Superaerobatic.

Saturday under a bright sun.

'Weather warnings'? What are those? Much of our weather is now accompanied by 'warnings'. But life goes on, and our gang of 7 on the PWay carried on as normal on Saturday.

 

We were disturbed in our morning musings over doughnuts by a gang member who is a Boeing Stearman pilot in his day job. He texted that he'd be flying over us in 5 minutes!

We rushed outside, still munching, and there they were!

Just as they flew over us, the nearest plane released a white cloud.

There's no need to shower us in leftover seawater, Dave :-)

What an enjoyable meeting that was. Wonder where they were off to, they were heading west.

 

Our intention was to continue fishplate greasing - we have a bout 10 miles to do, so it's quite a stretch - but on signing on we found an instruction to check out rough riding at Peasebrook, so we did that first.

So what are they finding over there? Looks alright from where I'm standing...

We checked the length between Little Buckland and Peasebrook Farm, and found various anomalies, which the annual tamping should correct again. Nothing too serious though.

We then let the scheduled train pass.

A very modern looking train, headed by one of our class 47s. Steve looks on.

The return journey picture, ruined by a slow camera shutter.

We had the cross level with us so took a large number of readings, which are being discussed here by Bert and Jim.

 

 

The upshot was that we decided to put on a Temporary Speed Restriction (TSR) of 10mph. Some corrective packing will be done on Wednesday.

Luckily we were ready for that possible TSR, so we had loaded the right boards back at the farm.

 

 

Then we went back to the mess coach for lunch. That said, the tinny mess coach gets unbearably hot under a persistent sun, so we decided to patronise the Coffepot and its luxurious canopy instead.

Our other diesel today was 37 215.

 

 

 

After lunch it was that fishplate greasing after all, continuing from where we left off last time (the start of the Gretton straight). Dave stayed behind while we were at Peasebrook, and on our return announced proudly that he had found the fault with the failed backpack pump, and repaired it. So we had two backpacks again today. Phew!

 

Yours truly had brought the wherewithal to remove more of the pink graffiti that we treated at Working Lane, clearly the place the little vandal had used to get on the line. He had walked all the way up to Greet tunnel, tagging several bits of signalling along his walk, and drinking from a quart plastic bottle of juice as he went, which he tossed on the ground by the tunnel. We retrieved that, as well as a cider bottle a bit further along.

 

The final bit of tagging was on the brand new Greet tunnel sign, the one we admired a few weeks back.

We cleaned that off, so here it is back to 'as new' condition. Graffiti has to be treated straight away, to show that it is not worth the effort as it will soon be removed again.

The Greet tunnel mouth is getting increasingly covered in brambles, and these could do with being removed, as the roots damage the brickwork.

 

We caught up with the others on the approaches to Gretton.

Next to applying the Interflon with two backpacks, we also replaced quite a few highlighted Mills keys with Panlocks.

They won't come out again!

As Tim pulled in another Panlock, Bert marched past with his backpack on.

We paused by this bridge to let train 2 by, parking the Landie on the former up line.

Train 2 was hauled by 37 215, not too visible here as against the sun. Unfortunately it is not a good idea to stand on the opposite side of the track to the rest of the gang, so we have to content ourselves with a shot into the sun.

The 47 on the other hand was captured on the Preston Road bridge, with the sun behind the camera. Bodywork in the shade is the only complaint here, but the colours are nice.

On the left is a fully laden Walnut tree. The walnut harvest looks to be particularly good this year, but nobody will be picking these.

We were here to turn the Landie round, then back down the track to pick up the backpacks. We said we'd do a mile in the afternoon, then reward ourselves with an ice cream.

And there we are, outside the Coffeepot. Strange, no two ice creams were the same, but all were lovely on this hot day.

From L to R: Dave, Tim, Jim, Adam, and Steve under that hat. Bert was inside, organising the tea.

A brief interlude:

On our travels about Gloucestershire, we've always got one eye open for lamp posts... and are they perhaps GWR ones?

How about this one? Well, closer inspection revealed that it was indeed a railway one, but of Midland origin.

It appears this one has a few brothers and sisters further up the drive, and they all come from Ashchurch, a junction with several platforms.

Well, we guess that is indeed Midland...

Monday at Toddington.

A few hours at Toddington for various discussions, and a bit of fabrication in anticipation of a (hopefully positive) outcome to our offer to build P2 at Broadway.

4270 was in the Toddington car park, waiting to be collected. We paired it with the bus that has been stickered with Stanway viaduct.

Also at Toddington, a supporter of the railway has retrieved and restored the former Boxford booking office (Lambourne branch). He's done a pukka job of restoring it, including the reinstatement of the boarded up windows.

If asked nicely, he would be willing for it to be used somewhere on the railway.

In other news, a 'Griddle Hut' along the lines of the CRC 'Snack shack' is under consideration for Winchcombe, platform 1. Would that add to, or detract from the heritage atmosphere?

On the apron by the steam shed the Deltic visitor has been stabled next to two recently restored coal wagons. These were once heavily graffitied, and now look so much better. They hold our emergency stockpile.

In the David page shed Neal was working on the three posts that will hold up the bottom of the P2 steps at Broadway, as well as the canopy extension from the replica Waiting Room that he is prepared to build there.

 

Here is Neal making the boxes that will surround the bottom of the posts. They will be so shaped that they will give the posts an appearance as if made of cast ion, as we did on P1.

Where the wider boxes will run into the narrower uprights strips of angled metal will be welded on and shaped.

In this picture Neal is cutting the strips out of a 10mm plate.

 

 

 

On a quick trip to Winchcombe we were dismayed to find that yet another modern adornment had been screwed to the stone Monmouth Troy building.

It's that grey arm top centre. This is on top of the B&Q spotlight next to the heritage lamp (do you really need both?) with its additional PIR detectors, and lengths of plastic cable running along the wall.

The grey arm seems to be a WiFi receiver. The Friends of Winchcombe Station were taken by surprise by this modern fitting to the station that they look after. It went up about 3 weeks ago. We really ought to have a Heritage Conservation Panel on our railway, to protect the museum structures that we have built.

Our Cotton Sturdy makes a splash.

Our Friends of Winchcombe Station attended the meeting of the Cotton Motorcycle Owner's Club at Gloucester. This took place behind 'Folk at Gloucester' (the former folk museum in the 16thC Bishop Hooper's lodging)

Cotton motorcycles meet at Gloucester

No, we don't have any Cotton motorcycles at Winchcombe, but we do have another Cotton product: The Sturdy. It's normally kept in working order in the corrugated iron shed at the top end of P2 at Winchcombe.

Two members of the FoWS attended the rally, armed with a GWR Trust stand, and our working Sturdy.

Here it is by our stand, in a fictitious but credible late period GWR livery. It's got a Briggs & Stratton engine.

Ian reverses the Sturdy back onto its trailer.

The Vulcan Works where the Cotton motorbikes were made was just over the road from the back entrance to Folk at Gloucester - there is even a blue plaque to mark the association.

 

There was plenty of interest from those attending the event and one fellow actually joined the GWSR

with the object of becoming an active volunteer. There were 2 other Sturdys there but we think ours

was the only one currently in working order. The onlookers were impressed when we drove it away

and backed it up the ramp on to the trailer. 

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

A cool day at last, and with a full complement of five we were productive too.

We started the day with some adjustments to our trestles, so that we could work simultaneously from both the inside and the outside.

Dave kicked off on the inside, where the centre portion of the backing up hadn't been completed last week.

Jules can be seen watching him from below. With all the safety screens we had to climb in through the window today to get to the inside. All the stones were passed though the window, and of course the mortar too.

 

 

 

We're running diesels at the moment, so what would we have today? 

 

The answer was this Peak, which is waiting here by the box for its opposite number to arrive. That would be 37 215.

The crew of the Peak were a cheerful lot, and quite happy to pose for a picture. Well, so would you, if you were allowed to drive this beast.

Guys, if you want a personal copy of the picture, email the blog at breva2011 (at) hotmail.co.uk.

A contribution to the Usk hut rebuild never goes amiss....

 

 

With traffic to-ing and fro-ing and Dave and Jules laying blocks, John, yours truly and Paul decided to have a closer look at exactly what slates managed to make it from the ruin in Usk goods yard back to Winchcombe. We took a picture of John sorting them out, but the camera decided it wasn't going to play, and the image wasn't there when we uploaded our pics just now. Oh well, so you'll have to take our word for it.

We reckon we have some 200 original slates. How many do we actually need though?

Here is Paul doing a test layout. He came to the conclusion that we need 12 per m2. It's that many because they overlap not only from side to side, but upwards and downwards too. In the end you only get to use one quarter of the surface of each slate.

After a quick measure of the loose truss, we got to 30m2 for the roof area, so that makes 360 slates.

 

 

Another factor to bear in mind for the calculation is the quality of the slate. You can check this by tapping it. If it rings it's OK. If it makes a noise like hitting a piece of stiff cardboard, it's no longer usable, as fractured somewhere. 

So we need something like another 200 slates. Luckily there are a couple of stillages of similar slates in the other half of the yard (we think formerly from Exminster box) so that should allow us to construct a sympathetic looking roof.

Jules was working on the outside, and given last week's backing up was able to start on the third row above the lintel, now firmly part of the pointed gable end.

He's laying 5 inch blocks here. On the right you can see one with a number on it - most have disappeared already, so that idea never worked in practice.

Once he had completed the backing up of the middle bit left over from last week, Dave started outside as well, working towards Jules from the opposite end.

Not all the blocks are in perfect condition. One here is missing a corner, so Dave made it a little triangular plug, which he is fitting in the picture.

 

Lunch time came all too soon. This time we had another treat from Mrs. Dave:

Lemon drizzle cake, served with silver cake tongs! That tasted extra good.

While the team munched and drank coffee, we had a quick look upstairs for a picture unobstructed by legs and burly builders:

This is the northern gable end on its way up, with the third course half finished. We were having some issues with the joints, which weren't coming out right (not staggered enough).

All cake eaten, Dave was soon back with the blocks, which, while we had all the lengths right, we had to take down again and refit in a different order to respect the rules about overlapping joints.

Nae bother though.

 

 

Later in the day we too climbed in through the window for this picture of the inside of the gable end:

This is the back of the three courses. Without the dressed stones - for the outside only - it's a lot more higgeldy piggeldy, but you can see that the middle was filled in as described earlier, and indeed an extra bit added on top.

Our last shot of the day shows Dave near the corner, and here you can see how the slope is becoming more evident, following the line up to the top.

By Christmas, maybe. We'll see.

Then we got a visit from some of the returning PWay chaps - back from packing the dip at Little Buckland - and they wondered if we wanted to join them for a last cup of tea in the Coffeepot.

We did!

Members of the PWay gang, with our Paul centre left, looking grumpy. That's normal then.

 

 

There was a slight drama during the day, twice in fact. We saw the signalman walk out with a huge red flag, and the incoming train crawl to a stop next to him.

The flag was to inform the drivers that there were trespassers along the line, not once, but twice! Two different lots.

The things we have to put up with.

A new post.

Swapping a post at Winchcombe

Several weeks of planning culminated on Friday in the successful swapping of a yard lamp post on Winchcombe platform 2, for an 8ft standard platform example.

Below is the 'before' situation.

Note the height of the post, with a rather small looking lamp on top.

The idea of the taller post here was to light the footbridge, but it turned out in practice that it was too tall. Not only is a yard lamp twice as high above ground (at 13ft 6ins) than a standard platform lamp (at 6ft), but this one has been stood on the ground instead of buried in it, which added another 2ft 6 ins. to its actual height.

After a while concerns were raised how to safely change the lightbulb, or to remove the rust streaking down it, and paint it. We therefore agreed with the Friends of Winchcombe Station to remove the overtall yard lamp post, and replace it with an 8ft example, which is still 2ft taller than a standard platform post, but is more easily reachable with a single ladder.

The drawing above shows the three types of cast iron lamp posts used by the GWR. It's a 1936 drawing, reproduced by BR, which we scanned from the most useful book on GWR architecture, Great Western Architecture by A. Vaughan. It's well worth buying.

The yard lamp post at Winchcombe is the third from the left, and the replacement we used is the second from the left. The first on the left is the standard GWR platform post, being 6ft above ground, and within easy reach of the lamp man without a ladder. Note that they are all buried in the ground.

Just how tall is this post?

It took quite a long time to get all our ducks in line, but Friday was the day, and everything came out perfectly.

In the picture you can see Walt, who volunteered to drive the Telehandler, sizing up the job. The sling for it is on the fence, but where is the centre of gravity?

The post has been isolated from the electric supply, with this panel opened at the bottom. The panel is a non-standard add-on, as normally the octagonal bottom 2ft 6ins are buried in the ground.

Neal has got the big ladder out, but as you can see it stretches only just above half way up, assuming you stood on the top step. Some plastic barriers kept a number of well wishers at bay. We also didn't realise that while Friday is a non-running day, it didn't mean there were no trains. In fact is was a diesel footplate experience, involving our Deltic visitor. And it was due soon!

First thing, Neal and Yours Truly set off in the Transit to pick up the man basket from Toddington. Walt positioned the Telehandler, and with the basket firmly attached to the forks Neal soared to new heights.

 

After Neal took the lamp top off a strap was attached to the upper half. As tree branches were in the way for a higher lift, we decided to lay the post down on this side of the fence, once it was off its securing bolts.

The strap was them moved to the centre of gravity, and the post lifted sideways over the fence.

Soon the Telehandler could be seen advancing down the grass behind the fence - fortunately rock hard, due to the drought - and after checking for errant Deltics, we waved it over the barrow crossing.

The post was then taken to the waiting Transit in the yard.

The return load was one of the two 8ft posts that were donated recently by a supporter near Wells. They are formerly from Keynsham, and are unusual in that while they give the 8ft height above ground, they do not have the 2ft 6ins casting that goes below ground. Instead these (1930s?) posts bolt directly on to a slab in the ground.

Back over the barrow crossing with the smaller load.

 

 

One of the preparations we did was to measure the bolt holes in the base of the Keynsham posts, and compare with the bolts to which the yard lamp was secured. Thank God for GWR standardisation: they were the same! So in principle all we had to do with the new post was drop it straight in. But would it really fit?

With this shorter post it was of course easier to drop it straight in, we were well below the tree branches above. But would it fit? What to do if it didn't?

Then there was a short interruption from 'a drone' - the Deltic with its footplate experience came by.

55019 ROYAL HIGHLAND FUSILIER slowly draws into Winchcombe station.

Deltic 55019 is about to set off again here, over our 14 mile line.

Back at the farm the lads had the post screwed down, and were fitting the top back on.

Now the ladder fits - it's much more suitable at this height.

At the end of the afternoon, the scene at the bottom of the steps looked like this:

A more normal sized post, still larger than standard, and with the same lamp top, which now looks much more in proportion.

The FoWS will complete the wiring up, and give the post its final coats of chocolate and cream.

The yard lamp post was taken to Toddington.

We put it here, by the inspection pit and coaling area, which could do with a genuine GWR lamp, in this area, overseen by passing trains.

The final decision rests with the steam dept. A possible alternative use would be next to the future turntable, although that is probably some time away yet. We still have to find £600 for a special yard lamp top, like the ones by the water tower.

As we left, 55019 ROYAL HIGHLAND FUSILIER drifted back into Toddington. We trust that its candidate drivers enjoyed themselves, and that some cash was left over for the GWSR.

Saturday on the PWay.

A lightly smaller gang than usual - 5 of us. Some are away on holiday, it's what you get in summer.

The stalwarts Bert, Dave, Jim, Nick and Yours Truly met for doughnuts and tea in the as yet cool mess coach. It was soon to change!

We set off for that very long straight, between Greet and Prescott, where the Dixton straight starts (another long one, but now in a cutting).

Out today were Dinmore Manor and Foremarke Hall, arranged so that one moment you got two tenders facing you, then next time, two smokeboxes.

The day started with the tenders.

Given the trouble we are having with the back packs for the Interflon, Dave decided to try a small spray gun that we happened to have.

This worked quite well, albeit with an aperture that could be a tad smaller, and the fact that you had to bend down.

One back pack works; to have a second option would double our efficiency.

 

 

 

The second tender met us while we were setting out the site boards. 

Here is one end of today's site, at MP 14/I. It's along that very long and very high embankment. You get a grandiose view of Bredon Hill across the valley here. 

 

As we had a rather long work discussion before setting off, by the time we were on site and had the site boards set out, it was already time for lunch.

Consumer testing of a random batch of bacon baps today.

 

Here we need to make a public service announcement, at the request of two volunteers from the 'Bacon Bap to my door department'. Unlike stated last time, we PWay volunteers do not in fact pay full price for these baps, and we do get a discount. We hope this sets the record straight. Yours truly was confused by the frequent purchase of ice creams, which are indeed full price, but bacon baps (which are home made) certainly allow for a discount for us workers.

Right. Baps consumed, we really must get to work. This long stretch is probably the bumpiest of all the 14 mile railway we call our own. It could do with re-sleepering, and the rail ends cropping. It's on a long to do list. In the meantime, we have to spot resleeper, and jack and pack as required.

Nick (centre) has it easy, Jim (right) has it easier still.

This jacking and packing is made so much easier by our sponsored Robels, and this increased productivity allowed us to address several spots today, instead of the previous one or two with hand beaters and digging out with shovels.

Later in the day we had the other effect for our photographs - two trains, each with the smokebox leading. Here they are then. It's pretty out here.

We kept moving our site boards along bit by bit, so that several dips could be addressed. We had two men on Robels, with two more on shovels, scooping up supplies of ballast to fill the holes left behind after tamping.

Having done a lot of smaller jobs (i.e. dipped joints) we left the largest one to the end of the day. That was also the hottest part.

This large job concerned a dip in a 10 yard section of track, here by this tree. At first we could not see why there was a dip here, both in the track and in the haul road.

After a good look round the site we think we know: It's the four trees on the left (Malvern side) which are sucking water out of the ground. They are oaks, which have a large root footprint. Possibly because of the drought they are using up more groundwater, which results in ground movement. You can see a slight 'wobble' in the LH rail in the above photograph.

As we got here late in the day, and it's quite a big job, we will address this next time.

Wednesday with the Usketeers.

Well, that became Thursday, hence the blog post a day later than usual. Three out of the five of us had to attend to something else yesterday, so a last minute adjournment was arranged.

It may be hot, but we are still up for it, and have the oak tree to shade us.

Having got more sand first thing, we set Dave and Paul up with some muck, and then profited from the very dry weather to apply a coat of chestnut brown to the door, which was cleaned and primered last time.

 

 

Diesel haulage today, so it was guess the loco from its engine noise, as we sat and had our coffee.

The class 37 was an easy one, as it growls and has a lovely turbo whistle. This is 37 215.

It was met at Winchcombe by the Peak. That had some sorts of fans blowing and sounded rather different, so Yours Truly confidently identified it from under the oak tree as 'that Deltic'. 

Alas...

We had a quick chat with the class 37 crew - what was the smoke drifting out from under the front?

Answer: It's oil vapour from the vacuum exhauster.

So now you know...

 

Once the diesels had growled onwards we returned to Paul and Dave to find them inside and backing up.

They were working on the back of the northern gable end, backing up the two courses that were laid last week. Yes, every course of facing blocks needs another behind it to back it up, and make up that fat 16 inch wall.

Paul's side, just started.

Dave's side, also just started.

To give us a bit more room underneath while building up the gable ends, we took out the second to last truss. You might recall that Paul planned for this by wrapping the ends in DPC, so that they wouldn't stick to the mortar.

So yes, the truss came out easily. Yours Truly caught it from underneath and staggered away with it.

An hour later we had another meeting of the diesels, as the trains crossed at Winchcombe. Business was very modest today (and yesterday). Is it the heat? Or the traction? Well, one leads to the other, the fire risk is currently high.

Our new bag of sand is evident here. The one we got last week, sold to us as sharp sand, turned out not to be sharp when we started using it. It looked OK at first glance, and we were mostly interested in maintaining the red colour. We think we can use it inside, although our mortar needs it, according to the instructions.

We made a short day of it, as a couple of hours were lost at the beginning, getting the extra bag of sand. Above is Paul's corner, with a layer of rough blocks added on, and not quite reaching the middle.

On the other end is Dave's work, also a course that didn't quite reach the middle.

Yes, next week we have to do the middle ! The stones are already up there.

Last thing, luckily still under the tree, was a little maintenance of Maxie.  We got her some gearbox oil, as we spotted a small leak. We wondered how long these little 97cc mixers are designed to work? One job? Many years? Maxie is beginning to show her age, and has had to have a number of replacement parts already. Minnie you may remember broke her crank case in half, which was pretty drastic. She joined the great building site in heaven.

Steam engines at Broadway

Although we are currently running diesel haulage due to the fire risk at the moment, there was a bit of steam at Broadway a couple of days ago:

 

Two beautifully built model traction engines, that chuffed up the drive from the Caravan Club, to take a look around platform 1.

Ukraine 2003.

A topical subject, and if you want to know what the country is like during peaceful times, and you like railways, take a look at the two Flickr albums that we created:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/73536293@N02/albums/72157660959544482

This one is from 1998, and was with the LCGB, so hardened cases who wanted to see nothing but railways. We certainly got that, and some of those pictures are now very interesting records, with lots of infrastructure and huge steam engines like the P36s, LVs and Es.

In 2003 we went back, this time with a Dutch travel organisation, but led by a railway enthusiast friend. These are the pictures that have just been put up:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/73536293@N02/albums/72177720299414154

The transport and accommodation was the same Dzherelo hotel train in both cases, but the Dutch participants wanted a bit more tourism, with just one day devoted to steam, which was in the magnificent Carpathian mountains. So here you get more daily life, and a few more Soviet curiosities.

Hope you like them. Ukraine is a lovely country.