Friday special at Hayles.
Just three select volunteers on Friday, a one-off to unload the last of three lots of concrete CS1 sleepers for the winter relay at Hayles. In the afternoon the plan was to to proceed to Toddington, pick up two steel wagons, return to Hayles and pick up the spent ballast there from last winter, and take that to Winchcombe for the Usk hut.
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| Plan de campagne... |
We had a quick discussion outside over the 'ELK' rail carrier about what we were going to do, and who was going where.
The weather to start with was foul, with very heavy rain. Luckily there were brief dry periods, so we were able to escape the worst of it.
The 03 pushed the WARFLAT and a TOAD out ahead of it, over Chicken Curve, down the long Defford straight and to a point just before the Hayles halt. Here the 03 left us to our own devices, to be called back later when we were ready to pick up the two steel sided wagons from Toddington.
Dave trundled up and down with the Telehandler, carrying 8 sleepers at a time. In between times we availed ourselves of what nature had to offer: Some of the biggest, ripest blackberries we had ever seen.
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| A sea of concrete from above. |
With this load we have shuttled over 400 heavy duty CS1 sleepers to the Hayles relay site. The winter works stretch will be over 17 panels, requiring up to 408 replacement sleepers (some rails may be less than 60ft if trimmed in the past, so the exact number needed is not known.)
A neighbour then came out on to our track, over a little style he had made in the lineside fence. He said that the row of concrete sleepers, 4 feet high, spoilt his view of the Cotswolds, and asked us to move them.
This is the row in question. We pointed out that the row would be there for just 3 months, and that it was obscured by nettles anyway.
Nonetheless the neighbour insisted.
Is that reasonable?
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| Picture by Paul. |
In order to avoid conflict we had to start again and move the sleepers (or many of them at least) to this area under a tree.
Unfortunately this request delayed us sufficiently that the planned ballast move in the steel wagons in the afternoon had to be cancelled.
A coffee break was called for; we tried to remain philosophical. In the meantime we took two pictures which will help to explain the work that is planned.
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| Last winter's relay work, all done now. |
Lunch was taken in the Toad, with some of the load still on board, due to the delay imposed on us. After lunch we took off the remaining 60 sleepers, and the WARFLAT was once again empty, phew!
Shortly afterwards the 03 reappeared to take the empty train back to Winchcombe, without the expected spent ballast.
Dave in the Telehandler thought: Why not take at least one bucket load, as we were going home in that direction anyway?
So this is how one bucket load of spent ballast was dropped beside the Usk hut. If the available spent ballast is of sufficient quantity the aim is to raise the level of the (albeit rarely used) road to that of the lawn around the hut. By the tree it will drop down again.
Last but not least on Saturday a couple of pictures from Paul, who went off with the Ranger to correct two cracks that were found nearby.
The first was a rather clear fishplate crack, in a plate that was not reinforced with a deeper skirt.
You can see it in the picture here.
The second crack was a bit more subtle, so we have found an arrow for you to show where it is.
It's in the bottom of a cast iron chair, so almost underneath the rail and hard to spot. Track walkers have highlighted it with yellow paint.
The fishplate probably cracked because of a void under the sleepers nearby, so after replacing the plate Paul took the Robel to tamp the area and stabilise the ballast underneath the affected area. That should reduce the stress on the plate here in the future.
What to do with the Robel while busy with the camera?
Plant it in the ground!
Saturday with a list of faults.
A modest team of 6, but a large cream cake, donated by Paul. It went.... it went really well, with a strong mug of tea to take the sweet edge off it.
On Saturday we had a list of faults observed by our track walkers, so we decided to have a good bash at them (the faults, that is) and loaded up a Transit and the Ranger with kit and spare parts.
While doing so, we noticed that the doors to one of the box vans were open.
That's interesting, as it is our generator van (for when the PWay train goes out) and the genny inside it rarely sees the light of day.
It's a big old twin cylinder Lister. Enjoy the technology!
We joined the line through Working Lane, but couldn't start until the next service train had passed.
It was P&O, observed by members of the gang standing on the foundations of the platform to be that was never finished back in the 1990s.
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| Gentlemen, start your engines! |
Once P&O and its 8 carriages had passed the Robels were started up, to deal with a dipped joint reported here.
Note the smoke still coming out of Greet tunnel. Very atmospheric.
A bit further along it was a sleeper that needed replacing, one of several we needed to do. We dug it out, but couldn't remove it until the next train had come by.
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| Waiting for the train, with nothing to do.... |
This took some time in coming. It seemed to be delayed, but no one knew the reason why. One of life's mysteries.
Here it is at last, headed by 78019 - enjoy, as it is about to return home to the GCR, who lent it to us.
Everyone liked that engine!
Next was another sleeper to be replaced. This one had split into two halves. It came out as one, but then fell into two pieces by the lineside.
Graham is just moving the cast iron chair to one side, with Tim on the pan jack, waiting to drop the track back down again.
The next train soon came along again, but this time in a spectacular squall. It emerged out of a raincloud, which had just passed us. So we were in the sun, while the smokebox of P&O is clearly still covered in raindrops.
We moved on to the next sleeper for replacement. We did 3 during the day. Robels aside, replacing wooden sleepers is still a very slow old job. After a mile of this old wood along the Gretton straight we hit a stretch of concrete sleepers, and that gives us very little trouble.
The rails along the Gretton straight are also very old. At least second hand, but probably third hand. This is where we get most of our broken fishplates.
Paul is recording a broken plate here, accompanied by David.
This is what a cracked fishplate looks like. You can see the crack in the picture Ok, but you need to be an expert to see it in situ, while walking along the track.
The breakages are caused by having rails with crippled ends, very common if you use second or third hand rail.
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| Bert Ferrule is determined to get this chair off. Unfortunately the chair won. |
We then moved on to the start of the concrete sleeper stretch, just short of the Dixtion cutting. Here a small number of concrete sleeper chair defects were recorded.
It's harder to repair defects on concrete sleepers, that is true. But they do last so much longer.
The little Standard came by again.
The driver waves to us, acknowledging our waves in return.
The last shot of Saturday shows Graham dealing with a chair reported to be loose. We covered the thread with penetrating oil, and after a bit of a struggle Graham did eventually get the nut to move, and so tighten up the chair. Job done successfully!
Tuesday on steels.
A warm and dry day, ideal. Unfortunately Neal was called away to one of the several new training course opportunities, which turn out to be compulsory.
Yours truly spent the morning - without Neal - on grinding off the ends of the other facia board panels, so that they can be welded.
Grinding disks bought on Ebay seem to be made of papier mache. Last time a disk lasted just one panel and a half. This time we were using old stock, and all the fascia board ends were done with the same disk, with more to spare. Mind you, Neal will grind them down to the bitter end, a tiny little disk remains...
At lunch time Neal reappeared and together we manhandled the fascia boards round to do the other side.
They are not all the same size - in principle they are 7m25cm long, from a piece 6m long ex stock, so a good 3 feet need to be welded on.
This one was extra long though, with about 7 feet extra to be welded on. It covers not only the gap between trusses, but as it is the southernmost one on the P2 building it sticks out beyond the truss to cover the area of the chimney that is on the end.
Manoeuvering that was a challenge, but not an insurmountable one.
With the ends all ground to an point Neal welded the extra lengths required on to the end.
We can't look at the blue light of course, but the camera can! We sheltered behind the forklift, out of sight.
We took turns with the grinding, and here is Neal grinding off the excess weld to get the surfaces flat again.
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| Fill'er up, please! |
Outside in the yard after lunch a rhythmic beat started up. The Sulzer class 24 was started up and was being refuelled.
It's a strange, slow engine beat. Does the beat coincide with the engine revolutions? That would be very slow indeed.
The intended train to hook on to was this one, Foremarke Hall arriving from CRC.
There was a little blast on the regulator, to get the train through the crossover. Our newly planted yard lamp overlooks the scene.
We recently saw an old photogreaph of Honeybourne station, and in that was a whole row of yard lamps along the northern platform, with an electric light fitting on top. The yard lamp we retrieved from a car park at Dumbleton had one of those electric fittings still attached to the top - maybe it came from Honeybourne? It could very well be.
Once the train had arrived the class 24 emerged from its wait by the bracket signal and trundled up behind.
Here it is a from the back - a portrait for our diesel loving friends.
When we returned to the project Neal had finished grinding the weld off, and together we dragged the enormous fascia board up the unloading road.
Unfortunately the car park was quite full (which has a bright side of course) and we preferred not to venture outside with our long load. We left it by the gate for another day.
Wednesday with the Usketeers.
Still T shirt weather, it is so pleasant to work outside at the moment. Peter Green is playing as we write this...
... one of his best guitar solos. They were good times.
Good times on the Usk project too. Warm and dry weather promised.
But cold at the beginning of the day, so that we could record steam coming from Foremarke Hall as it drew into the station with the ECS for Cheltenham.
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| What is going on up there? |
We started the day with a brew, some maccaroons, a lemon tart, pain chocolat and of course doughnuts.
And then we complained about our waistlines!
After sorting out various things we finally got down to doing some work.
Not that laying the pavers is easy work, especially now that we have reached the big sandstone slab in front of the door. Dave is very careful with his work, and when we got to the slab there was much debate about which way we would go. What would look best? Require the least bit of cutting?
Then we got an unexpected visit from the grim reaper (isn't he always unexpected though) but with a strange request:
Would we like his scythe?
He had finished reaping grimly, and the scythe was now surplus to requirements.
John decided that a scythe was something still missing in his garage, and put his hand up for it.
In fact John spent the morning clearing the side of the cutting (excavated in 1905 by a Ruston steam navvy), together with Rick, who was on the modern equivalent of the scythe, the motorised strimmer.
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| Rick and John clear brambles and nettles from the cutting side. |
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| A view of Dave through the door. He's just making a start on working round the doorway slab. |
Yours truly spent much of the day bringing in barrows of earth fill, to complete the landscaping around the hut.
The source of the fill is a massive dump of spoil in the part of the PWay yard that was used for all sorts of dumping, so the true source is unknown - possibly the foundation excavations of something that we built?
But among the fill was the lower half of this thick bottle, possibly a Codd bottle. What was unusual about it was the name, which we had not seen before. We can read 'WINCHCOMBE' and 'TRADE MARK' with a name partially visible: J RICHXXXX.
We had not heard of a drinks seller in Winchcombe before, does anyone know more about this name?
John spent the afternoon staining the counter. We studied a lot of colours and plumped for two coats of this waxy stain, which gave it more age than the white coloured wood from the builder's.
This is how far John got by the end of the day. That lump of wood on the end still has to come off (was to help carry the counter) and on the right one of the boards needs to be cut to marry the rough stone of the wall.
Then, when the counter is in its final place, the skirting will be fitted around the bottom
Also the flap and another short bit of counter need to be fitted at the far end.
In the foreground the site has been prepared for another stretch of newly sown grass, the result of several barrowloads fetched up by yours truly during the day (and picking out all the detritus in the earth, such as PWay ballast stones, old keys, door bolts, broken porcelain, a Winchcombe bottle bottom and an Orignal Brewery bottom from Cheltenham etc etc etc.
The diamond pavers are being laid until they run out, probably right up to the corner of the building. Thanks to the discovery of a small supply of larger 6 x 12'' pavers the smaller ones we bought will go further.
No updates are possible for the next two weeks, so please be patient.
