New Wagon Project

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

As the weather has turned colder and outside tasks become more difficult, the Thompson coach, usefully located inside the shed, has been able to see a little more progress. The recently fitted wooden droplights in the guards area have required rather a lot of "fettling" which has been progressed steadily.

A new task has been cleaning and preparing original sliding ventilators for the windows. There are eight of these, six original and two extras, obtained as part of the coach's conversion from corridor to open configuration. These have suffered from "dezincification" which simply put is brass (an alloy formed from copper and zinc) corroding and thereby losing its zinc and reverting to copper. It appears to be an irreversible process, but much like aluminium corrosion cleaning and treating can go a very long way to slowing down or in an inside environment near-enough halting the process. Following online research (in other words consulting the oracle that is Mrs Google) various methods have been trialed including polishing with WD-40, treating with calcium carbonate, and salt with white vinegar. So far, the latter appears to be producing the best results with our particular grade of brass. The advantage this week has been the transformation of the coach, nasally at least, into a chip shop!

London North Eastern Railway 1938 Brake Third Open E16631E (GOLD)

The decision to use contractors for help has proven to be a good one with good progress continuing to be made. As I am not present directly for this coach, which is of course off site at Wirksworth, Ecclesbourne Valley Railway, then I will opt for an image based update with a brief caption on each pointing to progress. It's very exciting to see such work without having to shed the blood and sweat ourselves, having said that a significant financial bequest is what is fueling this dream...

First area of cleaned solebar primed

First area of cleaned solebar undercoated

Side framework now repaired and in aluminium primer

Much cant-rail renewal

The body slid over to allow dragbox (bufferbeam) plate repairs, a common Gresley issue

Floor stripped showing the body rolling method using poles

First wood going red and a further view of the poles

Extracted buffers

New cant-rail and re-fixing roof hoops

Removed buffers and gangway

End repair in evidence

Close up of the new cant-rail section

Repairing side framework

Corridor end

Typical cant-rail condition prior to replacement

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

With such focus on M35148 we have been unable to direct serious resources during the working week towards M14021. However work to needle gun the seaward side solebar and some underframe details continues at weekends.

British Railways 1958 Brake Corridor Second M35148 (SILVER)

This coach continues to be the workshop baby, receiving the most resource in an effort to get things done in time for next season. Inside the coach, the accessible saloon has had some of the cream doorways sanded down and undercoated.

The guards compartment ceiling has now had its final coat. The cream walls have had their first coat with much now rubbed down ready for the second coat. Key components such as the handbrake wheel, which had become very worn,. have been cleaned back smooth and brought back to life shiny black!

The side corridor along the compartments, the wall of which needed so much attention, is now finally ready for building back up and a first coat of varnish has been applied.

Inside the compartments, the two which had been lagging behind owing to the window glass being missing are now catching up, as the glass and surrounding woodwork are now installed making them weather tight once more. Just a final varnish to seal everything in round the windows is now required in these areas.

At the Holt end, the tested toilet tank has now been refitted back into the ceiling which is a further milestone in reassembling the interior. The tank has been plumbed in on top of the roof at the "filling end" with pipework below "the draining end" to the taps etc still to undertake.

All of the exterior doors have now been refitted to the coach and the removed woodwork is doing very nicely on the bench having received several coats of new varnish. These are now ready to refit, as are the new lower panels which have arrived from our supplier.

Moving onto the exterior, the reassembly of the Holt end corridor connection has now been completed with all the woodwork, bellows and the complex passenger communication chord operating mechanism fitted in amongst the above, and being carefully adjusted for smooth and reliable operation. The Sheringham end bellows, which are simpler, are next to be refitted.

Much work has been dedicated to the adjustments of the refitted doors and refitting and resealing of the exterior doorway weather strips and internal door jambs. This work always takes a long time so we have been steadily working through the four passenger doors in particular.

As alluded to before, all of the window glass has been bedded back into the alloy frames which means the exterior bodysides are now physically all back in one piece. This means only one thing: the start of the long task of sanding and filling bodywork preparation, needed as we approach exterior completion and painting.

British Railways 1957 Class 101 Railcar Driving Trailer Composite Lavatory E56062 (SILVER)

No progress to report, though it is hoped to continue with the middle passenger doorway soon.

British Railways 1954 13 Ton Pipe Open B740918

This project will likely be shelved for the winter, as outside wagon woodwork is rarely possible during the colder and wetter months. We had hoped to complete the wagon over the summer period but alas, not. It will return to these notes in the Spring.

British Railways 1950 12 Ton Box Van B755094 (Maintenance)

By the skin of it's teeth as the weather closes in, the woodwork repairs to one of our storage vans has reached a point of near completion. The sliding door, recently hung back on, is now furnished and sliding open and shut again nicely. A few holes in the adjacent bodyside have been bolstered with a plywood outer covering and are being painted up on drier days.

British Railways (LMS Design) 1949 20 Ton Brakevan B950133

The Holt wagon team have now finished their main 2023 project, the LMS brakevan. It is now resplendent in BR bauxite and fully lettered out with a full compliment of side lamp irons, which concludes all of the previously outstanding items. The van saw its first use for the winter works trains preparing for the Norfolk Lights, setting up the displays etc.

British Railways (GWR Design) 1958 "Fruit D" W92097W

The Holt wagon team have now moved swiftly onto their next project, the "Fruit D" van. This has long been a staple of the goods set and is also useful in its own right as a vacuum fitted van which doubles up as an events store (tables, chairs etc). It was last restored in 2015 (see this page of the blog) and was running with a dual identity (GWR brown on one side and BR crimson on the other) but the unstable wood planking and eight years of harsh Norfolk sun have left at least one side ruined. Although not considered a basket case by any means, the cosmetic appearance of the seaward side in particular was awful so luckily the team have agreed to take it on.

No time has been wasted and they have begun stripping down the flakey paint on the bodyside planks, with the terrible seaward side almost done. A number of timbers need either replacing or making good. A start has been now been made on the Sheringham end. The group hope for a number of dry days  when they can drag it out into the daylight.

Maintenance

With the main running season now at an end there has been a glut of repairs and maintenance required prior to the start of the winter services this weekend. A failed generator has been replaced on the Gresley Buffet car, new batteries and LED lighting has been installed in TSO 4236, a broken steam heat pipe has been replaced on RBR 1969 and a hefty list of interior ailments has been attended to on a variety of service coaches. 

Job Vacancy

Weybourne Works is looking for a new individual to join the paid staff team in the Carriage & Wagon department, full time (45 hours Monday-Friday), to support our carriage overhauls operation. Whilst a variety of backgrounds will be considered ideally we are looking at an individual with some woodworking and/or metalworking experience. Contact the railway or look out on the NNR website and socials for the job advert if interested!