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Latest News: Archive
March 2007
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Latest News: Archive
March 2007
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33 065 passes Rash's Green. 17th March 2007. Photo: David Shepherd |
The Mid-Norfolk Railway's annual Diesel Gala was the most successful ever this year, including the first use of the new run-round loop at Dereham, the first service train hauled by 47 596 "Aldeburgh Festival", and the visit of 33 065 "Sealion".
The Saturday was especially busy - indeed one of the Saturday services was full to capacity with 35 people standing as well. We are in the process of restoring further coaches to add to the train, which should alleviate this problem in future.
A great many projects have come to completion in recent months, greatly enhancing the facilities and ambience of the railway - a point reflected in the many positive comments received from passengers.
By Gary Hall.
The area between County School level crossing and the accommodation crossing some 200 yards has been a top priority for the County School Group lately. It was requested that the west bank be strimmed soon and then maintained as grass land and the trees on the east side be coppiced. This has now been completed with a special thanks to Ray and Neil that have put in extra time so that this could be completed quickly. The last project that we have in this area will be to realign the foot path next to our boundary fence. This will require some earth work in order to make this happen. We have already set the end posts for the fence and erected part of the support for the embankment. This support will allow us to increase the width an additional three feet. It is amazing how much just a few dedicated workers can accomplish.
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Before and after views of the clearance to the south of County School. 29th September 2006 and 12th March 2007. Photos: Ray Jordan |
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The County School Area Group had a busy week end. Saturday saw the return of Steve McHay with his flail. Neil Page and Gary Hall met the driver at 8am and put up barricades. The driver spent the day trimming back the ground cover all the way up to bridge 1706 in order to keeping the vegetation at bay. He was also able to remove some of the brambles on the east side up to the station area.
We had a good day with four volunteers. We managed to install the fence posts south of the level crossing, but wire will need to be strung during the next working party. We also managed to install the structure that will support the bank by the level crossing. Only a few more paving slabs will be needed to finish this as far as the large tree.
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Left: The newly-installed fence posts. Right: The shoring to support the embankment. 25th March 2007. Photos: Gary Hall |
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By Owen Stratford, Trevor Brackpool and Paul Mobbs.
Today saw us completing the fitting of a set of fishplates to join the existing MOD flatbottom rails to the newly installed bullhead. Not straightforward jobs as not only are the rails different sizes but the bullhead is inclined and the flatbottom isn't. After a bit of head scratching and machining we got there and the rest of the day was spent lifting and packing the track either side of the joints to give a smooth transition between the two types of track.
To make a pleasant change from resleepering, today's works train was used for maintenance. Having shunted 47 596 out of the way to get to our train, and then doing battle through Yaxham Lido and the Garvestone boating lake (we had a lot of rain and there were several areas of bad flooding), we arrived at Hardingham. We were attending to bridge 1683 which has longitudinal timbers across it. The ride over this was never very good, and so we fitted wooden packings under the chairs to remove a slight twist that exists over the bridge. The approach panels were then lifted back up to level and the cross-level corrected, with the track being packed with the Hilti Hammers.
With this job (and one dipped joint in the vicinity) corrected, we stopped at Garvestone to install some extra drainage troughs. The small pipe installed from the road to the nearest catchpit had totally blocked up under the deluge of silt. We dug this out and made a trench into which we started to install open concrete troughing. This took the immediate flow of water and will be completed next week, but unfortunately the track has been covered with mud and will need digging out.
A day for completing a number of smaller but just important tasks associated with any project of this type. First the spare 60ft rails were cleared off site back to site down the yard, spare track components were also removed back to store in the main yard. Then it was time get out the bars and the track given a tweak to improve its alignment. Once done it was time to drop in some (approx 1 ton) more ballast to hold the alignment, so the bars were swapped for ballast forks. While all this was going on the D&F gang were busy erecting a fence around the site of the old Dereham North signal box base as the hole could be a hazard to Operating staff using the siding. They also went through the whole site litter picking so that the new installation looks neat and tidy, nice one chaps. Almost forgot, two Stop & Await Instruction signs were also erected.
Today's Northern section tidying train was a huge success: using a loco and two wagons, we took two trainloads of dumped garden waste, our own cuttings and disintegrating sleepers beyond the built-up areas for burning, while the remaining old sleepers from last year's changing program were stacked in to a pile further north for a future project. Then to round the day off we loaded the train with dumped rubble and took this back to Dereham for use as hardcore in future building projects. This has completed the major part of the clearance between the station and Swanton Road (the crossing furthest from the station within Dereham), with a small amount of tidying and yearly mowing now the only requirements to keep this as meadow grassland. The positions of section maintainer is still available for each of the areas between the crossings for a volunteer who would like to assist us in maintaining this highly visible part of the line. Our next aim is to bring the rest of the line within the outskirts of Dereham up to standard.
Continuing the push to the north is only possible thanks to the efforts of our dedicated volunteers so if you would like to see progress speeded up please consider joining us on the first Sunday of the month.
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Tidying up in the Northern Section. Left: Unloading fallen branches for burning. Right: Stacking up sleepers for future use. 4th March 2007. Photos: Jerry Alderson and Owen Stratford |
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Another major milestone was achieved in that, by prior arrangement, the new point and associated trackwork were inspected by the HMRI and passed fit to be brought into operational use.
This weekend's activity was all about hard graft and ballast. On Saturday the opportunity was taken to shunt the dogfish wagons onto the offloading spur, as the Operations staff had to rearrange the yard in preparation for the diesel gala. With the help of our resident JCB we set about loading the unused ballast pile from the yard car park to the wagons. Although the JCB was able to move the vast majority it was back to the ballast forks to remove the last couple of inches from the ash layer of the car park. Once the wagons were loaded, one was shunted out onto the newly installed track so that ballast could be dropped to infill the low points. Unfortunately the dogfish wagon had other ideas and decided that once the ballast was flowing from the centre door it wasn't going to stop! So we ended up with a "bit" more ballast than we had intended so on Sunday a start was made with forks and a trolley moving the ballast to where we had intended it to go.
The p-way team spent the day working at Garvestone crossing replacing the worn decking and the rotten battens. The sleepers underneath were still sound, so after cleaning out years of mud build up and replacing some battens the new decking, consisting of good second hand sleepers, was drilled and fixed with spikes. Unfortunately due to mechanical problems with the chainsaw we were unable to notch out two new outside edge sleepers, so we had to use the old ones after swapping them around to find a reasonably good fit. These will of course have to be replaced at some point in the future but should last a good while yet.
We had an early start today. One of our track section walkers had reported a cracked fishplate on Friday. As a result a 15mph Emergency Speed Restriction had been imposed. Trevor, Graham and Owen took down a replacement before the first train and fitted it, packing the joint sleepers while we were there. We then joined the remainder of the P Way team who had made a start on the day's activities. We were tackling the last patch of scrub on the down side at Watering Farm, on the north approach to Yaxham. This was left over after the Christmas working party. The scrub was easily cleared in the morning and a bonfire soon consumed the thorny branches. We then lit a second fire and cut back the trees on the approach to Yaxham's distant signal to avoid it becoming partially obscured from distant trains when the leaves return to the trees. Everyone was really pleased with all that was achieved and we got to watch all of the various locomotives fly past on the Diesel Gala.
A few P Way regulars spent the day at Crownthorpe. The purpose of the day was to backfill and regulate ballast around the recently changed sleepers. Most of the cutting was completed, but unfortunately we were short of help so did not quite manage to finish the task today.
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Felled trees in Northall Green Cutting. 24th March 2007. Photo: Matt Goodrum |
Two of our friends from the Wensleydale Railway came down for the weekend on a busman's holiday, providing us with a chance to discuss ideas and methods. They just happened to be fully trained and kitted out for chainsaw usage, a fact that we took full advantage of. On the Saturday they spent the day helping Roy clearing around Danemoor Bridge and the Sunday helping in deepest Northall Green Cutting in the northern section before having a leisurely ride on the last train of the day. This gave us a prime demonstration of how important tools like these are. Unfortunately at around £1,000 to get a volunteer trained and kitted out it's a lot more expensive than bow saws. With thanks to Andrew and David for their help.
After a two week break (the run round was in full use during the diesel gala and last weekend I had to attend to a minor fault on 31 438 - sticking horn valve), it was time to catch up with some of the snagging items left over from the commissioning of the run round. With the help of the JCB we moved the rest of the leftover rails left on site back down the yard into store. A request had been made to double the length of the unloading pad so we made a start in bringing up the components necessary, and with the aid of the P-way trolley, sufficient ballast was brought round to serve as infill in the gaps beside the rails. The JCB then got busy bringing soil to site to help complete the top surface of the pad.
We spent today at Garvestone. Upon arrival, we hung the new replacement gate onto the hinges. The new gate had been made fractionally longer than the previous one and this combined with the existing lean on the hinge post meant that it did not fit across the road properly. To correct this, the back of the post was dug out and then it was jacked upright. This enabled everything to fit properly, with just the ancillaries and gate furniture left to fit. On our previous visit a few weeks back, we had been unable to complete the replacement of the decking sleepers in the road because the chainsaw had a problem. We require this to cut notches to fit around the chairs. With the saw mended, we then cut the replacement boards, removed the old ones, and fitted the new ones. A liberal spiking of these secured them down. The final task of the day saw us install the last sections of a new trough drain to try to solve the waterlogging of the track that was occurring. After heavy rain, the water runs off down the road and floods the track with mud. We started to install an interceptor drain a few weeks ago and completed this after removing a buried baulk of wood and cutting one of the troughs to fit the geometry of the site.
By Gary Hall.
The weather has affected progress over the last few weeks, not being too conducive for cold fingers to locate and tighten nuts and bolts etc but none the less progress continues. The brake operating rods having been modified, fitted and adjusted such that the brakes are fully functioning. The water system is also now complete (thanks for finding the bottom hose Keith) and ready for leak testing, which we will do on a warmer day when no more overnight frosts are threatened.
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5th March 2007. Photo: Terry Mann |
The steering gearbox was the last one for overhaul and this was opened, stripped, cleaned, inspected and reassembled without the need for any remedial action. Hoist and derrick brake assemblies (overhauled off site by one of our group) have been fitted but refitting the brake shoes and final adjustment will wait until we are ready for operational testing, so we can ensure the brake drums remain clean and rust free until then. All the gearboxes have now been filled with oil and their respective external gear guards refitted in readiness for operational testing. The engine/generator covers have been temporarily fitted to allow routing of new conduits to the new electrical distribution box and this is the job which we are just starting. A week or two sorting this out and constructing a battery/equipment storage locker will see us ready for the start of electrical wiring. Not a simple task but the end is in sight (we hope)!