Future covered workshop and storage space (especially for carriages) ?

At first sight the cost per carriage seems high, but a large part of the cost is down to the earthworks needed to raise and level the site. However, it doesn't include either purchase (the site is on a long lease) or a separate maintenance facility, although it will include some "extras" like a full length pit on one road, some internal access staging, a steam heating plant and signalling alterations

 

http://www.abrail.co.uk/SBPhotographs.htm

Steam heating plant? I hope it’s authentic using a redundant locomotive from the linear scrapyard.

 

Sadly not! It will be a modern industrial boiler, to be used both for testing repairs to steam heating systems and also for carriage pre-heating.

 

On the NYMR at Newbridge is the PW Shed, this is 2 road by approx 45m.
Total cost of the building was £75k with a further £15k for spray on roof insulation.
All funded by York Area Group by sale of recycling materials mostly newspapers.

Currently housing 2 Tampers, a Ballast regulator, a Brake van, a Snowplough and a Sealion ballast hopper.

 

Could such a plant be used to steam test a repaired loco boiler without the need to light a fire in it?

 

I would imagine that would depend on a number of variables. Steam heating is normally around 40psi and a relatively small volume whereas locos are typically 160psi and upwards, so a much larger boiler capacitythan otherwise required would be needed.

 

My hunch would be that the rate of radiative heat loss from the structure of an unlagged boiler would probably exceed the power output of a portable steam generator, i.e. you’d just end up piping in steam and condensing it to water at ambient pressure inside the boiler. (Would be interesting to see a calculation though).

Tom

 

In theory, yes. That's what BR used to do. You would need a plant with a SWP higher than the boilers you are going to test, though.

 

Thanks everyone for your responses to my post. It seems for a basic storage shed you are looking at between £10,000 and £20,000 per carriage. Anything more and you're adding in facilities, which bumps the cost up. So if a railway has 30 carriages then you're looking at about £600,000. By the time you're adding in workshop facilities, electric, water, inspection pits and so on, it's probably looking towards the $750,000.

That amount of money might get you 7 to 8 carriages through a 'paid restoration', but definitely better to invest the money in covered accommodation to protect 30 carriages and provide the facility to restore them all. Its the way to go, but how do you raise that kind of money?:

Lottery grants
Alternative grants
Fund raising
Sponsorship
Donations

What is the more efficient way I wonder?

 

Lottery grants come with many strings attached and many hoops to jump through and even then the end result will be something totally different to your initial idea.

 

HLF is cutting back spending big time as lottery ticket sales have crashed...

 

If we're talking ruthless efficiency? 50p-£1 extra on tickets and ring fence the dosh raised explaining why the price has gone up.

You'd raise that cash in a few years depending on which member of the premier league it comes down to. This, of course, assumes you're not going for an NYMR style "appropriate shed" and instead just want and need somewhere to cover your stock.

If you instead went with an industrial/barn style steel building it might work out a touch cheaper.

 

That would not surprise me as they have a lot more competition now. I suspect many now support the hospital lottery - hospitals are more likely to to be seen as more important than a railway shed, carriage or sports facility. I also think they did themselves no favours increasing the stake by the addition of the 'colour' number part. I never yet bought a ticket by the way.

 

Again thanks for the replies. It sounds like the NYMR Carriage Maintenance and Storage Complex is going to be the envy of a lot of railways, but I wish them all the success. A railway like that really does need such a facility to keep the carriage fleet sustainable and reduce cost in the long term.

I have another question though. In our small single carriage shed we do have a small visitor room with a TV playing videos we have made of our restorations. Given that, for the large part, public money is used to build such facilities, do any of these accommodate visitors so they can safely see the work going on and maybe either lead to donations or better still become volunteers?

 

The Bluebell's c&w workshop at Horsted Keynes has an L-shaped gallery at one end, accessible to the public. From that gallery, you can see the ongoing restoration activity in the workshop; there are also displays showing the development of carriages, and some of the techniques used in restoration (for example, a seat that has been sectioned in various states of trim starting at bare frame all the way through to finished article). There's also a slide show showing photos of recovery of some of our carriages from grounded bodies.



RD7069. Bluebell Railway Carriage Works. by Ron Fisher, on Flickr

Not my photo, but shows the arrangement - the photographer is standing in one leg of the "L" which is raised to give an overall view; the end of the other leg can be seen on the right with some of the displays and the film playing.

The Isle of Wight workshop also has a walk through that allows viewing the restoration activity. I'm sure there are others.

Tom

 

The new NYMR facility will not have public access to any of it, but that's down to its location. There is still the question of what will become of the existing C & W facilities, and it's possible that they may continue in some form of use with public access

 

If you are designing your own overhaul facility, take note of the generous working and access space around the vehicles in the photo of the Bluebell's works in the post above.

Sawdust.

 

Cost of an 80 metre 2 road insulated tin shed is about £75k - £85k. That's just the shed. Add infrastructure etc. as funds permit.

Our problem is that, our site (at the moment) only has a rail connection. A big part of the cost will be providing the slip roads on and off a 70 MPH rated dual carriageway to gain vehicular access.

 

Further to the question of public access, this was in the Bluebell e-Newsletter about regular guided tours: this is in addition to the public access via the viewing gallery:

Go "Behind the Scenes" at Horsted Keynes​

As part of the Railway's ongoing plans to develop the visitor attractions at Horsted Keynes, the Carriage & Wagon Department will be running Behind the Scenes tours of the carriage works every Saturday at 2 p.m. starting on 26 May, 2018, and running until the end of September (except on Model Railway Weekend, 23 June). ​

This is an opportunity to see ongoing restoration work to our historic collection of carriages and wagons in areas that are not normally open to the public.​

This is also an opportunity for visitors who wouldn't normally get off at Horsted Keynes to make their acquaintance (or re-acquaintance) with what is probably the largest station on a Heritage Railway in the British Isles. The opportunity fits in well with the strategy of offering much more than just a train ride and ensuring that visitors can make a whole day (or more) of it at the Railway.​

The tour is timed so that visitors can eat lunch at Sheffield Park or East Grinstead and then hop on the 1:30 p.m. from Sheffield Park or the 1:15 p.m. from East Grinstead to Horsted Keynes to see what's going on in the workshops.​

The tours are free, although donations towards the Maunsell Restaurant Car are always very welcome! We look forward to seeing you in the C&W works!​

 

That's great. I think it is very important to be able to allow visitors round for a look as they have taken the time to visit the railway and part with money to help us continue what we do. Out current little shed has a visitor room and if anyone pokes their head round we engage and tell them what we are getting up to and show them around.

I know of another shed not to far from us where they charge for people to look round and quite abrupt with it too to anyone who wanders in. However they do get a guided tour and a stock book. I know there are Health & Safety considerations to consider as well, but it is important to be able to spare time for visitors and invite them to donate if they want, rather than demand it.

But that's just me. Besides, you never know who they might be. Perhaps a future volunteer, or member, or benefactor who would be willing to support your aims an objectives, which some railways have been fortunate enough to find out.

Here's another question: Has anyone considered renewable energy to keep running cost down? Is it a viable thing? I'm just thinking that is a carriage shed, given its large surface area, were to be used for solar generation, would it actually save the electric bill? Especially when during the week when there is usually less activity in a shed.