2016 and onward

A new year begins and the GWR Preservation Group is pleased to announce that its RSH ‘Birkenhead’ No.7386 is to remain at Elsecar Heritage Railway in Barnsley, (their website is www.elsecarrailway.co.uk ) for the coming season. Our locomotive is seen to be giving good service without any major problems, that do sometimes happen when steaming any sort of heritage locomotive, large or small.

Back in the yard, our site team have been hard at work, restoring the 1963 Perkins P130 Diesel engine that sits in our BR Generator wagon. Local motor engineers, H.T. Howard of Slough, Berkshire, ( www.hthoward.co.uk ) worked their miracles on the engine block, bores, pistons and allied surfaces to enable it to be re-assembled before Christmas last year. It was fired up this week and is now running at Southall Railway Centre. (Very well done the team!) Various connections are now being put into place for this power unit to give the site a better quality power source for general use and additional lighting. For railway heritage buffs amongst us, this wagon was converted from an Eastern Region Blue Spot Fish Van back in the mid 1960′s for use by the Willesden MD Electrification Train.

Peckett ‘William Murdoch’ No.2100 has had an interest shown for hire and we are awaiting confirmation from the potential hirer.

The Group, in the last few months, has enlisted quite a few more members from email enquiries, they have hands on experience and would like to assist us on site in many ways.

We welcome them with open arms and gratefull thanks.

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