No news … must be good news.
Wednesday 20th
Following on from our help to the P&O Group, our team got stuck in beneath their loco again.
Left is Rob; right is Bruce, and Gilbert is under there somewhere! That’s Andrew (red arrow) representing the P&O Group.
Here’s Rob removing a spring hanger. There are two cotter pins in each hanger - one at the top and one at the bottom. The P&O guys had helpfully removed the bottom cotter … it’s the top one that needs to come out!
With the top one out, the hanger drops down and out. Then there is a plate on top of the spring to be removed.
Rob again, in a relatively spacious area, removing another hanger.
With both hangers out, the spring has to be rotated (bottom pulled towards Rob) to release the yoke at the point of suspension. Then the spring comes crashing down! Once all six springs are off, the horn ties have to be released. This needs four nuts undoing (thankfully, they had all been loosened by P&O guys beforehand). However, the horn tie is a tad heavy, and also come crashing down. Rob’s thumb can vouch for that!
There’s not a lot of room under there! Fitting these all back together when the underkeep pads have been replaced is going to be a challenge. It will have to be done over a pit; otherwise these lumps are just too heavy to lift back from this position.
By end of play, we had all six springs off and four of the six horn ties. It was a shame, because I thought we’d got them all off, but Rob & I started in the middle; moved to the front, then forgot about the back ones … doh! 😒
Roger
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