Service returns after holidays to the Isle of Wight!
London North Eastern Railway 1950 Brake Corridor Third E1866 (GOLD)
The Thompson has progressed well over the last month, with a few more volunteers returning to the fray after the 18 month forced sabbatical. The main news for the exterior has been a start on the hanging of the doors, a major feature of the vehicle. These doors are made of a rather heavy wooden frame with a steel skin screwed to the outside edge, and had been off the vehicle receiving repairs before the pandemic. Before the steel skin is returned to place, they are being hung as skeletons to check the fit and the ensure modifications and easing can be done with ease. The team have continued with the worst doors on the coach, the luggage double doors, the challenge being lining up three edges at once (on two doors) rather than the usual two. Double doors on both sides of the vehicle are being attended to, with more adjusting still required at present.
At the opposite end of the vehicle, the first of the replacement canvas corridor connection bellows has been fitted, which incidentally are more of a PVC type material. This has proven quite fiddly squeezing it into place, but as with many jobs it came together in the end.
Underneath the coach, the linkages which will break the vacuum train pipe when the handbrake is wound on have now been finished and work nicely. This job required both mechanical rods and levers for the handbrake end, as well as the pipework for the vacuum side of the system utilising a guards emergency brake valve. The individuals working on this have now moved onto introducing two new T pieces into the previously straight vacuum pipe under the vehicle. These are to allow the fitting of BR Mark 1 "Direct Admission" valves, which are needed to go with the BR vacuum cylinders which are going to be fitted ton the vehicle. It was decided that the older LNER type cylinders with separate reservoir tanks (with no DA valves) are not going to be retained. Making the vacuum system (near enough) identical to a Mark 1 will have the added bonus of standardisation as well once the vehicle is in traffic.
In readiness for the full conversion, two BR type vacuum cylinders have been removed from store and prepared ready for fitting under the coach. Both cylinders had some issues when they were first tested on the vacuum cylinder rig, but with some cleaning up of components and a few replacement parts, two working cylinders were created without having to fully strip them down and overhaul them. However a weep in the top chamber was discovered on one of them during testing, which after some tapping became a hole! The cylinder in question was previously fitted to a wagon, which sometimes have more exposed brake cylinders than coaches, so we speculate that this localised area of corrosion on the top is due to it either resting against a piece of the wagon's framework/body, or directly below a point where water has been able to drip onto it over many years. The cylinder in question is currently awaiting welding up by paid staff.
Moving onto the interior, the brake area was found to be irreversibly damaged by steam engine smuts due to the vehicle spending a period outside with no doors, with the cream paint unable to be cleaned. Now that the vehicle is permanently indoors, the area was cleared of all detritus and a fresh coat of cream paint applied to the walls, and white gloss on the ceiling, returning it to how it was after its initial restoration.
In the passenger saloon area, insulation is being progressively fitted to the walls. With the coach being quite full of "stuff", almost as much time is spent getting to the relevant sections of bodyside than is spent actually fitting the insulation itself!
British Railways 1959 Brake Corridor Composite E21224 (GOLD)
I am unable to give this section justice, mainly due to being on holiday and being fully absorbed by the Class 31 upon returning. However in our absence, there was a two week period of high activity on the vehicle with most of the department pulling together to get the vehicle in a usable condition (not complete!) in time for the Mixed Traction Gala in July. The seating was fitted allowing the remaining missing items in the passenger compartments to be installed, including the varnished seat back edges, curtains tie backs and corner varnished beading.
Along the passenger corridor, the large varnished heater grill support beam was screwed to the wall which allowed the grills themselves to also be fitted. Further adjustments were also made to the compartment sliding doors, including the fitting of all their "furniture" such as the handles.
An item we though may have to be "left out", but was achieved in the limited timescale, was the Holt end corridor sliding door. This was hung into place, complete with runner screwed into the newly lino'd floor, and all cover strips and pelmets fitted.
One of the areas which received the least work were the toilet and store cupboard "compartments" which flank the passenger ones at each end. This was mainly because they were not priority areas (the toilet is to be added later this year) so work instead concentrated on the public areas that would be in use for the Gala. Other than re-hanging the two doors, which had to be removed for the fitting of the lino, these areas just received a quick clear out of workshop tools etc.
The guards compartment was almost complete already, but a few finishing touches such as the emergency "ambulance cupboard" signage and the fitting of the guards seat were undertaken. Immediately obvious was that we appear to have salvaged an incorrectly sized base bracket for the seat, which has positioned itself at a jaunty angle, which prompted a few jokes from some guards along the lines of those electric inclining chairs that are most useful for some who suffer from advancing years! The seat angle is now on the list for rectification!
The luggage van area was already ready for traffic so didn't require any work during the lead-up to the gala.
Underneath the coach, the two vacuum cylinders received works to get them operating once more, following ten years idle. Again, I have to be brief with details due to absence, but much reconnecting was done to "liven" the systems beneath now that the coach was on its bogies again. In the end, further ridge height adjustments of the springs was not required as the vehicle just came back into tolerance after all the heavy items inside had weighed the body back down.
All of the above contributed towards the coach passing a Fitness to Run exam allowing it to star at the Mixed Traffic Gala. The coach was well received and we have had many favorable comments, for which we thank those people who made them!
Nevertheless this particular blog is not a completion special, as there are still around 25 outstanding items of the coach to attend to before it is considered complete and robust enough for long term passenger traffic. The operating department kindly returned the coach to us to allow these further niggles to be attended to. These will be described in detail in future blogs, however some of the main tasks are the commissioning of the air brake system, the fitting out of the toilet compartment, a whole host of "snagging items" to make sure the interior is strong enough to withstand school children(!) and further works underneath including the completion of the new steam heating pipework and the underfloor systems for the Network Rail approved control emission toilet.
British Railways 1956 Brake Corridor Composite E21103 (SILVER)
The replacement for the Class 31 in the shed (see below) is our other Mark 1 BCK, an almost identical sister to E21224. E21103 has been in service on the NNR for far longer than it ran in "commercial service" for BR and is now due something like its third overhaul with us, or perhaps that should read overdue! Remarkably it has an excellent interior but the doors, bodywork and paintwork are letting it down badly and it is the first of the four "Covid Casualties" (that were withdrawn from service in 2020) that we seek to overhaul and return to service (the others being E4651, E4667 & M26012)
Releasing brake vehicles from traffic for works, particularly those which contain wheelchair accessible areas, is always problematic and is an issue that the railway is working towards resolving in the future. However for the time being, there is a pressing need for E21103 to be out of service for as brief a time as possible. The plan is to not take on too many other projects for the time being and have a more concentrated effort on E21103, to try and undertake the works in record time. We must balance the requirement to do a good job, so that this precious brake vehicle can last for a good while in service, against the dangers of getting too entrenched in "Gold standard" works which take a very long time to undertake, such as on predecessor E21224. We have made a tentative start on the vehicle already but given the amount of detail in the rest of this update I will hold off and provide more on E21103 next time.
British Railways 1960 Brush Type 2 D5631
The most photogenic and "headline" news for this update is the completion of the Class 31's repaint. A few years ago we stressed the importance of undertaking the final paint as late as possible in the restoration to prevent damage, and so it was that the final paint was being applied just days before the launch gala.
Following removal from the staging area, the process of gloss green, white stripes and varnishing was repeated for the lower sections of the loco. This done, volunteers set to applying a coat of black gloss to all the visible sections of the bogies and underframe, along with red on the two end buffer-beams. Air pipes, axlebox covers and buffer-beam equipment was then picked out in a mix of colours including red, orange, yellow and white.
All that remained was a few finishing touches such as the fitting of worksplates and shed plates, overhead warning signs and blue star coupling codes to the front. As planned, D5631 then went on to be formally launched on the Saturday of the Mixed Traction Gala, which also signaled the end of our involvement for now.
We are extremely pleased with how well the Class 31 turned out which now takes its rightful place as the best presented diesel on the railway. Enjoy it before the soot and sunlight get to it!
British Railways (SR Design) 1948 25 Ton Brakevan 55167 (SILVER)
The vehicle is now reaching an advanced stage, with both verandah ends now refitted. This has now heralded a new "painting era" with the previous repaired and prepared areas changing colour rapidly!
The first top coats are now being applied to the two bodysides, which are the most advanced areas.
Maintenance
Not so much maintenance, more of an addition to one of the working vehicles. The M&GN Society's DMU trailer car, E56062, has finally had its unique (but missing) single seat adjacent to the toilet returned to its rightful place. Most of them were removed prior to preservation, however a handful survived but not all owners wanted them so some have been removed post-preservation. We were able to secure one of these unwanted examples, albeit just the framework with no cushions, and have cleaned it up and repainted it to match the existing seat colours. Luckily we also had matching seat material left over, so the upholstery team made two cushions from scratch, with no references other than the frame they had to slot into. Newly upholstered, the seat was quickly installed into the vehicle and makes for a fine sight! Seating capacity is now up by one, although we haven't spotted anyone sitting on it yet!
Workshop
With the closing of several projects at once, we took the opportunity to hold back the new tasks by a week to allow us time to have a serious "reset" of the lower half of the workshop which had become very untidy over the last few years. This task is logically much easier with no coaches inside getting in the way, giving much more space to sort and work.
Although done in two halves, the process has been the same, with everything first tidied up and all unnecessary material culled. Mobile items were them temporarily moved elsewhere before the shed floor itself was swept, hoovered, washed and wet-hoovered to create a clean floor. This was then painted for the first time since the shed was built, a task which was long overdue. This time around, we have opted for a mixed colour scheme, with the main (visitor suitable) walkways picked out in green, "no-go" bays in which the coaches are berthed in red, and everything else grey.
Time will tell whether the system is successful! The floors were finished off by marking out all the walkways and colour divides with yellow lines, which makes things very clear, along with returning all of our equipment back into their rightful locations. This will set us up well going forwards with our next round of restorations, which hopefully will benefit from the clearer, cleaner workspace.
