Santa has arrived at the North Pole.

Friday at Winchcombe.

Quick, quick, our replacement GWR lamp post hasn't got its top on yet, and Saturday is the start of Santa trains at Winchcombe!

Luckily the weather forecast was fine and dry, so we were able to use the silicone on the glass.

First of all, get your tools ready. Here is the kit for a 16 inch Windsor lamp top.

And this is the top of the post where it is destined to go.

The FoWS have given it a first coat of paint, but the acanthus leaves haven't been picked out yet. That is still to come.

The first item to go on is the frame itself, still without glass. Otherwise it would be too awkward and heavy.

 

There it is. Still without glass, but the lightbulb works. On the left is the sidehung door. Cheaper lamp tops have no door, but a removable top - not authentic.

Next, Neal started to fit the specially cut glass, which came as part of the kit. Don't drop any, Neal, they are difficult to replace!

For the full effect, we'd need lamp glasses that read 'WINCHCOMBE'. At Broadway we achieved that effect by cheating a bit (well it was early days) - we used stickers.

If anyone knows how to get proper lamp glasses, we'd be interested to hear. Otherwise it'll be stickers again, but not until we have replaced all of the non-original posts.

The glass panes are held in place by little tabs inside, but that does not ensure a watertight seal, so we ran silicone down the edges.

Then we put the top on, and it was time for a photograph.

There's one more non-original post to do on P1, but at the moment we don't have any more posts with which to do it. If you have one in your garden that you want to donate, get in touch! We'd love to hear from you.

One of the canopy gang poses with the new post, and its 16 inch top.

Saturday at Gotherington.

Not the continuation of spot resleepering at Winchcombe, no, but dealing with a list of minor faults at Gotherington.

 

Normal doughnut supplies were interupted on Saturday, so alternative sources were tried, thanks to Tony.

These were actually rather tasty, being a mixture of chocolate, caramel and sprinkles.

Yum!

We loaded up two vans and set of with the list of minor faults for Gotherington skew. Just in time for the first up Santa train to come past. The first of the Christmas season.

It came storming by.

Sadly it was a tad too stormily - the camera had to have a think about it first, before releasing the shutter. By that time Foremarke Hall had already managed to get a buffer past.

Then we put a load of ballast in the Citroen, and the team split into two.

You see, it's over here, mile post 15...

The main gang went to change a lifter plate for a slightly higher one, while three of us went to Manor Lane to add some ballast to a foot crossing between there and Cleeve.

We had noticed before that there seemed to be a lot of alcoholic litter around the Manor Lane entrance gate, which is on our property, but set back some way from the road.

Party time...

Our gate approach, hard to find and discreetly around a bend, is apparently the place to have a party for the local youth. Beer bottles and party balloons littered the site.

We negotiated the beer bottles on the ground and made our way to the foot crossing. Here the rubber panels had risen a little, and revealed an unsafe edge. We back filled this with the ballast that was loaded at Skew bridge.

Job done. Let's hope it lasts. It's quite a busy crossing, with that new housing estate nearby.

As we left, we got a message to let us know that a train was passing Gotherington, so we paused the return journey to let it pass. This is the second ECS, on its way to CRC to pick up Santa passengers.

We then drove on through, to exit at the Cleeve foot crossing.

Wrongo! No fewer than three cars illegally parked around our exit. No way to get out here on Saturday. No one about (Nursery shut, so not customers of theirs), so all we could do was drive all the way back to Manor Lane. 

Back in at Skew bridge depot then, and turn right down the Dixton straight, to find the gang in the cutting there grappling with that lifter plate we need to replace.

You'd think a quick change with the impact wrench for a higher lift, but no. The new plate wouldn't fit, as one of the sleepers was too close. So that had to be dug out and barred across some.

Burp !

After that strenuous bit of sleeper barring and ballast shovelling, we afforded ourselves a tea break, and consumption of the remaining chocolate doughnuts.

Enjoying the last days of its boiler ticket, 4270 accelerates a Santa train out of Gotherington.

The sun was very pale on Saturday, but as it wasn't very strong it allowed some interesting shots of the now full returning Santa train.

Another lifter plate was required just past Gotherington Skew bridge. This one was simpler, phew!

Foremarke Hall on its way to the North Pole with excited children.

We had lunch in the platform shelter at Gotherington. What a lovely little station. You sit back and watch 

the trains steam out of the passing loop.

 

We waved to the children, all expecting a meeting with the visitor from the North Pole. 

Although most seemed excited, some were already crying. Best to get it in early. Perhaps they felt guilty, and had some misbehaviours to confess?

 

 

 

The long trudge home, through Gotherington station and back to the vans.

The next job was just a simple replacement of a defective insulating end post, which should take just two people to do the job. As were were about a dozen again, yours truly took the opportunity duck out and talk to Bryan, the owner of the station. That's always an interesting conversation. Heritage railway tips flow both ways.

What we didn't realise was that the swapping of the end post wasn't so simple at all, and involved all of the gang (except yours truly of course), as the joint was so tight the whole rail had to be loosened and moved back a few mm with wedges. Quite a job! Then back on foot from one end of the loop to the other.

 On the way back to Skew bridge yard we stopped to shovel some more ballast. We had some left in the truck after the crossing fill, and here at Granna lane some sleeper ends were exposed - a great place to lose some spare ballast.

This was an easy job - just shovel it off the truck, and drop it down. Soon done.

 

 Back at Winchcombe we put back the tools, parked up the truck, then had a look round the Santa platform. It really was very jolly and exciting there. Lots of helpful volunteers dressed in red.

At the business end was 4270, looking festive and atmospheric in the evening light and platform lamps.

Got your ticket yet? It's too late - all the Santa tickets are sold out this year. Good news for the company, as the winter is costly in maintenance and outgoings that don't stop, just because the trains do.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday without the Usketeers.

A miserable day. Gigaclear came to install superfast Broadband at the blogger country pile. A 2 - 3 hour job, they said.

The workmen ripped out the BT apparatus and phone, and ran a cable under the lawn and drilled a hole in the side of the house.

After 5 hours they left, but without a Gigaclear service in place !!! Some sort of issue with the supply, nothing to do with the house, or their work.

An engineer will come... (when ?????)

Luckily we were able to reconnect the many cables and plugs of the old BT modem, so this blogpost comes to you one more time through a rural telephone line. Thank you BT, but wish your service wasn't so slow, expensive, and recently, more and more intermittent.

Well, somebody had fun today. The pictures below are thanks to Julian. You can send pictures by email, but you can't send brandy soaked fruitcake :-(

 

 

 

Today was glass day. Through family connections we managed to order the glass for all the windows, ready cut, for a very friendly price.

Here are Paul and Dave, proudly bearing the much awaited goods.

 

 

The most interesting glazing was round the two sliding windows. These enabled the operator of the original weighbridge to communicate with the customer, and hand out tickets etc. So they needed to open, and not slam in the wind.

There are two then, on little brass rollers, which run along a steel strip. 

As examples of  'this is one we did earlier' the brass rollers, worn flat after seizing, have been turned and in one case replaced some while back, and were in store (read - lamp hut).

The steel strip was badly rusted and full of craters, which is no doubt why the rollers had flat spots worn into them. It was replaced with a new one, with the same screw holes.

In the picture you can see Paul re-cut the space for one of the rollers, which was part filled in when our friendly joiner Steve mended the corner of that window with a piece of new wood. (another thing we did earlier)

There's more glazing to do with the two plain windows that open. (less interessting)

 

 

 

 

Next came the putty for the glass, and in this picture you can see Paul tap in some securing nails

 

 

 

 

The centre window is fixed, and outside Paul was getting the frame ready to insert the first sliding window.

Then it was lunch time. The building is now mostly dry thanks to the tarpaulin over the trusses, but when we had a look on Saturday, after some stormy and wet nights, there was half an inch of water covering the floor. At the time the windows had rather flappy polythene sheets over them.

Now the big window is glazed on one side, and the chance of rain pouring in like last week should be considerably reduced.

Paul and Dave chew the fat.....

 

 

 

Then it was the turn of the second sliding window, which you can see here on the makeshift table being fitted with putty.

Last week there was also talk of fitting the door, which is now fully repainted. We have hinges and a bolt. (both original)

 

 

At the end of a rather dingey but dry day (humidity 100%, according to the BBC) both windows were in, and a large hole in the side of the building plugged.

An addendum to Julian's report states that one of the two smaller windows was also glazed, leaving one more to do next week. Paul won't be there, but he now has two carefully trained apprentices...

This does look rather good, doesn't it. It's even somewhat seasonal. Those little stickers on the glass look like winter snowflakes at first glance.

We still need to fit some brass locks on the window. There was one original at Usk, the other was snapped, but we found a brand new replacement in a local shop at Broadway. Great ! It's one of those lovely hardware shops that has everything. (Plug: Cotswolds Building Supplies!)

For the scaffolding we continue to await funding to pay for it. 

A last minute picture from Dave:

Big window glazed up, tower scaffold moved back to the chimney end.

Thanks from a reader.

Many of you add comments on the blog, which we always read and appreciate. But last week we received a book in an envelope, addressed to 'The Heritage Herald blog' at Churchward house! Luckily they knew who was behind it. The envelope contained a 1964 book on the Lynton & Barnstaple, and a note of thanks for several years of blog reading enjoyment.

We have the 1989 updated book on the L&B, so to read this original volume was rather fun. Many thanks for the little gift, received from an anonymous supporter.

A little puzzle

As this blogpost feels a bit short (thank you, Gigaclear) we will set you a little puzzle.

It's a picture we came across while writing an article. It was taken in 1953, and shows an 8F on its side after a derailment.

Copyright: NSM

Can anyone say more? Note the 'RAPIER' steam crane on the right.