A Bit of Training

 Tuesday 10th March

A great turn out today with 10 of us attending at the S & T workshop at Winchcombe for what was to be a day of demonstration,  fault finding procedures  and education.

Initially Peter W presented a slide show to explain how the electrical circuitry of  token machines worked:

And then a practical demo of the machines in action. To do this a pair of the token machines have been wired up to operate on the bench and Peter W and Andy D volunteering to be the signalman  at Winchcombe and Cheltenham to show how the tokens worked in practice.

With a very interested audience!

And as if that wasn't enough excitement , there followed an equally interesting presentation on telephone technology given by Mike S on the BT 700 handsets used on the railway and how to maintain them.

Then off to Winchcombe signal box locking room where a Strowger " telephone  exchange" is installed for a working demo

 We now have a lot of electrical knowledge between us, boosted by our new recruits Martin H and Mike C - this bodes well for fault finding in the many and varied systems on the railway. Kevern O continues with the setting up of the acceptance lever system between Toddington and Broadway and a SPAD warning system. More on this in the future when I understand a bit more about it!

I have been a bit tardy in publishing the previous weeks work so here is a brief summary of March 3rd.

A bit of Finishing Off at Cheltenham with a good turn out with 8 of us. Some work still to do at the new pointwork to set up the detector linkages to the point motor

Peter W checking that we have power to the unit

And two more bits of track bonding to finish off - Martin on the drill unit

The electrical work has now been completed  and all the stage one cabling replacement  project is complete. Testing has been carried out and,  except for a few small problems which have been ironed out, all is working well. 

Congratulations to all involved for carrying out a complicated project which was completed on time for the new running season.

Curly

PS

While we were in the Winchcombe locking room being Stoweraged  I took a photo of the locking trays which I think you will find interesting - here is a fine example of the mechanical lever locking that keeps the signalling safe. Worthy of a bit more training for us here to understand all the interlocking sequences  - one for the future!

Note the electrical locks connected below.

Making Connections

 Tuesday 24th Feb

Work continues with the cabling upgrade project. All the connections at the new lineside cabinets must be completed so that testing of all the systems can be carried out next Tuesday.

Mike S and Mike C have now completed connecting at Southam, Cleeve foot crossing and Station Road bridge

All looking nice and tidy! All this new cabling has now eliminated approx 14  "coffin joints" which have had high fault potential. Here is one of them with its rusty lid sitting on a brick built enclosure

Mike E has continued with cable connections at CRC so we should now be ready to do all the testing next week with all relevant signal boxes manned  for a while.

Then back at CRC some more work to do at the replaced pointwork. Quite a bit of track re- bonding using the motorised twin drilling machine. New recruit Martin applying the pressure

Bit more work required next week to set up the detectors on the point motor.

We also need to complete the re-connection of the point motor and do some track bonding at Gotherington next week. 

Curly

Re-fitting CRC Point Motor

 Tuesday 17th Feb

Now that the replacement pointwork has been installed at CRC Hunting Butts, the point motor has to be put back in position, bolted down and re-connected.

This involves the drilling 4 20mm  dia holes through the sleepers and soleplate, fitting the spreader bars (the yellow one is brand new), and connecting the 3 detector bars. Ran out of time here so the adjustment and testing will have too be done another day.

A bit of a problem occurred in Winchcombe signal box this morning - the Winchcombe/Gotherington token broke in the token machine. The small end was eventually fished out and a spare one was found and the machine reset

All sorted before the first train appeared!

On Wednesday John P and John B installed lineside boxes at the CRC distant signal and at Bishops Cleeve Station Road bridge. Plenty of cable connecting planned for this weekend.

Curly

Wednesday Supplement

 Wed 11th Feb

A few photos courtesy of John B who was helping with the cable laying under B/Cleeve foot crossing on Wednesday and heading northwards .

Through the tube:

Note the yellow ID tape on top of the cable to warn any future digging activity of the cable underneath.

And now the RRV laying the cable in the trench

Curly

Cabinet Fitting

 Tuesday 9th Feb

Back to Bishops Ceeve foot crossing today to install a lineside cabinet for the connection of the cables. A bit of digging required by John P to prepare a hole large enough for the Poetcrete to secure it - plus a bit of hammering in. A length of point rodding for mounting a cabinet is ideal.

Here it is in position

The trench has now been dug from here to the station road bridge ready for the cable to be laid on Wednesday. This will be the limit of new cable for now. It will be connected to the existing cable until we continue with the next phase.

And here the cable will pass here under the foot crossing through the tube

Attention will now move to re- installing the point motor on the new points at CRC next week.

Curly

Cabling Continues

 Tues 3rd Feb

Various activities associated with the re-cabling project  going on today and this week.

Hole boring under the Bishops Cleeve Foot Crossing was proceeding at great pace. Two approach troughs have been dug out to enable the pneumatic powered vibrating mole to approach well below the footpath. Two 1" bore tubes have been inserted - one to feed through our current cable replacement and one any future cabling that may be required (future proofing!). This photo courtesy of John B:

Mike S and Mike C have been practising their skills in the workshop today at preparing the ends of 10 pair armoured cable . Getting the tough outer layers cut off requires a well practised technique. Mike E is our expert at this and has been doing most of the new  cable connecting so far. While he is on holiday, the other two Mike's are preparing for action. Here are some examples of cable prep from Mike E

Very tough outer and inner armouring

followed by 20 grease coated wires (10 pairs) - gets a bit messy doing this on site sitting at a lineside cabinet!

So on Wednesday Mike S has been to CRC to connect sections of the cable in the lineside "shoebox" at Southam Road bridge

and then up to the Section Start signal to install an additional phone on the side of the adjacent cabinet

 

John P spent most of the day in the workshop drilling and assembling a new stretcher for the replacement pointwork at CRC

There is a great feeling of development and cooperation in S &T at the moment - so much stuff is getting done. Kevern O. is spending much time sorting out the outstanding electrical work required in Broadway and Toddington signal boxes . 

Exciting times!

Curly

Cabling in Progress

 Tuesday 27th Jan

I have been absent for the last couple of weeks , so I have a bit of catching up to do.

There has been some excellent progress with the laying of new cables between CRC and Gotherington. 18" deep trenches have now been dug from CRC section signal  to Bishops Cleeve foot crossing and cables are in the process of being buried. 

So today there was concentration on feeding the cable into the trench from the CRC distant signal to BC. This is now a very slick operation using the RRV machine ( Stevie) with the cable coil on its trailer to feed the cable into the trench

You will notice that there has been a significant amount of rainfall recently , a lot of which has ended up in the trench!

John P is hanging on to the cable so that the RRV doesn't pull it away from the connection point - think the water in the trench was aiding the loss of friction to hold it back.

It's at this point that we need to terminate the cable and connect to a cabinet on the opposite side of the track to feed the lamp on the distant signal

So we insert a "high vis" yellow pipe to route the cable under the track. A mention now to Mike E who is slaving away to make all the complicated cable connections . 

Meanwhile back at Bishops Cleeve foot crossing we have decided that the best way to route the cable over the  "waterway " that passes under the track is to insert a row of concrete troughs adjacent to the sleeper ends.

It's nice to be back shovelling ballast and thanks to our new recruit Mike C for all his assistance with the heavy lifting!

Here is one of the many cable "coffin joints"

near Southam Road bridge which will now be redundant. These are potentially joints which have been giving us problems - there are approx 17 of these with different types of cable between here and Gotherington.

John P here preparing to insert a yellow tube under the track

John P and Mike C tidying up the ballast

So with our new 10 pair armoured cable we should enjoy many years of trouble free operation

 

Curly