August News Part 1

Great Eastern Railway 1899 4 Wheel Brake Third 853

A lot more work is going into the door locks and catches with several continuing to be the focus of attention this week. Some of the passenger doors have received their locks which includes the internal tongue for opening the door from the inside. These were too easily operated at first so they have had their springs changed internally to stiffen them up so they cannot be operated by accident whilst the train is in motion!

Sticking with the safety theme, inside the guards van some cupboards have been moved from one side to another as it has now been realised that at least one of them was sticking out and causing a risk of head injury. By having the higher cupboard above another cupboard that takes up floor space it should prevent the former from hitting people in the skull...

Inside the compartments, some very expensive ash luggage rack poles are now being test fitted and have been put in position on the two outer walls. They should varnish up very nicely.

Lastly, the first of the four buffer shanks are now in the lathe next door and are being machined down (so they fit the revised arrangement on the coach). This is being done under contract so has had to wait for an available space in the work schedule to progress. Hopefully the other three can follow the first one in time.

British Railways 1959 Brake Corridor Composite E21224

The metal covers which fit along the side corridor protecting passengers' ankles from the electric heaters that were fitted in there, briefly mentioned last week, have now all been stripped of old paint and are currently in a polished metal state ready for repainting. Working with a heat gun has been very arduous in the current weather conditions! With the outer covers done, the inner covers which go behind the heaters and stop the vehicle's internal insulation being singed were brushed down and painted in rust-kill primer. These have not had the same attention as the visible covers as not being seen there simply was no need, consequently all of them were easily cleaned and painted in one day. They will have further coats of paint applied in due course.

The alloy window frames for the landward side of the vehicle (currently stacked up in component form at the side of the workshop until 21224 itself returns from storage) are also in the process of being polished up to remove all traces of old paint, so we get no reactions to any etch primers we apply in due course. Over half of the stack have been completed so far.

British Railways 1959 Tourist Second Open M4843

A batch of curved hardwood door posts have now arrived for the vehicle which will allow the doors to be refitted properly to the Sheringham end vestibule once labour becomes available to do so. A bit of time did allow a brief test to be made with one of them and a bit of adjustment to the rebate has been required using a router.

The middle vestibule, which still has its doors(!), has joined the ranks of areas which have received re-varnishing to improve its appearance.

As part of the project for "getting everything ready" to refit the corridor connections when the time is right, a set of lighting jumper bases have been machined from hardwood. These are fixed to the outer steel skin and are what the jumper cables themselves and associated covers all screw onto. Their exposed position leads them to rot badly in service so renewal can be common during major overhauls. A set of eight have been made, enough for 4843 and 21224.

British Railways 1957 Tourist Second Open E4521

The new kid on the block when it comes to these jottings... E4521 is a "standard" open second identical to many of our Mark 1's we operate. Having been used on the NNR since the 1980's it was withdrawn from service over ten years ago and has been a resident inside Bridge Road carriage sheds. It has long been the railway's ambition to extract it and get it back into service. Due to the Suburban 4 project this has not been possible these last few years but the time is soon coming where we may be able to just squeeze it through the programme. It has been assessed and is quite poor in some areas but remarkably good in other areas. It has therefore been decided to place it on the "Silver" overhaul programme, which is unusual for a vehicle being extracted from storage - they are normally so dilapidated they require a "Gold"!

E4521 remains inside Bridge Road for the moment but will be one of the coaches replacing E3868 & M26012 in the works (see below) once it has been tripped from Holt. In preparation for its move, this week we emptied all of the stores which have been put inside the coach over the last few years, and then filled it with enough seating to reupholster in due course, as the original seating had been removed and fitted to various other coaches, particularly TSO E4641 which we completed back in 2016.

E4521 is now ready for its overhaul to begin.

British Railways 1953 Tourist Second Open E3868 & 1962 Corridor Second M26012

In an extremely rare occurrence, this week we completed two projects at once which has returned the two service rakes of coaches at Sheringham back to full strength. TSO E3868 was completed after its ends were repainted black. Whilst we were there with the paintbrush the two end doors also received a coat of cream.

M26012 meanwhile received a coat of paint on its sole-bar and exposed underframe components just to boost its appearance. The white stars (which denote where the vacuum brake cylinder pull chords are located) were also applied and the emergency lighting point sockets also lettered.

Both are now back at Sheringham and have boosted the proportion of shiny coaches we have in service considerably.

British Railways 1960 Brush Type 2 D5631

The department currently has 50% of its paid workforce dedicated to getting the Class 31 diesel back together again. Bodywork and welding is ongoing next door in the loco shed, but five doors have made it into our shed with the intention of making two good ones out of the selection. They are being stripped down, repaired and rebuilt.