A total of nine of us in attendance at Winchcombe today with a lot of cleaning and painting in prospect.
First mission was to rescue a large lineside cabinet from the back of the yard:
This is to be cleaned up and converted into an oil store for our Oiling Gang's equipment at Toddington. (We have already prepared one for Broadway which will be sited behind the signal box).
A bit of carpentry required for a shelf and a new base:
We have a selection of ladders, two of which are needed for the crow's nests on the bracket signal for Broadway. Jim P and Malcolm W sort this out to make sure the two lengths are satisfactory
And then it's back to the paintbrush for Jim to bring them back to exhibition standard!
While on the subject of the bracket signal I am consigned to apply the top white gloss coat to the post and dolls
All the newly installed signals at Broadway will require lamps. These will consist of LED lights in traditional lamp casings. We have a selection of old casings which will need a fair amount of attention to make them presentable - we could do with a grit blaster for this (a lot of fiddly areas difficult to get at to clean off rust) - but Peter W has a go with emery paper and needle file:
And after several hours this is the result ready for some primer
Luckily we should have enough of these lamp casings because as we were discussing the different types Malcolm produced a brand new one of which several had been made for us some time ago.
One of the problems with the old casings is that they have a series of slots in their base to allow air to circulate through to the oil lamp - they tend to rust away badly in this area making them difficult to re-mount
In the picture above the reconditioned main signal one is on the left, a new main signal one is in the centre and a new ground signal one is on the right. The new ones are pretty faithful reproductions of the originals - I am impressed with the workmanship in making one of these.
Paul D and Mike S, two of our telephony and electrical experts were on site today continuing with the PAT testing of various equipment including the station vacuum cleaner!
Curly
At least the bracket signal is on the ground for you to paint. When on the SVR, the signals were mainly already in situ, and climbing the signal ladder to stretch out (no H&S then) was rather more like being on a trapeze than a preservation railway!!!
ReplyDeleteThe signal lamps look rather good and it's nice to know that the station staff will not have to go up the ladders every week to fill and trim the lamps.
Regards, Paul.
Yes that was one of the less glamorous jobs of a signalman. My father was a signalman with the Midland on the line between Nottingham and Lincoln (most boxes now gone) and I remember being allowed as a youngster into the box to watch the trains and see him trudging to the signals carrying the replacement lamps and heaving himself up the lsdders. How we have moved on! Hope you aren't too upset with us converting to LED's!
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