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Latest News: Archive
March 2010
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Latest News: Archive
March 2010
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D182 at Dereham. 21st March 2010. Photo: Graham Moates |
This weekend saw another successful Diesel Gala for the Mid-Norfolk Railway drawing enthusiasts from across the country to Dereham. In a first for the MNR, the Railway used the Stratford 47 Group-owned 47 580 County of Essex to bring in three other preserved locomotives by rail from the Midland Railway Centre and Barrow Hill.
The locos, 45 133, D182 (46 045) and 26 007, all performed well alongside resident engines D8069 (20 069), 50 019 "Ramillies" and 73 210. The Mid-Norfolk Railway would like to thank the loco owners and all those who have assisted with this event. Plans now turn to MNR's Class 37 Jubilee weekend planned for the 24th-26th September.
By Trevor Brackpool, Owen Stratford and Robin Stratford.
P Way were planning to make a start on another round of resleepering today, but the replacement sleepers had not yet turned up. As a result, we made our way to Thuxton. The final track panel south of the level crossing was fishplated up and the sleepers spaced out. We then collected a rail from the south end of the headshunt and moved it up to replace the 6ft rail in this last panel because the original rail had a fishplate in the middle. Some ballast was packed under the transition to the new track. With this completed, we turned our attention to the last panel next to the level crossing on the north side. Again the sleepers were spaced and keyed up whilst hanging the fishplates. Owen went back to Dereham and brought out a couple of locos once the morning's driver experience had cleared the single line. We transferred the ballast hopper from the north end to the south end of the loop (which required the two locos) and deposited its contents onto the two new panels. The panels can be jacked up through this and aligned in the future. A bit more track fettling and ballast shovelling at the end of the platform completed the day nicely and we returned to Dereham.
Today saw the completion of the visibility clearance required between Thuxton and Garvestone for the erection of the new up signal required for the Thuxton Loop.
6 volunteers continued burning of cut vegetation at Danemoor, while another 6 started visibility clearance for the accommodation crossing north of Kimberley. We are working on the upside (ie the inside of the curve) and hope to improve the situation over the next few weeks.
This is the only part of the whole railway that has never had any major clearance because the track is in the middle of the formation as it swings from downside to upside towards Danemoor.
P Way delivered a batch of 80 sleepers to Whinburgh today in order to replace those on a 1/2 mile length that were damaged by a recent tamper visit. We laid them out from Whinburgh Trout Farm to north of Toller's Lane ready for installation before starting at the southern end. Once we had dropped the sleepers off, 38 were changed with the ends being backfilled. We also replaced 4 chairs that had also been broken and installed a few ferrules in chairs that had obviously been disturbed by the works.
After 3 days of preparation including a day's chainsawing by Graeme Burton, 12 volunteers started today to burn the cut vegetation. This section proved challenging with hawthorn and huge brambles interwoven but the first 50 yard section was completed in time for the gala. The group worked extremely hard to achieve the day's target and the area was transformed. Our efforts were greatly helped by Robin Stratford who arrived early to get the main fires going plus Eddie Johnson and Pete Smith who cut by hand all day.
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Dereham-bound train passes Thuxton. 20th March 2010. Photo: Leslie Dale |
With the diesel gala in full swing, PW could not get any meaningful access to the running line. As a result we returned to Thuxton. The last two panels on the south side of the level crossing on the up loop had been left with ballast dropped into the 4 foot. The first job was to remove a small army of randy frogs that were sitting on top of the geotextile, right in our way. With this done, the panels were jacked up through the ballast to an approximate level and the ballast was packed underneath the sleepers. We then slewed the track into alignment. This was particularly pleasing as the rails on either side of the level crossing are now aligned with each other and give a flavour of things to come. We then collected a 40ft rail from the north end of the loop and swapped it with one of the ones to the north of the level crossing installed a few weeks ago, because the wear proved to be a poor match. With the main works completed, an hour or so was spent boxing off ballast around the platform.
The Wednesday gang have been continuing the vegetation clearnce at the south end of Danemoor Cutting. With the birds' nesting season virtually upon us, our usual policy of 'cut and burn' would not work and this project needs completion. So, we have just completed the vegetation cutting, which alone was a massive task undertaken by Ernie Woolley, Barry Brackpool, Graeme Burton and Paul Eldridge. There are now approximately 150 person days of difficult burning to do as most is hawthorn and blackthorn. This major clearance work will improve things in many ways and will be impressive when complete.
The P-Way gang returned to the last sleepers requiring changing between Yaxham and Dereham near to Westfield Lane. The sleepers were run out by train, with a later start than planned since none of the wagons were formed up into the train again and so required shunting. With help from the Northern Section Group, we changed all 31 sleepers and backfilled them too, completing this area for another few years.
By Toby Rawlings and Gary Hall.
Due to the bad weather over the last few months the Northern Section had fallen behind with the important task of greasing the fishplates between Dereham and Hoe. To catch up a week long blitz was organized with help from the Probation Service, with their Community Payback Workers under the supervision of our own volunteers. 44 sets of plates were removed, cleaned and greased north of Neatherd Road, while a further 19 were completed south of Bridge 1701 where the plates were in a much worse condition. Thanks to all the volunteers who made themselves available throughout the week.
The Northern Section team cleaned another 16 track joints south from Bridge 1697. Due to the low rail temperature it was impossible to fit all the fishplate bolts back on after greasing: this will have to wait until the rails expand in the heat of the summer months. At the same time another group dug out over 30 rotten sleepers north of Swanton Road.
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Clearance near Swanton Road. 21st March 2010. Photo: Matt Goodrum |
Nine northern section team members had an excellent day cutting and burning north of Swanton Road today. After the disappointment of our previous attempts at lighting fires being snowed off so far this year we had little trouble lighting and loading 4 good sized bonfires today. We were able to dispose of a large amount of pre-cut material, complete the clearance of the up side fence line and fell a few further trees that were too close to the line.
Our first job today was to reassess the avenue to County School station. We have been installing lengths of rail beside the road to encourage drivers to stay on the road and not go around the speed bumps causing damage. The local farmer has some concerns about getting his wide machinery along the road. We have some large concrete disk that are sitting in the drive at County School so we thought that using one of them instead may solve the problem. We soon had one erected and only time will tell if it will work. We then went to North Elmham and started to cut down trees for a while. The logs have been piled up and moved back to County School leaving only the branches to burn off later. Back at county School, David was working in the orchard and had piles of branches. We helped him get a fire lit and he then cleared the area. Just before we left we made an attempt to cast a new inspection pit cover.
Two Northern Section volunteers spent the day moving the cut material from last year's vegetation clearance at Neatherd Road northwards, as burning it in situ may have upset our neighbours in Dereham. This involved running the track trolley over Swanton Road level crossing, and man-handling its dilapidated southern gate, a dozen or so times.