Block laying starts.

Thursday in the greenhouse.

No, not the doghouse, that's where you get put if you spend too much time on the railway.

Oh....

Too late now, here we are in the greenhouse at Toddington. We met there to await the return of the framework for the Broadway P2 building from the galvanisers. We waited and waited, and eventually found out that we were last customer of the day for their list.

In the meantime therefore we continued with the long job of cleaning and painting the canopy steelwork. We have done a good 80% of it, although a few bits, coated only with primer, began to rust over the winter. The greenhouse is not ideal, but it's what we have, so we make the best job of it.

Here Neal is cleaning one of the arches of a ridge purlin.

While we were home on domestic duties, Neal had spent a day at Toddington cutting these gusset plates to size.They sit between the trusses and the ring beams. We cleaned them of oil and mill scale, then primered them.

 

Finally, at last, at the end of the day it was our turn for the deliveries of the galvanised steelwork.

Sadly by then it was too late to execute part 2 of our plan, taking them to Broadway with the trailer and the mini digger. That'll be for another day. You have to be flexible around here.

 

Neal parked the stanchions and ring beams in the car park to begin with, then when the lorry had gone, he took them up to the greenhouse.

There's a small job with the holes to be done.

 

Here is an overview of the greenhouse at the end of the afternoon.

The stanchions are under cover, and three curved angles have been half cleaned and primered.

3 more straight angles were also done (off camera).

 

Just as we were packing up there was a roar overhead.

It's always thrilling to see the A400s flying so low. This one was one of the lowest we have ever seen! He's certainly lower than the Cotswolds Edge behind, and must have followed the railway round Chicken Curve at Winchcombe.

Friday - block laying starts.

We split into two teams - two laying the first blocks, one drilling holes at Toddington. The stanchions are back and need some of the holes widening. After that they will be brought to Broadway for erection in between the blocks.

The very first block is laid for the rebuild of our waiting room.

Friday 16th February 2024 then saw the start of laying blocks on P2 at Broadway. These are solid 6 inch blocks and quite heavy (apparently 27Kg each), so we have equipped ourselves with a pair of the block lifters, as you can see in the picture. They make a big difference.

John built the corner, as outlined with yellow marker paint by Neal, as well as the lines above (which kept getting in the way, but were essential)

He then moved to the opposite corner and started to work back, with two courses of 6 inch blocks.

Measurements were also taken using the laser level by the platform, to make sure we were working at the correct height. It wasn't easy, as the concrete foundations are only a rough guide, and tend to rise and fall a bit.

 

The piece in the middle had to be cut to size, and then one end was complete, in 6 inch blocks.

Neal then came back, having finished with the stanchions at Toddington. He checked John's work (as if that was neccessary...) with the laser level, and then we celebrated with a sandwich lunch in the signal box.

After lunch, and in brilliant sunshine, John started on the long stretch at the rear, and Neal constituted a second block laying unit by making a start on the front.

This area nearest to the camera will be the store room, so no stanchions are needed here as it is not under the canopy.

A shot from the footbridge shows the area being worked on on Friday, piles of blocks laid out near their intended site for use, and the corners laid dry for marking out. And two block layers at work.

Here you can see Neal's row of blocks progressing north, but with a gap appearing by his feet.

What's the gap by your feet for, Neal?

As he laid a block over the top of it, Neal explained that the gap was to allow two service ducts - the ones that we laid under the tracks from P1 - to enter the store room, where the fuse box will be located.

We still have to dig a trench under the platform between here and the gap in the platform wall that we made earlier. Services to Broadway, we hear, will resume at Easter, so we need to get that sorted before then.

 

Once the double row of blocks had reached the location of the first of the stanchions - the wall separating the store room from the main waiting room - we stopped and then laid a row of 4 inch blocks on top.

 

Those four inch blocks went down very quickly, as they are somewhat lighter and you just need to follow the row underneath. And bend down less too, that makes a difference.

Along the inside, where John is standing, will be another row of 4 inch blocks, but standing on their sides. The gap in between will be filled with concrete.

Lastly on Friday was the observation of a casualty. This tyre (with a 'y' as it is an English one) had given in to the weight of blocks it was carrying.

Ian from the Broadway maintenance gang very kindly changed the wheel for us.

PWay happenings.

Saturday - a good gang of 13 reached the end of the 'cutting and shutting' section, just over the foot crossing between Manor Lane and Bishops Cleeve.

This is it then, that foot crossing, and the last rail replaced to just beyond it, and the rubber pads removed -  and put back again.

The section now needs spot robelling, and some fishplates replaced by lifters, so not quite done yet, but the worst is over, and we are well within the time available.

 

The gang afforded itself this memorial picture:

Photographs by Bert Ferrule, with thanks.

Want to join us in our adventures? You can ! Become a volunteer through the Trust website:

https://www.gwrt.org.uk/volunteering/volunteer

In other news the WARFLAT loaded with concrete sleepers was pushed up to Stanway on Monday.

The viaduct works are going well, and relaying the track is about to begin. The Trust's appeal has reached £350.000, which is enough for the waterproofing work (phew!) but not enough to cover the cost of the parapet emergency repairs. (from memory, another £250k) That is straight cash out for the trust.

You can help us by donating here:

https://www.gwrt.org.uk/donate/stanway-viaduct-appeal

Monday at Broadway.

A day of logistics mostly, fetching stuff from Winchcombe for the P2 build.

 

The first thing was to get the trailer out, so that we could take the mini digger to Broadway.

This time truck, trailer and keys all coincided, and we were good to go !

We also took a couple of second hand sheets of plywood, as these will come in handy.

We called in at Toddington to pick up the galvanised stanchions. They were filled with water, despite having been kept under the greenhouse. The wind blows the rain in sideways.

However, they were too long to fit on the trailer, or the truck with trailer behind, so we decided to come back for them.

John stayed behind at Broadway to await the delivery of a number of 100mm drainage pipes. He was just putting them into storage when we arrived with the mini digger.

 

Having unloaded the mini digger at Broadway, we went back to Toddington, dropped off the trailer for a while, and loaded up the 6 stanchions on to the Transit.

Things are never simple, and we were intercepted by the guys from the narrow gauge, and they asked very nicely if we would load some point timbers onto a bogie truck, seen parked on the lawn here.

Then, finally, we were good to go. Here are the 6 stanchions, loaded on the back of the Transit. They weigh 100Kg each, so with 600 Kg on a 1500Kg truck we were easily within its capacity. In fact with the load on the back the Transit handled rather better than usual - it is very light over its twin rear wheels.

Arrived at Broadway, we used the mini digger to unload the stanchions, two at a time, on to a trolley that we brought up from the loco dept with the first run.

We then pushed the trolley up platform 1, across the barrow crossing, and back down platform 2. That went surprisingly well.

Now all 6 stanchions are waiting on the edge of the platform, ready for erection. 

Holes will need drilling into the concrete, and threaded bar will be inserted and fixed with a resin bond.

While John and Yours Truly returned the truck and trailer to Winchcombe, Neal got busy with the mini digger and dug out some of the centre of the site.

Taking the spoil to our temporary tipping site was a very glutinous job indeed - just look at the clay around this dumper wheel.

Tuesday - the centre is dug out.

A dry day, with two wet ones announced next, so we pressed ahead as much as possible.

Neal spent the whole day on this job, bringing the level of the centre of the build down to a few cm above the foundation ring.

On top of this will go a course of broken bricks, then sand, insulation, a DPM and finally 100mm of concrete, to form the floor of the new building.

 

 

We fired up the little dumper, then noticed that a bit of a wheel seemed to have fallen off.

 

Via a little temporary bridge we crossed the slightly lower foundation ring and got loaded up by Neal with mostly thick unadulterated clay.

Our vigilant heritage eyes constantly surveyed the material, and eventually spotted a circular piece of procelain, marked 12 - 37. No doubt the bottom of a GWR cup.

Being loaded up by Neal.

Another job during loading was to pick out the many bricks that came along. These will be used again as part of the first infill layer. Sadly almost all are damaged in one way or another - blues, commons and Redbank facing bricks - but we did manage to retrieve 15 good ones earlier, which we gave to the RAT, which just did an excellent repair job on the brickwork at Toddington.

A  second 'team' - well, John by himself really - began building the interior wall alongside the 6 inch blocks laid earlier in the week. 

This wall will consist of 4 inch blocks in two courses, stood sideways on.

In between dumper emptying turns the job was to keep John supplied with mortar as well as blocks, which he was consuming quite steadily.

Some blocks also needed cutting to size, which meant gearing up with goggles, dust mask and ear defenders. Then taking them all off again after two minutes' work...

Neal's hole for the conduits is now conspicuous.

During the quite long day, all in sunshine but windy, Neal slowly worked his way along the site, and the dumper took the clay to the temorary dump site beghind the footbridge.

What is stored up there now is at least another train of three wagons full.

Near the end of a busy day we took this picture from the footbridge. It shows Neal in the centre of the site, with the dumper now parked alongside, to receive the last of the excavated material. That part of the job was completed on Tuesday.

John's block laying is also becoming more prominent. We have already emptied two pallets of them, so felt quite good about progress.

Here is how far John got by the end of the day. A row of 4 inch blocks all the way round the store room, and a second one on top nearly half way round.

 

At the same time this shot over the whole of the site shows John's work in the foreground, and the conclusion to the levelling of the site in the middle.

We will resume on Friday, when better weather is announced. Work then will centre around the blockwork, as well as erection of the first stanchions (if a drill bit is delivered on time).

 

Usketeers

No Usketeering this week, in view of the dire weather forecast for today. High winds, and rain.

Better luck next week !

PWay

The WARFLAT filled with sleepers that was sent to the viaduct has returned, and then restacked.

Here it is, ready for its second run.

Today, Wednesday, the PWay gang was braver than the Usketeers, and was out in the rain at Manor Lane.

Cutting and shutting having been successfully completed, the next job is to robel the locations of the old fishplate joints. As the ends of the rails were crippled, each former joint has a shape in the ballast which needs to be tamped out. With the rails getting cumulatively shorter, the old joint soon wanders away from the new one, but their former locations were marked with paint.

The new joints will also be done.

Paul provided these pictures.

Here you can see proof that the rail has moved along, because the seat of the plastic under the clip (known on another railway as the 'biscuit') has moved along. It's the lighter spot on the left.

This could be more than one sleeper, in fact a whole rail length's worth is possible.

This close up shows that, while the two cut rails now meet end on on the level, the one on the left is slightly more worn that the one on the right. This will result in a thud, and beating into the ballast of the joint, and the crippled end saga starts again.

To prevent the thud we fit lifter fishplates. Because all our early laid track is second hand and hence of all different rates of wear, we use many of these lifters.

The one in the picture is for a new rail on the right, and one that is worn down 1/8th inch on the left. It says so, you can't be clearer than that. The 109FB describes the rail in question as weighing 109lbs/yard and of flatbottom shape - of course, as in the picture.

Fishplate-ology.... it's a dark art.