No excuses for poor timekeeping today! The Toddington Station clock is now receiving its final black paint makeover after its mechanical/electrical overhaul somewhere down south. Here it is , almost second perfect, on the bench in the S & T coach at Winchcombe:
You will have noticed from a previous blog that there is a large pile of point rodding sitting in the yard at Winchcombe which was recently collected from the Great Central Railway at Loughborough. I learnt yesterday that this rodding has quite an interesting history. Apparently it came previously from the Wells and Walsingham Narrow Gauge Railway in Norfolk where it was used as rails. I mention this because one edge of the rodding has been rolled over by train wheels producing a sharp lip which we have decided must be removed because it is a bit of a hazard to handling and is a potential water trap. So, you know what's coming next! There are about 130 eighteen foot long lengths to angle grind to remove this lip plus a significant amount of rust and pitting to remove. This should keep us busy for a few weeks. We may need a bit more for Broadway but fingers crossed.we have enough here.
But first things first. The ends of the rodding have a connecting fishplate bolted in. Unfortunately the bolts used are undersize and must be replaced with close fit bolts to prevent any movement during operation. The nuts were well rusted onto the bolts so it was necessary to cut off the off the bolt heads
With an angle grinder - this kept John P busy for most of the day:
Curly
PS Have to admit that we had time off to watch the Race Trains pass through Winchcombe station well tooled up with Guinness and champagne - great to see the Railway in action again.
You deserve time off to watch the trains go by! BTW, when the point rodding is treated, would it cost to much to have it hot dipped galvanised? just a thought. I do not envy you with all that grinding work to be done!
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Paul & Marion.
Yes. Shouldn't take us too long to do when we get a good team in next week! We have a few well experienced grafters with an angle grinder! Cheaper that way - would rather see the money spent on rail and ballast. It is proposed that the new steel rodding stools we have made "in-house" for going down the platform area may be galvanised. Will attempt to get you a representative picture next week of the many stools ( we are talking in the hundreds) we have ready for Broadway.
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