Monday 8th December: Visit of 47 580 "County of Essex"

Photo: SF47 Group

Stratford Class 47 loco 47 580 "County of Essex" will be visiting the Mid-Norfolk Railway for a few months. It will be working Santa Special trains on Sunday 14th, Saturday 20th, Sunday 21st, Tuesday 23rd and Wednesday 24th December (subject to availability). These will be the loco's first workings since entering preservation.

Limited seating is available for people wishing to ride behind 47 580 on these dates: the maximum number of people is limited to 36 and pre-booking is recommended. Booking can be made over the telephone on (01362) 851723. Travel on the day will be first come first served.

Normal fares will apply or a £10 rover ticket can be purchased allowing travel for the whole day. The only guaranteed departure times will be the starting points for the Santa trains, and all trains will call at Dereham and Wymondham only. On the Santa trains, 47 580 will be top and tailing with another loco.

The loco will also be working Mince Pie specials on Sunday 28th December and Thursday 1st January.

Permanent Way Reports

By Trevor Brackpool and Owen Stratford.

Saturday 6th December: Lifting and Packing

Work continued today in Dereham Yard. It was really cold and we spent the day completing the lifting and packing of the recently-installed point and siding connection.

Saturday 13th December: Building a Siding

The weather today was appalling. There was a horrible icy wind and it was chucking it down with rain. A few hardy souls spent the day back in Dereham. We used the crane to install rails onto the panels into siding three. These were moved into a rough alignment and fishplated up, leaving a 15ft gap to cut in next to the turnout. The rails for this section were extracted from the pile and laid out ready for cutting in next week when we can feel our fingers! We also located and moved some of the last few remaining missing components into position before deciding that it was not worth being outside today!

Sunday 14th December: Level Crossing Repairs

We caught the train to Wymondham today to attend to some sleepers that needed attention in the deck of some of the crossings. We started at Wymondham Church Lane where one of the timbers had split up the middle and was no longer holding together properly. This was removed and a new one notched and dropped into place before spiking it back down. We then moved up the track to crossing number three, a farm crossing, where one of the deck sleepers had gone totally rotten. This was quickly replaced and spiked down too before we attended to some minor tweaks to displaced sleepers in Wymondham Loop. We returned on the next train.

Saturday 20th December: Building a Siding

We were in Dereham again today and after last weekend and the rubbish weather, we were determined to get siding three connected up. To start with the siding was tweaked into a good alignment with jacks and bars. We then set up the two closures and cut them to length, drilled the holes and fishplated them up. Everything was keyed up ready for final completion. Meanwhile, we were also preparing materials for Thuxton. The flatrol was loaded up with AS1 chairs and we also scoured the yard to get sufficient L1 and M1 chairs (the little square ones that fit in the intricate areas of points) Some scrap was cleared out and skipped and we tidied up scrap sleepers into a pile ready for selling on. Piles of ash ballast were spread next to each sleeper ready for lifting and packing the track.

Sunday 21st December: Building a Siding

For today's work in Dereham, we started off by fitting step fishplates in the new siding three as required. We then fastened down all of the remaining chairs onto the sleepers in the point and also put nuts onto the fangbolts that secure the chairs onto the western region sleepers that form the first two panels in siding three. With everything completed, we set up the new siding on jacks and began the job of lifting and packing it, with further ash ballast being tripped up as required. With this completed over the first two panels, we completed the day by running the rail crane onto the new siding.


Left: Packing track. Right: Crane in the new siding. 21st December 2008. Photos: Owen Stratford

Saturday 27th December: Vegetation Clearance

P Way held their annual post Christmas social event today, namely the Christmas Vegetation Bash. This is always an excellent way to work off the overindulgences of Christmas in a fun and relaxed way with friends, and this year was no exception. We were working at Danemoor this year. The plan was to attack the vegetation working south of the road bridge (1682) towards the summit, taking out the front line of trees and bushes on either side where they have been getting too close to the train. We managed to get about one third of the way up the cutting and have opened things up considerably, with two chainsaws on the go and five bonfires to cope with the length of track that we worked on. We also had a passing train, delivering three new coaches to the railway from Norwich, a BG, a PCV, a tank wagon and a bent Mk2f. There were two Mk3s on the back for brake force and these returned with the Advenza class 47 in the afternoon. Thanks to everyone for their hard work this year.


Clearing vegetation. 27th December 2008. Left Photo: Owen Stratford. Right Photo: Barney Stratford.