen set off south, only to have to return in reverse, straight into the North Westerly.

Brave indeed.

After the train had gone, the tired elves trudged back to their waiting area for a 20 minute rest.

The penguins, now in a permanent (no longer temporary) basic plywood hut on the platform kept on singing.

 

 

 

Monday at Broadway.

Dealing with the aftermath of the storm, and then back to brick laying. 

The storm did no real damage to Broadway station, but it did blow off all the hessian and polythene sheets that covered our work.

The trees are still up, but we learned of the intention to remove a further 6 next week. Perhaps it is indeed safer that way, but it seems clear that, with all the trees already removed in prior years, it won't be long before they are all gone. They are such an iconic part of the atmosphere at the station.

Other pines have been planted on the Malvern side, north of the station.

Here's our opening shot for Monday. You can see the window cills along the front, and at the back John is busy laying bricks.

The wagons are back again, empty. After some delay, the digger has been hired back for Thursday, and its first job will be to take away the ramp, and dig out the foundations for the canopy end supports.




During the day John worked along the southern half of the back, where he laid a sixth course.

As you can see, brick laying is powered by tea.



This is the same shot again, but now from the outside.

At the end of the day the sixth course was done half way along the back, and half way along the southern end.








Wednesday with the Usketeers.

Back at Winchcombe by the weighbridge, our second day here.

We had barely sat down inside the hut for an initial cup of coffee, when there was a furious rat-a-tat-tat that went right through the walls. It was a colleague from our C&M department with an SDS drill, drilling holes in the foundations for the underpinning. Good Morning to you, too!



 

The C&M guys didn't waste any time, minutes later the rebar had been hammered home, and shuttering was being put in.




The Telehandler then came up, with its bucket loaded with ballast and a concrete mixer. 

In the meantime, Paul was readying the site where the Usketeers were to work: Under the front wall, underpinning a failing lintel.

The first thing to do here was to clean out the pit, and make it ready for the construction of two piers that will support the front wall with its crack.

This rusty RSJ had no discernible function, and was so badly gone that it came away in Paul's hands. We took it out.




 

 

Concrete was soon being poured into the underpinning pit on the corner.

Paul, Dave and Yours Truly then prepared the ground for the construction of the two supporting piers in the pit.

One pier would be 48 bricks, we calculated, so we went to get these. The bricks are from Verney Junction, so have seen prior railway use. Regular readers will have seen us demolishing part of the platforms there, prior to the East-West link being built through the site.

Yours Truly spent a lot of time cleaning out the pit of debris and mud. The bottom needs to be clean for the piers to have a good footing.

We also dug into the mud under the weighbridge table. Here it is between 1 and 6 ins deep, the 6 ins being around the outside, where coal dust fell down the slot.

Up above is a large 'X' shaped beam, and this holds up the weighing table. It is balanced on a long beam running L to R in the picture, which connects it to the balance inside the hut.

We believe the weighbridge was upgraded after the war, with a larger table and balance mechanism. The pit was also rebuilt in blue bricks, whereas the original one was in reds. In places you can see a combination of both.

Next week should see a start being made on the construction of the two supporting piers for the failing lintel.



PWay at Hunting Butts.

This is an area where we have repeated trespass, despite our best efforts to stop it.


 

 

 

The southern portal of the short (90m) Hunting Butts tunnel is protected by these Armco barriers dug into the ground. That should deter anyone, you'd think. Not so, they managed to get underneath and pry open one of the barriers.

Today's job was to fit a rail across them all, so that they could not be pried open individually.





The result of the vandals' visit, just a few days ago, was further graffiti spraying of some of the goods vehicles kept there. Wooden vans that were once kept there were burned out and have since been removed, but the amount of space we have elsewhere on the line is very limited.

The PWay gang also collected a lot of potentially burnable material for disposal elsewhere.

Our catch pits are also being opened and the lids thrown in. In this one we have fitted a blue secure cover underneath, which is bolted down.

You can imagine why the railway is not keen on using the last 3/4 mile of track we own towards Cheltenham, because of the vandal activity in this area. There is a big housing estate nearby.



 

Another job today, while we were down there, was to place more rubber pads for the robo flail crossing.

This one is between Gotheringon and Bishops Cleeve.



 

Finally, at Cheltenham Race Course, a timber was replaced on the northern turnout of the loop.

A busy and interesting day for the gang.







Broadway P2 waiting room - the cills.

As readers will have noticed from the previous blog, we are now high enough at the front to start placing window cills.

We have in store the six that fit along the front, but need to order two more for the end windows. The cills under the canopy (the 6) are slightly different from those in the open on the end (the other two). We therefore need to order two more, and because of their different form this is a special order.


One of our kind readers had taken the initiative to support us with the cost of three of the window cills. They're marked in green above. The front ones cost us £97 each, and the two end ones £422 each. Those are a bit different, and need new moulds making.

If you want to join his initiative, or know more, send us a blogger contact form (top right).



3 comments:

  1. Hi Jo. Not just the loco. crew being brave in the cold. I think you were ALL brave to be out in this very cold weather! I find it bad enough where I am in Cornwall, and I am in one of the warmest areas of Great Britain!
    I must ask the question. Where oh where do the singing penguines come into Christmas? I'm sure that I have NOT read in the Bible that in the stable in Bethlehem that there were cattle and 'THREE PENGUINES' when Jesus Christ was born! A donkey and lamb and cow would have been more apropriate surely. We seem to be getting more and more ruled by market trends and advertising. The next thing might be the the baby Jesus quenched His thirst by swigging from a bottle of Coca Cola, and Mary and Joseph left him with the shapherds and wise men whilst they went off and got a 'Big Mac'!!
    John is doing exceedingly ell on the brick front at Broadway ably assisted by yourself. I look daily to see what has changed.
    The photographs do look good in the cold atmosphere, but after being out taking the pictures, a nice hot cup of tea or coffee would be very necessary.
    Regards, Paul.

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    Replies
    1. Worth remembering that Father Christmas as we know it was virtually pretty much by coca cola back in the 1930s, so we've been where we are for quite a while now!

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  2. I heartily second Paul's sentiments. "Distant's on!" "Hands to shorten sail!" comes to mind for the loco crews. And yes, who is going to really radical, and produce a good, old fashioned Nativity in our increasingly secularised society? Who knows, it might prove extremely popular.
    You all deserve triple house points for turning out last Saturday. Really. That is above and beyond, and no tarpaulin to hide under!
    Respect, Mark

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