REVIEW OF THE YEAR 2022

As is traditional, the final Blog post of the year looks back on what we have achieved these past 12 months. Whilst I will be told off if i say that "Covid has gone", it is fair to say that 2022 has been the first full year since the pandemic that we have been able to operate in the workshops without direct restrictions. It has therefore been business as usual with the minor caveat that we don't have as many people anymore. And what a year it has been! Prior to Covid we ranked each year based on the number of coaches that went through for overhaul work, however 2022 was very different as we dialed down the thoroughness and ramped up the speed! I am of course referring to the conveyor belt project which was designed to be a shot in the arm to quickly and dramatically improve the exterior of the coaching stock fleet. This it did extremely successfully with no less than 16 vehicles being refreshed in a year! We have now returned to a more normal pace of life.

The first month of the year was spent inside undertaking a bogie overhaul and interior refresh on BCK E21103, which would prove to be our main project for the year. Suburban brake E43357 was out-shopped as the sixth member of the conveyor belt project, resplendent in BR Crimson. Contractors Heritage Painting also completed the bodywork and repaint of the Class 37 locomotive.

In February we successfully registered two more coaches to run on the mainline between Sheringham and Cromer, these being TSO E4641 & BCK E21224, bringing the mainline fleet up to five vehicles. The sixth conveyor belt coach, dining car M4372, was turned out in Crimson & Cream. Heavy overhaul work to BCK E21224 & Thompson E1866E continued, the latter seeing a lot of door work undertaken.

In March BCK E21224 was back with us again for more teething issues with the brake system to be rectified, which was duly done with it returning to traffic in time for the Steam Gala. The seventh conveyor belt coach, RBR E1969, was completed. On the wagon front, Oyster ballast plough brake DB993707 sneaked in for a quick refresh before the gala and a more thorough restoration of ballast hopper HW426 commenced.

April was a busy month, with the completion of the restoration of SR brakevan 55167 (undertaken at Holt) being the highlight. The eighth conveyor belt vehicle, service TSO E4236, was also turned out. BCK E21103 was also progressing well, with bodywork and paint preparation completed along with the bogie overhaul work. Minor works were undertaken to the 7F steam loco (tender repaint), DMU trailer car (vacuum cylinder replacement) and Gresley Buffet car (window replacement).

May saw TSO M4958 go through as the ninth conveyor belt vehicle, however the month was dominated by the arrival of the Quad-Art set for its re-varnishing work.

June was a consolidation month (the only one in the year we think!) as all the time was needed to plough through the Quad-Art refresh, which means working on four coaches at once. The upholstery department finished their main project for the season, TSO M4958. The restoration of hopper HW426, tank wagon 5304 (at Holt), BCK E21103 & Thomspon E1866E all continued to progress and the M&GN Society finished off the month nicely by announcing their new acquisition, Gresley Brake E16631E.

In July the re-varnishing of the Quads were finished, representing coaches 10 to 13 in the conveyor belt. We also undertook trails with a new type of ground lathe which it was hoped could turn the wheels on the Quads. Finally another new coach, BFO(K) M14021 arrived at the railway for future restoration for the dining train.

August saw further completions, with two wagons, hopper HW426 and tank wagon 5304 both returning to service. The Quad Art set had a pair of wheelsets swapped out for a more suitable pair, which was very interesting as it was an intermediate bogie which needed accessing! The Gold restoration of BFO(K) M14021 was also started.

September saw all hands to the pump in a big effort to complete BCK E21103 in time for the 40's weekend. This was achieved just in time!

October was a further flurry of refreshes, with static seating coach 4667 prepared for use up at Holt, gaining a quick coat of SR Green and becoming conveyor 14 in the process. Also painted was dining train kitchen car M81033 (conveyor 15), the only one to be done out in the open at Sheringham! We also welcomed another new arrival, CCT 94338, from Embsay.

During November a lot of effort was put into preparing for the Norfolk Lights Express season. We also started to bodywork overhaul on dining train FO M3116 and completed the 16th, and final, conveyor belt refresh, DMU M51188.

By December the paint brushes were well and truly worn out! As the temperatures fell, we returned to our normal business of overhaul work, with BFO(K) M14021, Thompson E1866E and FO M3116 keeping us busy.

So there we have it, a very busy year indeed. It has been truly unique, with the railway never having painted so many vehicles in one calendar month before, so it will take a little adjustment for observers to get used to normal working again! Looking forwards to 2023, half of the shed will be locked in to the long running Gold overhauls of Mark 1 BFO(K) M14021 and Thompson E1866E. The other half will be slightly more changeable but we do have a stack of Silver level overhauls to catch up on. It is hoped to put FO M3116, BSK W35148 and one Class 101 DMU vehicle through, all for similar bodywork treatment. We will also see the return of the Quad-Art set one more time, in order to split and lift the entire set to have the wheelsets all turned. Another exciting year of progress awaits!

Finished For Christmas

Blog Number 300!

Firstly I would like to wish all of our readers a Happy Christmas! However and perhaps even more importantly, I would also like to say a sincere thank you to those who have stuck with us and stayed interested in what we do. Readership has plummeted over the past few years and is the lowest it has ever been. For whatever reason, lots of people who used to read these updates before the pandemic simply have not returned, and the experiment (last year) of having fewer updates with more news in each one was not successful in winning visitors back. This year, for the first time since Covid, we returned to the original format of more regular news but readership has remained low. What has kept me going in spending time writing the page has been the continued support and overwhelmingly positive feedback from those I meet in person who do still visit the page, so to those of you reading this, thanks again! We are looking forwards to another interesting year of restoration in 2023, but before then don't forget our review of the year (next week) where we will be undertaking the tradition of looking back on everything we have achieved in 2022, and this year it was quite a journey! So read on for the final standard workshop update for 2022, which coincidentally is the 300th blog post...

London North Eastern Railway 1950 Brake Corridor Third E1866 (GOLD)

It has been a quiet few weeks as the team have been spending time at home on the approach to Christmas, however a few items are being attended to. A replacement section of steel from the corridor connection has been fabricated using an original example as a somewhat rotten pattern.

London North Eastern Railway Brake Third Open E16631E (GOLD)

The second wheelset for the Gresley brake has now been fully set up in the lathe and is in the process of being turned. The completed first one has been moved back into the carriage shed and presents an interesting comparison with its worn sisters still awaiting lathe time.

British Railways 1961 Brake First Open (Kitchen) M14021 (GOLD)

The long task of window frame restoration continues, with more trim drilling and tapping. Just over half of the windows have now been completed, so this will continue well into the New Year.

The sliding light alloy frame cleaning continues well and we are now almost complete, with just two (of the 16) still to finish off. With all paint stripped off revealing good condition aluminium underneath, they look very nice already, even though we haven't started cleaning up the actual glass itself...

Moving on from windows to doors, the refurbishment of the large sliding end doors for the corridor connection on FO M3116 had gone so well that we moved straight onto those for M14021! The first one, from the Holt end, has had its exterior face stripped back to bare metal and any fittings such as handles etc removed. The face on this one is made from galvanized steel and is in excellent order.

The bodyside door overhauls have continued to progress at a steady rate. We have reached a milestone in that the four aluminium passenger doors have now been completed as far as we can take them for now (we need to order some replacement lower door cards). They are now lined up and await the completion of their steel cousins.

This leaves four more doors left to do: two inward opening guards doors and a pair of double luggage doors for the kitchen area. These will take longer than the alloy doors as there is more to them in terms of the refurbishment of the steel outer skins and wooden inner frames, both of which can give more trouble than the aluminium. The first candidate is one of the guards doors, which has now been completely stripped down into its component parts, a process which itself took two days! The wooden frame has been cleaned up, de-nailed and a replacement lower section machined up and fitted back into the door. Luckily, this is the only major wooden surgery to do on this particular door, so we have got off lightly!

More refurbishment of this fifth door, particularly all of the "bits" that have been taken off it and the main outer steel skin itself, will follow next year.

British Railways 1962 First Open M3116 (SILVER)

The removed seaward side window frames have progressed particularly well with the cleaned up inner edges receiving a coat of primer and two gloss coats to build up a layer which will hopefully help keep the alloy from meeting the steel of the coach bodyside.

Attention is now turning to the landward side equivalents. Half of them have been removed from the coach and will no doubt be receiving the same "treatment" soon!

The welding repairs to the Sheringham corridor end have now been completed. Luckily the landward side corner needed much less surgery than its seaward side sister, although we did find a rather large mess on the corner full of filler. The type of filler used suggests this shameful bodge was a British Rail creation, rather than that of the previous preservation-era contract overhaul M3116 had.

Staying at the Sheringham end, a suitably repainted sliding door has also been fitted back in at this end.

With the landward side windows removed, bodywork preparation has been progressing down that side, in an identical fashion to that of the seaward only a few weeks ago. I won't repeat the details but we are getting there!

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Motor Brake Second M51188

The interior works to the guards van continue. One wall in particular needed a second coat, so we completed this on the door into the next saloon before running out of cream paint! This has been reordered but will need to arrive before we complete the rest of the wall.

Whilst we were waiting, the floor was given a coat of red paint and this can now harden over the Christmas break.

We also audited the emergency ambulance cupboard and it was found to have several items missing. These will be ordered and replenished before closing the cupboard and signing it back off for traffic. For the first time the guards area will be neat and tidy, as part of our wider programme to slowly work our way through the brake vehicles on the railway and attach to the walls and/or floors all the emergency items that are currently rolling around loose without a fixed home!

Workshop

The task to overhaul and repaint three vacuum brake cylinders has now finally been concluded, with the third example brought proudly up to gloss. The first one has been set aside and will be used on the overhaul of pipe wagon B740918 next spring when the weather improves. The remaining two are our "ready-to-go" spares for the 2023 season and have been placed on a pallet to await the call.

The Holt station platform trolley has now been completed and given several coats of grey paint. It will probably be lettered before being returned to the station.

Finally, the workshop gained a Christmas present in the form of a new belt sander for the woodworking area. The old one was too small and had become damaged to the point where it failed a safety inspection, becoming unusable as a result. We are very grateful to the Tool Fund who generously agreed to fund the purchase of this item (a three figure sum). It will greatly enhance our ability to "fettle" our beloved wooden components!

Articulated Gresley Bogie Acquired

British Railways 1961 Brake First Open (Kitchen) M14021 (GOLD)

Bodyside windows continue to be a focus with another two days spent on the long task of re-drilling and tapping alloy trim sections to correct 60 years worth of damage. This has been backed up by a start being made on the sliding lights, which so far have not been touched. These are having their paint stripped off the frames and attempts made to clean up the aluminium corrosion present on the non-painted internal side. Once stripped they are being polished and so far the metal itself looks to be in good condition considering their age.

The other area of progress is the door overhauls. The third door has now been stripped to bare metal, repainted into primer and mechanical fittings added, bringing it up to the same stage as door two. Both of these are now awaiting their woodwork to complete.

The fourth door has been stripped down to its component parts and the skin is now part way through having its old paint stripped.

British Railways 1962 First Open M3116 (SILVER)

All of the seaward side windows are now removed and have had all their old sealant removed ready for repainting.

The seaward bodyside is now prepped ready for paint and work on the coach itself has turned to the Sheringham corridor end, which has one corner in particular which had been repaired badly by a contractor last time the coach was overhauled. Much filler and pop rivets was in evidence which had failed over time allowing water in. This area was stripped back and new skin work properly welded into place this time. We also replaced some missing plate work which supports the passenger communication apparatus. The area is still in progress but is now going back together again, the good news being that we have caught the water ingress in time, before it had chance to severely damage any of the structural framework.

The two sliding end doors have had their repaints finished, and the Holt end example has been refitted back onto the coach.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Motor Brake Second M51188

The work to fit emergency equipment brackets to the guards brake has now been completed, with some final modifications to the fire extinguisher and fire beater brackets this week. Once we have some more materials arrive we will add the final touches which are the straps to hold the extinguishers and wheelchair ramp in place.

Also in the guards brake, the cream wall repainting has also been completed, which has boosted the areas appearance. With the ceiling and walls repainted, this has of course made the floor look careworn, so we will likely be investigating a coat of floor paint soon!

London North Eastern Railway Articulated Bogie

Last week the National Railway Museum completed the legal transfer of this Gresley Articulated bogie, and associated frame sections, to the railway. This is the only surviving articulated Gresley bogie other than those under the Quad Set. Acquisition of this bogie will make it possible for us to split the set to enable the re-profiling of the wheels next year. The bogie is unfamiliar to most as despite being on loan and present at the railway for many years it has spent almost all its time hidden from view, tucked away in the back of Bridge Road sheds.

More Windows

London North Eastern Railway 1950 Brake Corridor Third E1866 (GOLD)

Progress has been limited to applying more coats of paint and furthering of existing tasks/projects on the vehicle.

London North Eastern Railway Brake Third Open E16631E (GOLD)

The first of the four wheelsets has now been successfully turned on our in-house wheel lathe.

British Railways 1961 Brake First Open (Kitchen) M14021 (GOLD)

All of the bodyside windows have had the hidden backs painted in a first coat of gloss and work continues on drilling and tapping various new screws to repair damaged trim.

The cleaning of the aluminium luggage racking mentioned last week has progressed really well with all of them now returned to their former glory. During the process we have discovered that we are actually two racks short of fully furnishing the main passenger saloon, so we are investigating options to rectify this.

The door overhauls continue steadily. The first one has now been finished (as far as we are going with them for the time being). Meanwhile the second door has had its main skin cleaned back and coated in primer, and all of the mechanical components overhauled and refitted, leaving just the wooden elements left to restore. The third door has been started and has now been stripped down into its component parts and is part way through paint stripping of the outer skin.

British Railways 1962 First Open M3116 (SILVER)

The seaward side remains the focus with much of it now being sanded and filled in the areas where the steel is good. Almost all of the windows have now been removed from this side.

The window frames are now in the process of having the old sealant removed from the rear faces before being cleaned back to bare aluminium.

The window apertures, where the frames sit on the bodyside, are being cleaned back and rust treated whilst the opportunity is there to access them.

Meanwhile the two end doors continue to be treated and are now up to their gloss coats.

British Railways 1956 Gangwayed Brake (Kitchen) M81033

Work to fine tune the generator continues.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Motor Brake Second M51188

Work has continued on the brakevan interior whilst the Locomotive Department are busy underneath the vehicle. The walls have now all been rubbed back ready for a repaint, which itself has been partially completed.

A series of equipment brackets/aids are also being fitted to the walls to improve the tidiness of the area. Brackets for fire extinguishers, fire beaters, sweeping brushes and wheelchair ramp are all in the process of being made up. This was done to sister vehicle E51228 a few years ago so M51188 was somewhat overdue.

British Railways 1954 13 Ton Pipe Open B740918

No progress to report. With weather so poor it is likely that this project will drop away from these notes until the Spring when drier conditions allow work to restart.

Workshop

Several other projects in the workshop continue to thrive. the Sheringham platform trolley rebuild is doing well with woodwork now completed and primer applied.

A small but essential task to renew the seals in the rams which allow us to move our lifting jacks is now complete, with the repaired wheel/handle arrangements returned to their places on the jacks. These will be needed later this month when we lift M14021 for the first time.

The last of our current batch of vacuum cylinder overhauls has been mechanically rebuilt and tested successfully. It now awaits repainting. We now have a set of three, one for the Pipe Wagon restoration and two spares for the 2023 season.

A further six battery charging leads are being prepared in order to upgrade temporary ones we put into use at Sheringham earlier in the year. This has involved careful restoration of some very old plug units which have been sitting in stores for a very long time!

M51188 Released

London North Eastern Railway 1950 Brake Corridor Third E1866 (GOLD)

This week work has continued to focus on the windows. There were not enough brass internal window surrounds owing to the conversion from side corridor to open configuration so some reproductions have been made out of several pieces of brass cut, bent, soldered and milled into a respectable shape! They have turned out very well and have been test fitted this week and are now out for polishing up properly.

British Railways 1961 Brake First Open (Kitchen) M14021 (GOLD)

Applying so much labour to the window frames is starting to pay off, with this mammoth task coming close to an end. All 12 frames have now been fully cleaned back to bare aluminium, including all of the associated separate trim, quite a task in the end. Two of the frames have also been assessed and all the trim test fitted back on, a process that involves much drilling out of old screws and thread tapping of holes. This process is slow and steady so will continue for the next few weeks.

In the meantime, the frames have all had the painted areas primed in special etch primer to protect them, and the outer ring which sits against the steel bodysides have had a first coat of gloss. These layers are to try and separate the steel from the alloy to limit the adverse reaction between the two metals.

With the frames coming to an end, we have moved onto other components stripped off the vehicle. Also aluminium are the luggage racks, which have been salvaged from a scrapped open coach as 14021 wouldn't have had this type during its days as a compartment coach. They are in a bad way cosmetically but by gentle cleaning with great patience they are coming back up very well indeed.

A start has also been made on overhauling the doors, which are a mix of steel (guards) and aluminium (passenger). So far two passenger doors have been stripped down to a bare casting with all their individual components off and being cleaned up and/or repaired ready to put back on. The door castings have been stripped back to metal and one has been etch primed.

The woodwork for the first one has been test fitted and has been sanded down and bleached. The parts are now being built back up again with new varnish prior to refitting. The doors will probably all be at different stages for some time yet before they all drift back together again!

British Railways 1962 First Open M3116 (Silver)

Good progress is also being made with the other dining coach in the works.The work to repair, sand and fill the lower 1/3 of the vehicle has now been completed, with the seaward side being run along much quicker than the landward as it didn't have the awful varnish on it that had caused damage. The upper sections have now been started, with the vehicle being moved into the staging for better access. Several more windows have now been removed to allow the bodysides to be prepped.

The coach ends and corridor connection, whilst generally in good order, is now being repaired and resealed where required, in order to keep the water out. We found one of the long pieces of wood bolted on the end of the vehicle had randomly rotted on its own, so this has carefully been removed without disturbing any surrounding material and will be replaced. 

The two end sliding doors from the corridor connection have been removed, stripped back to bare metal and are in the process of being painted up. One end is at the primer stage whilst the other is in undercoat.

British Railways 1956 Gangwayed Brake (Kitchen) M81033

Work to fine tune the generator continues.

British Railways 1958 Class 101 Railcar Driving Motor Brake Second M51188

The exterior finishing touches have been applied, including painting of footboards and various bolt heads and handrails. With the exterior completed, the vehicle has been moved out and is now handed over to the Loco Dept next door for their own mechanical winter maintenance to be done.

We are finishing off the guards van improvements at the same time. The whole ceiling has now been painted so it is fresh white and all one colour! After much head scratching we managed to reconnect the guards lighting which had decided to stop working whilst the vehicle was in the shed. We may well do some more brake van improvements to better hold the emergency equipment before we declare the vehicle fully finished.

British Railways 1954 13 Ton Pipe Open B740918

No progress to report.