February News Part 4

Great Eastern Railway 1899 4 Wheel Brake Third 853

Work on the doors has continued. Four more Great Eastern Railway luggage doors have been picked up from a similar grounded body located in Walcott (on the coat about half way between Cromer and Great Yarmouth) and will provide parts for the same doors intended for 853 and currently undergoing rebuild.

Some reclaimed brake gear has also been brought inside ready to refurbish for the guards compartment in 853. It isn't strictly of GER ancestry but it will provide an authentic "feel" and of course replace the required equipment that was lost when the brake became a grounded body back in the 1920's. Buffers are also being gathered for the project. One of these was attached to the grounded body in the yard that the Pway department use as their HQ, and was removed (by force!) this week.

Lastly, 16 passenger communication cord ends (shaped like cute little trumpets!) have been painted white ready for eventual fitting.

Great Northern Railway (later M&GN) 1887 6 Wheel Third 129

No progress, however it did have a wobble up and down the yard on Wednesday as part of the shunting required to swap vehicles around inside our shed.

British Railways 1960 Restaurant Buffet (Refurbished) E1969

An uninspiring update this week for E1969, however it has seen the most work out of any of the current projects. Every day has been spent with several people progressing the bodywork preparation, so the smell of body filler and the hum of sanders remain a constant!

A slightly different task has been the roof, which has had all its loose paint chipped off and these areas patch painted in roof paint to bring the layer level with the sections which are still in place. Once the filler dust has gone, the whole roof will receive a "top up" coat to freshen its appearance. The roof does not need a full strip down, as this has been done already on this carriage when it was fully rebuilt in the 2000's.

British Railways 1955 Mark 1 Suburban Composite Lavatory E43041

A landmark moment this week. Early in the week the final seats were completed and brought up from the upholstery department. The sheer size of these seats, and the complexity of the First Class examples, is a real credit to our volunteer upholsterers Keith and Martin who have done a fantastic job these past months on E43041. They have recently been putting in extra work days as well to get the carriage finished, a fact which has not gone unnoticed by paid C&W staff. The outstanding four compartments (three Third Class and one First Class) were rapidly fitted out with the seating which concluded the final main restoration task on the vehicle. E43041 is now awaiting a final internal clean before being released into service.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Trailer Second Lavatory M56352

The repainting continues. The task of lining out the vehicle, introduced last week, has progressed steadily. The upper (of two) lines has now been completed, which was the final task that required the vehicle to be in the staged area. M56352 has now been shunted out of there and its place taken by E1969. Once out of the staging, M56352,s lower line was started. So far, the black edging has been completed and the first (of two) cream sections of the line applied to the front end and the landward side. This job will continue next week. The lettering has also been started, with the vehicle's numbers and cab door "Private" signs applied in black only (cream to follow).

A start has been made on the half yellow warning panel on the cab front, which has been marked out and has reached the undercoat stage.

Attention has now turned to the chassis area, which is accessible now that the vehicle has left the staging. This will not be getting much attention but a quick spruce up to improve its appearance. Alan Cripps has cleaned down the front bufferbeam and coated it in red, whilst Dave Palmer has undertaken similar treatment to the solebars and rear bufferbeam, but had black as his colour of attack. It is amazing how much of a difference simply repainting the solebars and bufferbeams makes.

The loco department have been back in and have replaced the multiple working control air pipe on the front bufferbeam, this had been missing for a while as it sprung a leak some time ago and had been blanked off as an interim measure. It is now back in position as nature intended.

British Railways 1959 Class 03 Diesel Shunter D2063

The windows have now all been successfully fitted to the Carriage & Wagon shunter, so Monkey won't be getting wet when he has his cab rides during the showery months!

Workshop

No pictures of the Axeman this week as I forgot my camera the day he was in, some would argue that describing him in text only might be for the best? Nevertheless he was busy as ever, assisted by those who are easily led astray,.. The hoist arm for the mezzanine floor has been fitted into position and the hoist itself installed, wired up and tested successfully. This feature will be a great help when we start loading up the mezzanine later this year. He has now turned his attention to a carrier basket to easily hold the items which will be going up and down.

February News Part 3

Great Eastern Railway 1899 4 Wheel Brake Third 853

Another case of "more of the same", I'm afraid. Most of the folks have been occupied further progressing the door reconstructions. Lots of woodwork and filler has been appearing as a result. After a long absence Monkey has finally returned, we're not sure what he's been up to but he mentioned something about American politics... He was on hand to supervise the door works in any case!

Great Northern Railway (later M&GN) 1887 6 Wheel Third 129

No progress to report.

British Railways 1960 Restaurant Buffet (Refurbished) E1969

The aluminium window frames and door edging strips mentioned last week are now fully finished off, with their filled holes (over the rivets) now dressed smooth and a coat of etch primer applied throughout.

Paint preparation work continues with a particular focus on the lower half of the seaward side. Not too much to report on the task, as it is the classic sand/fill/sand/fill/sand routine, which doesn't really translate into exciting words very well!

The interior has just had a little bit of finishing works done to it to tidy up some of the damage caused by removing the windows, such as touching in of varnish.

British Railways 1955 Mark 1 Suburban Composite Lavatory E43041

Re-upholstery of the final three (third class) compartments is now approaching its end. It is anticipated that these last seats will be completed and fitted over the next few weeks, which will signal the end of this major rebuild.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Trailer Second Lavatory M56352

As suggested last week, the second coating of the green gloss has progressed at a fast pace this week, and the main panel painting is now complete except for the yellow warning panel on the cab end. The seaward side aluminium window frames have also been painted silver, following the landward examples which were treated last week.

Our trusty volunteers on Wednesday attended to several smaller outstanding tasks, with the edges of the gutter painted grey where the gloss green from the bodysides has splashed onto them. A lock was also adjusted on one of the doors and a spacial block to provide it with extra support fitted. It now operates much better.

The current task is now the lining out of the vehicle, which was started as soon as the green had hardened off enough to mark out the lines. So far, a first coat has been applied to the upper of the two cream lines which run the full length of the vehicle. In total there is around 260 feet of lines to paint on, by hand!

British Railways 1959 Class 03 Diesel Shunter D2063

The cab window fitting has progressed and the engine room doors have been painted and are now ready for refitting.

Workshop

The Axeman made his triumphant return and has immediately returned bearing cake. He certainly knows how to get into a place, although that is perhaps not surprising given that he previously worked for the Prison Service! (No, not as an inmate...). He has made a start of constructing a main support for the winch that is to be fitted to the new mezzanine floor. This is specially shaped to attach to the steel roof supports of the building and will be a useful addition to this area.

Monkey has, of course, inspected and declared his approval!

February News Part 2

It has been a relatively quiet week this week, however progress never sleeps...

Great Eastern Railway 1899 4 Wheel Brake Third 853

Work on the tasks described in previous weeks rolls on. There was much activity this week on the door reconstruction, and getting most of the assorted brake gear into black gloss. A lot of these bits have now been boxed up and placed out of the way until they are needed. The team has been slightly depleted due to illness, so we wish the Axeman and Bernard a speedy return to all four cylinders.

Great Northern Railway (later M&GN) 1887 6 Wheel Third 129

No progress to report.

British Railways 1960 Restaurant Buffet (Refurbished) E1969

As eluded to last week, window fitting continued this week and all of the windows have now been refitted to the coach. The aluminium door edging strips have also been refitted and the remaining doors re-hung. The coach is now substantially "complete" once again.

The two ongoing tasks are now the paint preparation (sanding) work, which has been merrily progressing along the bottom 50% of the landward side, and also filling over the new rivets in the windows and sanding them smooth. The seaward side has been completed in this regard, with the landward side still to tackle.

After all of the windows and doors were returned to the exterior, we were able to put back all of the trim and woodwork which we had to remove from the interior to get the windows out. This has now been done and the interior is back as it was before we started the work. A lot of the fittings had gotten rather dirty, as expected, so a day's cleaning was required to return the tables, chairs etc back to their usual glory.

British Railways 1955 Mark 1 Suburban Composite Lavatory E43041

Reupholstery of the final three (third class) compartments has progressed.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Trailer Second Lavatory M56352

This vehicle is now fully in the hands of the painters. The undercoat was finished early on in the week, which was followed by several days of gloss painting. The whole vehicle has now been covered in a (first) coat of BR green gloss. The 2-character route indicator box was then fitted and the roof got a second coat of grey paint. The second coat of green on the bodysides and doors is now progressing and is about half way to completion.

The alloy window frames were sadly found to be in much poorer condition than the powercar we completed in August. Therefore instead of polishing them up we have had to resort to painting them silver, however they do look fresher than they were. The landward side windows have been painted with the seaward side to follow.

British Railways 1959 Class 03 Diesel Shunter D2063

The running plate has been painted gloss black and the windows are being prepared for refitting so that the loco is watertight again. Only the engine room doors now left to refit.

Where's Nico?

In Monkey's temporary absence, Nico, sporting his woolly hat, has appeared subtly in one of the pictures above (Where's Wally style). Can you see him?!? The first person to answer correctly in the comments section receives a free pass to come and volunteer in Carriage & Wagon whenever they like!!

February News Part 1

Great Eastern Railway 1899 4 Wheel Brake Third 853

Work on larger tasks described in previous weeks has continued on an ongoing basis. This includes door rebuilding, woodwork repairs to the sides of the body and removing of rusted bolts from the flooring.

The brake-gear has seen the most visible change, with a full set of brake show carriers now completed to the gloss black stage. Various other parts, including brake linkages and the main cross shaft are not far behind, having been cleaned of rust (by the Axeman and friends) and coated in metal primer.

Great Northern Railway (later M&GN) 1887 6 Wheel Third 129

No progress to report.

British Railways 1960 Restaurant Buffet (Refurbished) E1969

The focus has continued to be on the windows. These were all gloss painted so that the hidden edges would be well protected, and the seaward side of the vehicle now has these windows refitted. We now stand a chance at keeping at least some of the workshop dust out of this once pristine coach!

One laborious task has been the cleaning and repainting of the aluminium weather strips which go around the door apertures. These have been methodically dealt with and have now been repainted in primer ready for refitting.

Some work has now started on rubbing down the paintwork in the areas that haven't required any remedial attention. This will save time when the DMU vacates the staged area and the preparation work on E1969 starts "proper".

British Railways 1955 Mark 1 Suburban Composite Lavatory E43041

More varnishing work has been completed in the corridors, and the upholstery of the final First Class compartment has been completed.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Trailer Second Lavatory M56352

The "feathering in" process (described last week) was completed by the middle of the week, which allowed us to thoroughly wash down the sides, using many men, to ready them for painting at long last.

The roof was first coated with its new grey paint, which was the start of the transformation in colour. Management were even to be seen assisting with the roof painting!

The rest of the week has been spent coating the bodysides in undercoat. This is now complete with the exception of four doors which will be finished off early next week.

British Railways 1959 Class 03 Diesel Shunter D2063

This week has seen the black "wasp stripes" added to the loco, which really sets it off nicely. The handrails have also been painted white which leaves only the engine room doors and the running plate still to paint.

Roger Williams

This week was Roger Williams' final day working with us. He has been part of the department for over 10 years and has brought a multitude of skills to the varying tasks required over the years. We wish him well with his retirement!