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Latest News
Volunteer News
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Latest News
Volunteer News
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Southern Section reports by Trevor Brackpool, Roy Malyon, Toby Rawlings and Owen Stratford.
Northern Section reports by Toby Rawlings and Gary Hall.
The P Way team spent the day redistributing ballast in the platform at Thuxton to present a tidy image for our passengers. We should have been greasing fishplates, but the overnight temperature of 0°C forced a postponement. As the rails cool, they contract and it becomes impossible to remove the plates.
P Way carried on with this year's fishplate greasing. Starting just south of Yaxham Road in Dereham, we completed as far as the 9 mile post in Whinburgh Cutting, a distance of nearly two miles. The unseasonably warm weather meant that the plates came off reasonably easily and the rain was insufficient to stop the job.
P Way started on this year's programme of fishplate greasing today. We grease every other set of plates working south from Dereham. Each plate has to be undone, disassembled and laid out before the second party follows up and cleans off the old hard grease and inspects the plates for cracks. The final group applies fresh grease and reassembles the plates before the nuts are re-tightened. It was borderline on being too cold to do the job, but we had a go anyway. When it is too cold then the rails contract and prevent you removing the plates. We had a few awkward ones but generally the job was going OK until we got to a few hundred metres south of Yaxham Road. At this point nearly every plate was impossible to remove and so after a site conference, we returned to Dereham and greased the joints around the yard points and down the MOD road instead. The stock was also pulled out of the main platform so we could complete that area too before we called it a day. Pete also serviced all of the points, cleaning the slide chairs and applying new grease to them and the checkrails. Let's hope that it is warmer next week.
We completed the strimming of the section between the one-mile post and Chapel Lane Bridge (1674) in Wymondham today.
Norfolk County Council contractors removed silt from the huge silt trap just north of Yaxham level crossing today. This silt trap is on our land but only takes water from the highway drainage system and, as happened last time, the 'sucking' lorry had to be emptied before it could complete the task.
The Wednesday group enjoyed fine weather as they continued clearance of the upside embankment between bridges 1689 and 1690 south of Yaxham.
We have recently made lamp- and sign-posts from the rails that we removed when Yaxham level crossing was replaced. We finished installing three new lamp-posts, and also the new station sign at Yaxham. New electric wiring will be installed in the future.
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Original crank for Y4 signal. 8th January 2012. Photo: Owen Stratford |
Trevor and Owen spent the morning working on some archaeology at Yaxham. We are assessing the feasibility of re-erecting a signal gantry adjacent to the level crossing and wanted to find out if the original base was still present and if so what condition it was in. This is located just outside of our property in what is now the station cottage, but still on the former platform. We had a hunch that something was there because a tractor tyre had been used as a flower planer for many years in an odd location. To start off with the bramble shrubbery was removed and we dug out the soil and bricks from the tyre. This was then removed and we cleaned down to the 1960s platform surface. Right where we were expecting there was a mound of concrete. This was broken out with a great deal of effort and underneath we found what we were looking for - four pieces of angle iron sticking up out of the ground. The base was in surprisingly good condition having been flame cut at ground level and still had the crank in situ. With the mission accomplished, we photographed what we had found and backfilled the hole.
With a good turnout and nice weather we set off today to Crownthorpe bridge (1677) with 31 235 after a slight delay due to the failure of our booked loco. The P Way job was to replace the waybeam packer under the 6ft rail, the first time that we have attempted this and so we allowed plenty of time. The bridge is constructed as a set of main beams with cross-girders spanning between them parallel to the sleepers. Above these sit two way beams each a 2ft square baulk of wood which supports the track. There is then a packer that is 5 inches deep and the length of the bridge secured to each of these with conventional wooden sleepered track resting on top. One of these packers had started to go rotten and so required replacing. We first had to remove the boards running down the 4ft that formed a walkway in order to gain access. This was now redundant as a replacement had been constructed over the lifted side of the bridge. The walkway supports were then cut back to the edge of the cess waybeam. With this preparatory work completed, all of the bolts and fittings were removed and the track was jacked up. The 30ft long packing was then persuaded to move from the place that it has occupied for past 60 or more years! The new beam was positioned alongside and everything liberally coated in creosote in order to prolong the life of our work. We then fitted the packer and lowered the track back on top before fettling the track by inserting hardwood shims under the chairs to take up voids and remove twist. We then ran the loco over the bridge to bed it in and fettled it finally.
Meanwhile several other jobs were going on. Roland was working on boxing off ballast and Barney completed the strimming of the embankment started after Christmas. We also loaded up firewood that had been sold into a van.
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Left Photo: The work site at Bridge 1677. Right Photo: The deck of the bridge, showing the new packer. 7th January 2012. Photos: Owen Stratford |
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Strimming continued south of the Tiffey foot crossing at Wymondham working towards the Abbey platform. This is the third Saturday of continuous strimming and the results of our efforts can now be seen very clearly on the downside inside of the curve near the 1 mile 20 chain marker post.
The Wednesday gang got off to a good start for 2012 on the 4th. by continuing the upside vegetation clearance near Bridge 1689 south of Yaxham. We are working towards bridge 1690 and expect that it will take at least 5 weeks to complete this section.
Barney and Owen spent the morning in Dereham continuing with grinding the stainless steel weld rail head deposit. We only had a couple of hours but managed another couple of metres.
Today was our annual post Christmas Vegetation Bash. We had selected the area to the north of Crownthorpe Bridge (1677) to be attended to. This particular stretch has several diseased or dead trees in it that required cutting down anyway and we removed those around in addition in order to open up the views. The views are both from the train and also of the line from the adjacent road for photographers. This is a very popular spot and often features in magazines. There were two chainsaws on the go and Paul brought along his Tirfor. This is a winch that had to be used on a great many of the trees in order to pull them down safely in the intended direction. We had 14 people working on the job and by the end of the day we had cleared about 80 metres and created two huge wood piles and a large bonfire. A big thank you to all who helped.
Trevor and Owen used the morning for a trial of grinding the stainless steel deposit on the rail head at the automatic crossings in Dereham. BR had installed this to assist in the reliable operation of the track circuits, but it results in the line being restricted to 5mph. Normally on automatic crossings, the train would be able to accelerate as soon as the front of the train had passed over and we were seeing if we could reduce the size of the deposit with a view to smoothing the passage of the wheels. Stainless steel is very hard and after three hours, we had used up all of our discs and only ground 2 yards of track!
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Clearance near Yaxham Up Distant. 17th December 2011. Photo: Owen Stratford |
P Way continued on with a small clearance project adjacent to Yaxham's up distant signal today. We worked our way towards Dereham removing another few stands of scrub and trees in order to open up the visibility of the signal. This has the added bonus of making the line more visible from the adjacent road and will increase the profile of the railway here, with a certain amount of free publicity from the trains being visible.
Strimming continued near the Tiffey Footpath crossing at Wymondham. There is much cut vegetation to collect and burn, plus we will be continuing towards Wymondham Abbey Station as soon as we get a chance.
For many weeks, the Wednesday group have continued vegetation clearance just south of the Mustard Pot Bridge (1689) in Whinburgh Cutting. This lengthy project continues and has already produced benefits with a drier track-bed and better views for our passengers.
The group have also undertaken three drainage repairs: at Toller's Lane; at Wymondham, near the Tiffey Walk Foot-crossing; and just north of Whinburgh Bridge [1690] where a section of broken pipe had washed part of the embankment away.
During the winter months much strimming of embankments takes place to control brambles and saplings so that grasses and wild flowers are encouraged. Work has started near Rash's Green in Dereham and south of Chapel Lane Bridge [1674] at Wymondham.
At odd times during the last month work has taken place to erect a 100 yard long fence at the northern end of Thuxton platform. A few dropper bars still need to be fixed but apart from that, it is complete.
There were only three of us out on PW today so we were limited as to what we could do. We spent the time on the embankment out at Yaxham up distant on the first of two weekends clearing scrub around the signal. Barry wielded his chainsaw whilst Trevor and Owen kept the fire stoked up. It was quite heavy going as we had to drag everything up the bank.
P Way spent the weekend with a lorry travelling around the region collecting donated items. We picked up a superb Westinghouse signal frame from Ongar, the rest of the Seven Sisters frame from Downham Market and two HA point machines from the midlands. This equipment will enable us to fit out Thuxton and Dereham boxes as well as setting up trap switches for the new siding at Thuxton.
With the work on the turnout in Dereham completed ahead of schedule, we had an extra bonus job that could be fitted in before the start of the santa trains. As a result, we took out a works train to Thuxton. On the way out we delivered pipes to Yaxham, sleepers to near Garvestone and collected some scrap fence wire. After arriving at Thuxton, we set up the crane and used it to unload the switches removed from the yard point in Dereham. Although heavily worn on the diverging route, the main is not too bad and these will be installed as trap switches in the siding - recycling at its best! It does not matter for the worn side to be there as if a train ever reaches it then it will be derailed by the traps anyway. We then worked our way through the station and collected the remaining rail offcuts, spare sleepers, a concrete gate post and unloaded some chippings for the platform. Meanwhile Trevor and the other half of the PW gang were having a pleasant time trolleying up some slag ballast in order to top up four panels of track in the down loop that were in need of work following earlier tamping. All of these jobs were completed by mid afternoon, and with the train loco returned from its test run, we collected wood on the return journey, delivering it to a house that backed onto the line.
Barry and Owen spent a productive day in Dereham. We started off by loading up a pair of switches onto the tench wagon that will be used at Thuxton to form traps in the siding. With this completed, the remainder of the train was loaded ready for next week. The rail lifting beam was stowed on board and some sleepers and a wagon load of pipes was also loaded. The works train for next week was then formed up before we moved into the MLV after lunch. We then spent a useful three hours clearing up inside the MLV, removing scrap and transferring spares back to their designated storage locations. We used the opportunity to tidy and stack the remaining gear as well.
With a slightly delayed start due to a flat battery on one of the DMU cars, we used the time to carry on backfilling ballast in front of the point in Dereham. After about 45 mins of charging, we were in business and so set off to attend to today's job. We were lifting and packing around 20 yards of track adjacent to Yaxham level crossing where there was a residual dip in the track to correct. This was finished by lunchtime and we then spent the next couple of hours barrowing up ballast from the platform to top up the beds. Unfortunately there was none on site to hand. We then piled back into the railcar and set about tackling a few odd jobs. We delivered sleepers to near Thuxton ready for next weekend's job and then changed a couple of cracked fishplates that had been reported in by the section walkers.
Today saw us reinstall all of the signalling fittings. The first job was to mount the facing point lock casting, which involved digging a big hole as the bolts are inserted from the bottom of the sleeper! With this in place, the new lock stretcher bar, switch extensions and insulations were fitted. This set the front end to the correct opening and we could then fit the three new stretcher bars. Having adjusted these to the desired dimensions, they were marked and removed for drilling. This was duly completed and the stretchers bolted up into their final positions. Whilst all of this was going on, the cranks and drives from the ground frame were being reassembled. We were upgrading the drive to the standard basket lug as opposed to the previous turnbuckle type which is not so easily maintainable. The final job for the day was to cut in the facing point lock into the lock stretcher. We also had some help with completing the packing and the backfilling.
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Left photo: Notching the facing point lock bar. Right photo: Installed lock bar being adjusted. 13th November 2011. Photos: Owen Stratford |
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Back in Dereham, work continued on the new switches on the Main to MOD road turnout. We changed all of the timbers, inserting new hardwood ones. These were aligned and gauged before we drilled and screwed them down. We then also changed the first six sleepers off of the fronts of the points, also inserting new hardwood ones. With this finished, we made a start on the lifting and packing of the new track.
A small group of three spent the day working on the turnout at the south end of Dereham. We moved new rails into position and cut and drilled these to fit into the available spaces. Lift fishplates were fitted as appropriate and a new insulated joint installed ready for future track circuits. By the end of the day the track was ready for the re-timbering next week.
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Installing the new switches. 5th November 2011. Photo: Owen Stratford |
With a month of no scheduled passenger service, P Way started on the programme of winter maintenance. We were renewing the switches on the southern turnout into the main platforms in Dereham at the station throat. The old ones and all of the signalling fittings were dismantled and removed and we then craned in the new switches. The old ones were welded to the adjacent rails at the heels and so new rails were craned over for these too. The crane then was used to perform other duties around the station including a trial lift of the footbridge parts and replacing the exhaust silencer on the class 73. With the switches in position, we then set about moving up rails on the approach in order to square the switch blades. All of the ballast was also dug out ready for replacing the timbers next week.
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Relief drain at Yaxham. 22nd October 2011. Photo: Alex Neale |
Ever since we started work on the MNR we have been trying to solve the flooding problem at Yaxham.
Over a square mile of farmland drainage and road drains all converge at Yaxham level crossing causing flooding on the road to a depth of nearly a foot and the whole railway on both sides of the level crossing. Modern field drainage gives a quicker run off onto our property than the pipes were designed for.
We have spent much money and effort over the years even JCBing a quarter of a mile open ditch - soon to be piped - to try to get the water away, but the missing drainage link from the up cess south of the Yaxham Light Railway to the first pit to the north of the Level Crossing has remained a mystery.
However, whilst the level crossing was replaced last month, the main pipe was discovered in the 6 foot.
During this week 8 catch-pits have been uncovered and 2 breaks in the pipe have been repaired plus 2 more pits have been located. Of these so far, 4 are large pits and at least 2 wheelbarrowfuls of sediment have been removed from each.
Much work still remains and some pit lids may need raising. However, the crucial thing is that the whole system is now linked to overflow through the new pipe under the level crossing.
Throughout October the Wednesday group have continued vegetation clearance just south of the Mustard Pot Bridge (1689) in Whinburgh Cutting. This lengthy project continues and has already produced benefits with a drier track-bed and better views for our passengers.
In addition, during the last two Wednesdays of the month we used the service trains to move materials to various places along the line so that they are located ready for use during the winter months. The redundant rails from Yaxham level crossing have been cut up to form catch-pit covers for Kimberley and, using the better bits, for lamp-posts for both Yaxham and Thuxton. The Wednesday group moved these about so that they can be prepared for erection.
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Cutting vegetation in Whinburgh Cutting. 29th October 2011. Photo: Owen Stratford |
P Way worked on two fronts today. Trevor and Arnold completed the last three panels worth of ballast work at Toller's Lane. Barry, Owen and Pete meanwhile were removing trees back in the cutting. A good bonfire was soon roaring away after only one match to light it and it was consuming the cuttings faster than we could clear up the trees! Once again it was unseasonably warm and we were working in shirt sleeves. An early finish saw Trevor and Owen take the train down to Kimberley to recover the PW trolleys back to Thuxton and the rest of the group had a well-earned rest.
We spent the day in Whinburgh cutting continuing with the ballast regulating today. With the end in sight, a further six chains were completed towards Toller's Lane.
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Slates on the new roof. 18th October 2011. Photo: Gary Hall |
A group of us spent the day collecting slates from Dereham and putting them on the roof of the signal box at Thuxton. There are only two more rows to add, but they will need trimming to fit along the ridge of the roof. All of the fascias have now also been installed. If all goes well, we hope to have the outside of the roof completed within another 2 or 3 visits.
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Newly-installed drainage troughing. 15th October 2011. Photo: Owen Stratford |
A small P Way crew started off today at Yaxham. One of the jobs remaining after the renewal of the level crossing was to replace the drainage troughing that catches surface runoff water. We replaced this into the first bed off of the edge of the highway which required digging out the compacted bed. We then fitted troughs at either end of the pipe under the road so that the balancing drain can be brought into use.
Seven Northern Section members spent the day at the Summit between Swanton Road and Northall Green. We dug out, changed and backfilled nine odd sleepers which represent the last really bad examples up to the 13 milepost (Bridge 1697). After lunch we got the sighting boards out to jack and pack a dip in the six-foot rail which ironically enough is located at one of the highest points on the whole line.
With this year's vegetation clearance season well under way now, the Southern Section team have been making inroads into the scrub on the lifted side of Whinburgh Cutting.
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The rafters of the new roof. 7th October 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
Three volunteers have made a start on installing a pitched roof on the new signal box at Thuxton with all the trusses being delivered to site, hauled up the side of the scaffold and nailed in place. Also today a number of old sleepers were moved from Danemoor Cutting to Kimberley Park Station ready to receive the former Soham signal box.
The Wednesday crew assisted S&T today and went to Kimberley. We had a new level crossing gate delivered to replace the temporary one that was installed after a car ran into it. The gate makers were also there to fit the gate and we provided the muscle to move it into position. After traffic management was set up, the old gate was quickly removed before the new one was fitted and adjusted. All of the gate furniture was replaced and we also fitted a Black's Lock to the gate. This is a signalling lock that provides a more secure method of holding the gate closed. It is our first one on the line and will eventually be linked in to signalling.
Owen and John were on site at Yaxham whilst the tarmac contractor relaid the road. They started off installing a base layer, before adding two layers of tarmac. The entire site was cleaned up and reopened to traffic at 18:30 after the tarmac had had a few hours to cool down. Owen then went to Dereham and painted gate metalwork ready for Tuesday at Kimberley.
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Left photo: Base of the new road. Right photo: Tarmaced surface of the level crossing. 3rd October 2011. Photos: Owen Stratford |
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Again we were at Yaxham struggling with the heat. All of the timber edges for the road were cut and fitted into position. Around the crossing, the beds were cleaned and refilled with ballast where silt had washed off of the highway, damaging the crossing in the process and one of the reasons for us renewing it. The old track materials were also sorted and tidied, with spikes being removed and the sleepers graded ready for sale.
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Cutting a metal pipe to form a duct for future signalling equipment. 1st October 2011. Photo: Barney Stratford |
Record breaking October temperatures continued today which made working very hard. We were back at Yaxham and reconstructed the permanent way across the level crossing. The new sleepers were laid out before we installed the two new running rails. These were cut to length and fishplated up. We then gauged and screwed down the track. Unfortunately we then noticed that we had inadvertently ended up with a hump in the track and so had to dig it down again. With this done, the new crossing was packed to level and the works train run over it to look for any soft spots. The train then went off to Thuxton to deliver stone for the platform whilst we installed the checkrails. Finally the tie ins to the crossing were fettled. These will require further work to sort out the alignment in the winter. The drains and fences gang were also out with us and installed a new drain under the road along with some signalling ducts. Whilst there we actually found an original drain which had long eluded us.
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Removal of the old track and fittings. 30th September 2011. Photo: Owen Stratford |
Today saw us make a start on the renewal of Yaxham level crossing. We had a JCB on site and our tarmac contractor to break out all of the old road surface. We then dismantled the old crossing before the formation was excavated and levelled. Whilst all of this was in progress, the rail ends at the extremities of the crossing were cut back and re-drilled. This gives us fresh fishplate surfaces and also removes one set of joints from the edge of the carriageway where they were difficult to maintain. It was blisteringly hot and so we were glad to finish for the day.
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Nick digging silt out of the drains. 25th September 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
With seven Northern Section members on site today we achieved a great deal in and around County School. Tasks undertaken include clearing and burning vegetation near the P-Way Hut; greasing the points; removal and collection of the remaining wooden fence posts by the Road-Rail Machine; the uncovering, surveying and digging out of catchpits between Bridges 1706 and 1707. The original plan to retain soil behind the culvert entrance was swiftly cancelled after locating a wasps' nest in the undergrowth!
S&T had a maintenance day at Thuxton today whilst the loop was switched in for the gala. All of the points were mechanically gauged and lubricated. Whilst we were on site one of the point machines decided to develop an intermittent fault where the detection was lost. This was traced to inefficient snubbing of the motor causing the lock to spring back just enough to cause the detection contacts in the rocker to break. Some adjustment (after a lot of head scratching) solved the problem. We also installed a terminal block in the signal head for T2 to assist in cable testing before testing all of the track circuits and power supplies.
While gala trains whizzed up and down, four P-Way volunteers spent the day topping up low ballast beds in Whinburgh Cutting, completing another seven chains worth.
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Changing sleepers. 18th September 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
A team of eight Northern Section members carried on from last week, when we actually changed 27 sleepers, to complete the task by replacing another 17 north of Norwich Road in Dereham. We also managed to clean and backfill the ballast, tidy up the old sleepers and work on the bouncing joint next to the crossing ready for next week's Diesel Gala.
With an early start we were able to load, trolley and lay out the new sleepers before it got busy. However, restrictions on the main point in the station meant that Operations had to shunt rolling stock through our work site twice during the day. This limited what we could do when because Class 50 locos and missing sleepers tend not to mix well.
The Southern Section team spent the day carrying out vegetation clearance in Whinburgh Cutting. There is a particularly tasty plum tree growing here that keeps hungry volunteers sustained at this time of year. It's quite hard to tell apart from the surrounding scrub when it's not in fruit, so we decided to clear out the scrub to give it some light and make it more obvious which tree is to be kept.
With eight Northern Section group members on site working from Neatherd Road LC back towards Dereham Station we managed to change and backfill ballast around 26 sleepers today. Drilling and screwing down of the new sleepers was kindly undertaken by P-Way's Trevor who spent the afternoon with us. Hopefully next Sunday we shall complete this work which is aimed at improving this short section of track before the Diesel Gala at the end of the month.
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Check chairs. 10th September 2011. Photo: Toby Rawlings |
Today saw us working at Yaxham. We were preparing for the forthcoming renewal of the level crossing. The first job of the day was to load up some materials (chairs, screws, etc) onto the first train and travel out to site. Once there we spent the morning fixing check chairs to one end of each of the new sleepers to go under the road. This will save us time on the weekend. We then had a delivery of rails, pipes and edging timbers using the works train in the lunchtime slot and these were efficiently unloaded in the short hour-long window. This train was rescheduled from the previous week. With these rails on site and having measured up and decided how the crossing will be installed, we set about cutting them to length and bending the flare ends onto the checkrails using the jim-crow. It was a surprisingly warm day and so this seemed like a good point to have an early finish.
Today seven members of the Northern Section team dug out 43 sleepers ready for changing between Norwich and Neatherd Road Level Crossings in Dereham. We also managed to collect together the majority of the rubble from this section, repair several lengths of retaining wall and clear the last of the vegetation from the wall and fence above. After sheltering from a heavy shower in the Cottage we finished a little earlier than normal before it really started to pour down.
Unfortunately our planned works train today was cancelled at the last minute because of some problems shunting the stock at Dereham the previous week and so we had a hasty change of plans. Instead, we returning to Whinburgh and carried on with the ballast work through the cutting.