Maintenance Update

Weds 3rd:
John Tyler was first on the scene (as usual) and he responded to my plea re cleaning rail chairs.  Then Gil arrived and diverted John onto fixing things on the loco.  Bruce also joined in, nibbling away at the list of issues raised by crews recently.

John fixed the RHS valve spindle packing as well as cleaning 8 chairs.
Dixie would have been pulled into fixing things, too, but luckily I arrived with the new "oversink handwash unit", or water heater!  This was only delivered to me at 11.00 (hence I was a tad late).  So, he spent the rest of his time wiring the water heater up. 

Bruce broke from fixing things (i.e repacking LHS injector delivery clack cap (see attached), and tightening bolts on the running board) to nip home and make a T-section of 15mm copper water pipe, which we inserted into the cold supply to feed the heater.

Gil spent much time under the loco figuring out how to fix the bottom of the ashpan (which has warped yet again).  I believe John Cruxon was bending ears about the difficulty in raking ash out of our ashpan!

Gil also measured the axlebox clearances with his long feeler gauge.

John (Daily) Mayell popped in and cleaned about 3 rail chairs and collected his new share certificate.

I finished off a bright red bootscraper (special order for a retiring fireman (bee-bah-bee-bah fireman)), repainted my Mary's birthday bootscraper (for 12th April), and had a good grind on some bolts on the rail chair stock.

Thurs 4th:
I've gone away!

Roger


Saturday 6th (info supplied by Bruce):

A bit of a mixed day.

The front part of the ashpan had distorted upwards preventing the rake from entering, and thus making it difficult to get the ash out.

On Wednesday Gilbert straightened the bottom of the ashpan, using clamps, and today Paul Stratford, assisted by Gilbert, welded it in position.

Paul also suggested that we make a spacer to hold the damper door fully open, to assist ash disposal.

Roger Deane got the water heater working and changed some of the wiring in the kitchen area.

Bruce started to replace the gland packing on the cylinder lubrication Combining Valve but hit a snag when the gland nut fouled the operating lever before unscrewing far enough to insert the new packing.

After studying the drawing and consulting Andrew Meridith it became apparent that the operating lever on the front would need to be removed, but it was stuck fast and appeared to be pressed on.

Our new extractor should pull it off, but was too big to fit into the space available, so it was abandoned until next time as it was now getting well into the afternoon.

Fred had arrived for lunch and when finished, Fred, Gilbert and Roger D decamped to Winchcombe to work on the Siphon.

Bruce