Lineside Fence Repair and Maintenance

Over the past calendar year, sections of the lineside fence have been identified in need of repair.

David spent the day leading the Youth Group in completing the task of repairing and completing some maintenance tasks before Elf Express running.

One area which was identified early on in the year was near the Coast Road Bridge. Here Youth Group members are repairing the hole with new sections of timber wire fence.

Slightly further down the line, another gap had appeared. This was tended to as well.

Coal Delivery

With Elf Express just around the corner, a fresh batch of coal was delivered today for Ashington No.5 which will be hauling steam this year.

Sentinel 9559 New Bunker Assembly

Michael and Robert have begun the assembly of the new bunker for Sentinel 9559.

This included drilling and welding metal angles and sheets in place to the existing rear buffer beam and frame.

Robert using the Bridgeport milling machine to drill bolt holes for the angle supports before...

Welding washers in place to hold the sheet metal for the bottom half of the bunker to enable welding of multiple metal sheets to complete the bunker construction.

Miniature Railway Training

A training day for the Miniature Railway was led by Adam, training Youth Group members on skills of operational running, this included preparing steam, battery and diesel locomotives, passenger safety, and maintenance.

With supervision from Matt, some members light and prepare one of the steam locomotives for running.

Each member took a turn in driving a battery, diesel and steam locomotives with their fellow members acting as passengers to and from Engine House Halt.

The Miniature Railway serves as a great tool for training younger volunteers and equipping them with skills that are required to progress them onto the operational aspects of the railway.

NCB No.69 Reverser Block Fitting

 George has successfully bolted the reverser block to the reverser on NCB No.69.

Although the block fitting was faultless, the central hole has to be reamed to a larger size to enable the new pivot pin to fit.

After this, Cameron applied a coat of primer shortly before painting top coat red.

NCB No.69 Reverser Block

 With the assembly of the reverser quadrant picking up speed, George has completed some minor work to the reverser block which provides the pivot point for the reverser.

Having previously machined a new pin that goes through the reverser block, he has drilled and reamed a taper hole to fit a taper pin for security

George drilling the new hole.

Hand reaming the drilled hole for taper pin.

BESTT Riveting Course

Four volunteers completed a BESTT riveting course this week, having all undertaken a theoretical and practical assessment. All passing with flying colours!

With more and more volunteers becoming competent with practical skills such as riveting places the association in good stead for completing more complex maintenance and restoration work in-house.

Ben and Michael complete one of many test pieces.

Aaran heats up one of the many rivets used over the week using the Oxy-Propane.

Michael and Aaran rivet, with Ben and Robert looking on.