A sudden meeting

Friday at Toddington on steel.

The work to fabricate elements of the canopy for Broadway P2 continues.

 

Neal and John have been lengthening steel angle from 6m to 7m25, ready for the purlins to be made. These link the trusses, characterised by a zig-zag pattern of steel strip.

What they lengthened they decided to bring up to our 'greenhouse', which was a bit depressing and it just piled pain upon agony. We have donne 4 lengths so far, and Neal and John added another 10 to do.

We'll never get there at this rate!

 

But, guess what, they have now finished the lengthening stage, so came to join Yours Truly to help with the mill scale and rust removal.

Here is Neal at Work with the angle grinder.

 

Stepping back a bit from the 'greenhouse' you can see two work sites now, and much faster progress.

The number of steels coated is now 9, out of 44 to do.

 

 

 

At the end of the afternoon we treated ourselves to a box of 3 Magnums. Just the right number, and much cheaper if bought from the corner shop.

They went down particularly well.

 

Elsewhere on the Toddington site the Real Ale festival was in full swing.

As volunteers while signed on we are not allowed any beer, so we only took a peep of what there was to see in the beer tent. It looked great! Lucky customers....

Passing along the Toddington platform - Toddington being our only original station building - we were dismayed to see that further holes had been drilled into it.

In fact in this case two sets of holes, as the first try didn't work, witness the brick dust underneath. This is an ugly metal box, with a very modern combination lock underneath.

A similar thing has been done to the rear of the building, where the original brickwork was punched through for a modern plastic cable.

Is it alright to damage your primary historical asset in this way, without prior reference to any sort of curator of our 'living museum'?

A very un - 1904 concrete flowerbox has been put in front to boot.

There is currently nothing to prevent anyone at all to damage or alter our historic buildings on the railway in whatever way they please. You can do what you like. That is wrong.

The Real Ale festival had a lovely DMU shuttle that went up and down to link the beer tents at Toddington and Winchcombe with Broadway. They were well used, and it made the timetable interesting.

But in this picture modern additions also spoil the historical effect. Here it is some sort of internet relay station, one of several attached to historic buildings at Toddington and indeed on the original stone Monmouth Troy building at Winchcombe as well.

 

Sadly we do not seem to care for our historic fabric. Operational requirements come first. Surely there must be ways of achieving what we need in a more discreet or original way?

Saturday out with the gang.

While it was the (Three day) Real Ale event the gang pressed ahead with improvements and repairs to the track as usual.

On the menu on Saturday: Fit ballast retaining boards at Gretton, then (if we are still corpus mentis) change a (or several) rotten sleepers near mp 13.1.

Go! 

Two less than new concrete sleepers were retrieved from the yard and put on the Transit by Dave. Concrete sleepers are long lasting, but what do you do with them if they become damaged?

Find an alternative use. We have quite a few, and it costs money to take them away, so internal use is best.

Then we were off, in convoi, through Greet and then up Working Lane to the trackside.

Slowest vehicle first, natch, and emergency doughnuts ready within reach. Dave threads his way through the village in the Telehandler, pursued by an angry young man in a supermini.

 

Here we have arrived at a farmer's underbridge a bit beyond Gretton halt. Ballast has been slipping away here.

As we tamp the line and add ballast, the height creeps up here and there, so more ballast retention boards are needed. Also, when the line was relaid with minimal means, there was very little ballast available.

Here is Dave lifting off the two 'second hand' concrete sleepers, ready for swinging round (for which we need a line block).

We can't use the economy sleepers from Didbrook, because 'economy' means that they have big holes in them. They won't retain any ballast then.

 

 

Also, before dropping off the sleepers we need to drive in two long stakes.

You there, stand still and hold the pole while I hit it with a hammer!

Who, me? Graham looks a trifle worried. Yeah, go on, says Tim from a safe distance.

Now Graham looks a tad more comfortable, as it's Tim's turn to hold absolutely still. If he can.

Then we had to wait for a line block.

We waited.

And waited.

And waited.

No line block, but also no trains, due to a grass fire somewhere down south.

 

 

We only needed 20 minutes to swing the sleepers in, and pack them with spare ballast.

Here we are, job done, another one ticked off the list. Dave disked off the protruding bits of stake. We do a neat job.

Next, we moved back up the line a bit, to near the outer home signal where a rotten sleeper had been reported. Actually, closer inspection revealed 4 bad sleepers, which was just as well as we had brought 4 spares with us.

P&O is a bit further away than the cameraman would like, as at this precise point the (camera-) phone rang. Dang.

It was the insurance company, to talk about the accident your blogger had the previous evening. 

Yes, sadly it was so. Coming into Weston Subedge we were suddenly faced by a Polo that came round the corner much too fast, and ended up precisely on the wrong side of the road. Boom!

That was certainly unexpected! We managed to pretty much stop, but the Polo did not and there was a loud bang. We were uninjured - worry not, blog reports will continue - but the other driver, who passed her test only 3 weeks earlier, suffered a bash on the nose.

The blogger car was recovered to a yard in... Droitwich! We await news. But it's going to be messy, and you don't get compensated for that. If it's written off you never get all the money you need to buy a replacement, and if it's repaired, there will be questions about the accident when it's sold on at some point.

 

Back to Saturday with the gang.

Here we are digging out one of the old sleepers, with that lovely view to Breedon Hill in the background.

The chairs in this area are all economy S2s. What's one of those then?

In order to save on the cast iron raw material during the war the S2 chair (R) was produced, as a replacement for the normally used S1 (L).

You can see that it is thinner, but the holes are still the same distance apart. We replace the S2s systematically whenever we find them, as they have less surface area on the sleeper underneath and tend to dig in.

Our ultimate plan for this wooden sleepered section (the Gretton straight) is to replace them all with concrete. That will save on maintenance in the long term. The next bit, the Dixton cutting, is already in concrete.

 

We also heard some interesting aircraft noise.

This turned out to be a flight of three Hercules, we believe returning from a fly past in London. We won't see those again, now it's the A400s. Still interesting though.

This is the full resleepering site, stretched out over about 20 yards.

The annoying thing is that we have been spot resleepering in this area already, and now we've had to go back and do some more. Roll on the replacement in concrete!

With 4 new wooden sleepers in (actually, three were good second hand woods) the last job is to pack them well, not such a chore with the Robels now. 

We could still do with 2 more. Only 2 out of the gang of 9 were occupied there.

After changing the 4 sleepers and given the heat that day we were all out, and decided to return and see the Ale festival at Winchcombe.

 

Here the griddle tent was selling rather good looking curly sausage burgers, improved yet more by the liberal application of free ketchup. Oh yes.

That sausage bap was munched behind the Coffeepot, together with a big mug of tea.

Slightly out of the way of the madding crowd, we can observe the goings on at Winchcombe, which is always busier, what with the trains crossing here.

Saturday's item of interest was the DMU shuttle to Broadway not quite making it to Broadway. Or even all of the way out of the platform....

It stranded on the barrow crossing with a gear selector problem. Luckily among the crowd of C&W workers by the signal box (they have their own bench there) there were experts in DMU gear selection systems, and the DMU was swiftly helped on its way, to the sound of rousing cheers from within.

Broadway P2 build.

As you will have already seen we are preparing stuff in the background. We bought the steel just before the year end, and saved a bundle on the cost. Now we have started cleaning, primering and cutting it.

Also going on in the background is the application for a planning amendment for the P2 building. We have planning permission for it dating back to the original start, but it was for the self design P2 building by the former builder, which wasn't very realistic.

This amendment has now gone in, and you can read it here:

https://plan.wychavon.gov.uk/Planning/Display/W/23/01026/FUL

As the submission says, 'The updated drawing allows for a more historically accurate building with corrected clearance to the running line and increased public space.' We hope you will approve. It's going to be as good as the P1 building, indeed, slightly better still.

There are numerous improvements to the design. Basically the building will be almost identical to the P1 building, with the same brick detail and the same canopy. However, it will be longer than before by one bay between the trusses, to be in keeping with the main building, which is also longer. We have also added the little flat roofed 'toilet block' on the end, which will in fact become a store for maintenance. 

If you would like to leave a positive supporting comment on our application then please do. Planning approval isn't automatic, so we'd be grateful for any support given.

Monday in the yard.

An extra day. Just 3 of us, loading the Warflat with concrete sleepers. These are destined for Didbrook 2, where we will undertake the second and final session of 'economy' sleeper replacement during the next non-running season.

In view of the accident described above we are now on the Guzzi V85TT 'Tutti Terrani', which just about describes the rough volunteer car park at Winchcombe.

A hire car offered by our own insurers was declined, in view of the onorous contract conditions, and usurous daily hire rate (which is supposed to be paid by the at fault insurers). No wonder our premiums are so high.

 

So there we were, Walt the birthday boy (thanks for the walnut cake), new boy Bob and yours truly. Just 3 of us.

The warflat was emptied at Gotherington Skew, and today it was refilled with normal S1 concretes. As these are considerably heavier we could not stack them so high, and loading was slower because we reached the limit of what our Telehandler could lift.

 

 

Here's Walt with another load of 8 on. He could probably manage 12, but not be able to put them on the rear of the two piles. There are limits, you know!

 

Ad interim we spotted these traditional keys made of oak. They are brand new. You'd think we'd have abandoned this old fashioned way of securing bullhead rail into chairs by now, replacing them with Mills clips and Panlocks.

But no. For one role they are still used today.

Test question: Anyone know where we still use them?

It took most of the day (not counting the first hour eating Walt's cake) but here we are, one loaded Warflat. 160 concrete and chaired sleepers stacked and secured. Job done.

Next it has to go to Didbrook to be unloaded, on a non-running day. And come back with the 100 or so remaining economy sleepers that are still there.

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

No Jules today. In a surprise message he told us that he needed to withdraw from what he felt was two very enjoyable builds - Hayles Abbey Halt, and the Usk hut. Family reasons are behind this, and while we will miss his contribution and humour immensely, we wish Jules well. We hope to see him though on the event of the official opening of our little project.

We met especially early today, in order to get a couple of hours on the Telehandler before the PWay gang sets off. They would be needing it for a job at Didbrook.

So at 08.30am we see Dave in the Telehandler with the bucket on, bringing a load of earth from further down the yard. It's not really wanted there, the PWay yard was being used as a dump, so by spreading the earth around the hut we are doing two good jobs.

The whole site needs to rise by between 6 and 12 inches. Earth around the hut for seeding with grass, and some sort of infill material along the road round the back.

We had an unexpected visitor today - Peter K, who made all the GWR type spearhead fencing at Broadway, as well as a couple of replica gates. Aren't they great?

His expected C&M mates did not come, so he offered to spread some of the earth around.

Thank you, Peter!

Later he was called to Broadway, and he left the shovel stuck in the pile, but not before having shifted a significant amount.

We are very grateful.

The triangular area in front will be seeded as well, leaving space for the road on the left. This is a sort of escape road for the PWay yard, in case the crossing is ever blocked.

 

We offered Peter the chance to sit with us and drink coffee, and there was time for that. He went to get his lunch bag with the flask, and walked around Dave's several piles and into the atmospheric little building where cake was being shared inside.

 

We had two steamers on duty today:

35006 P&O, and...

Dinmore Manor, going the opposite way.

Loadings were a bit of a curate's egg, good if there was a party, not so good for individual passengers.

Paul was on his knees to see to that big old hole we had in the door. It's had so many locks over the last 150 years that the keyhole was enormous, so rather than block it with filler Paul cut out a square shape and glued a new piece of wood in its place.

He did a really nice job. Paul even replicated the grooves in the planks in front. Once that's painted you'll never know the difference.

 

 

In the afternoon we felt thirsty. Although the temperature was a modest 20 degrees C it was muggy, and it felt hot.

Coming back from the Coffeepot we took this snapshot of our Usk hut in the sun under the big oak tree.

John can be seen painting the big window, while Dave has started shovelling the big piles of earth into a flatter profile.

We have had a representation to allow the stabling of the intended vehicles here, but in fact we are not ready as the track needs more ballast. How we get this still has to be determined. There's a big pile of spent ballast at Hayles and this might do for this little siding. But how to get it back?

Lunch was graced by Mrs. Dave's excellent moist fruitcake, this time individually wrapped and in a Tupperware box. What had we done to merit such generosity?

After lunch and some discussion about the route Dave got the big drill out and drilled a hole diagonally through the corner of the door. This is to allow the routing of a power cable to the roof for a light, and we want to keep that hidden as much as possible.

Mid afternoon we got another delegation come to see us. It was the PWay gang, back from Didbrook and on its way to Mrs. Miggins Tea Shoppe, aka The Coffeepot.

Dave has moved over to the other corner, and here the ground level has to come up quite a bit. The area where the PWay chaps are walking needs to come up by about a foot, and this will be achieved by fill dumped in the other car park, on the other side of the track. It's another case of killing two birds with one stone, as that fill too is not wanted.

This is what the area looked like after Dave had levelled what was dumped there first thing. We had to guess the quantities, and indeed some more is required on the right, and by the pallet of diamond pattern pavers. But we have made an excellent start, which will be finished next week (Thursday in fact, not Wednesday that time) as we got Dave to bring plenty for both days.

Here is the view down the side. We have earth all the way round the hut now, basically to hold in place the boards for the gravel trough, but more is needed here before we bring the infill for the track.

Out in front the 4 - 5 big piles have been considerably flattened, thanks to Peter. We will finish this job next time, then we should be in a position to sow the grass seed.

 

During the day we had an A400 fly over us (with a very distinctive moan), and John sent us this picture of the platform at Hayles, which needs some tlc after 5 years. He could do with some gardening help here, so if anyone wants to help John, get in touch through the blog

Due to the blogger car being towed away for repair we came with the Winchcombe stationmaster today. This meant a car share, and a long wait in the evening as the last CRC bound train (hauled by a class 47) had a technical issue between Toddington and Broadway, and everything was delayed by about an hour, even this blog. Yes, you can't imagine the consequences!

 

Last but not least, a last minute quickie that came in just before the blog went live.

It's a picture by Paul of the Transit back from Didbrook, full of stuff left there after the relay. They also spent a long time replacing Mills keys with Panlocks, as the Mills keys were seen to be jumping out in large numbers. Strange! But we dealt with it.