West Somerset Railway General Discussion

It's in the shed at Lyd

 

Wasn’t there meant to be a diesel shunter you could drive at the steam rally also

 

Correct - leaking fusible plug was found. Required some repair work. hopefully the pannier will be out and about tomorrow. (BTW - BL is the recognised abreviation - not Lyd)

 

Just watched the very recent YouTube Admiral Scorner videos of DMU cab ride from BL to Minehead in three parts. Very interesting Videos
The DMU looks to have had a lot of work done on it recently, still has the unsuitable high back seats sadly so if you are not right at the front you cannot see forwards (or backwards) through the cab. The Cravens was far better with bus seats for those that can remember it but it would cost a lot of money to reseat the unit so it is what it is.
Lots of replaced rails lying in the cess so shows what a lot of work has been carried out and progress on the track but quite a few TSR to 10 mph indicating a lot more to do.
(The unit seemed to screech around quite a few bends perhaps some more track greasers would save excessive side wear on those new rails.)
It was notable how the trees and shrubs were creating a green tunnel effect on large lengths of line, and a flail would not go amiss either. With this seasons weather warm and wetish nature has been in a growing frenzy.

However the overriding effect of what shone through to me was the enthusiasm and friendliness of the staff and volunteers on the train and at stations, a total different aspect to that portrayed by the gloomsters and nitpickers ' its not done my way so it is all bad' posters on here.

Well done to the railway for giving a cab pass to an ex volunteer and what a positive advert for the railway.

Brian

 

My WSR Annual Pass has just arrived - with a rather nice card holder

Possibly the best thing I can do for the WSR at the moment

 

Link please??

 

After posting "YouTube Admiral Scorner" into Google [other search engines are available] these came up:
Part 1 -
Part 2 -
Part 3 -
Any use?

 

Thxs very enjoyable viewing

 

First time seeing 9351 today. What a lovely thing.

 

I am glad you think it came across as positive because that was exactly my idea when i arranged it.
As a volunteer who gets fed up with all the negative comments, I wanted to show how it really is.
Even though I dont like how i look or sound!
Robin F.

 

Out of curiosity, is the WSR still canted for the original (BR) line speed? If you are canted suitable for 45mph, and then further reduce line speed to, say, 10mph through a TSR the train will fall to the inside rail, leading to increased flange wear or rail wear or both. I believe on the Bluebell, as the original (pre-preservation) line has been relaid between SP and HK, the opportunity has been taken to reduce the cant on curves, but it is an expensive process because essentially it means relaying from the formation upwards; not just replacing rails and sleepers.

Tom

 

The cant coming into Washford from Minehead is rather interesting

 

As long as the Rail, Sleepers and Ballast are in good condition then, as part of a designed scheme, you can adjust the cant without relaying.
But you do need to be compliant with design standards.
Something that we do and have done for a number of years on the NYMR.
It used to be a case that we had to survey the track first and scheme it up back home, then peg it out, but now that we have a Tamper with on board computer with a track design package installed, we can design on the day (or more likely Night).

In our case the worst inherited Cant was 7 inch exceeding the current design limit of 6 inch. Even with the old BR speed limit of 40mph.

We take every opportunity to improve the alignment both vertically and horizontally especially in increasing the curve radius away from check rail limits.
Cant very rarely now exceeds 90mm and is more usually below 75mm
By using the Design package we do not try and just comply with standards for alignment by setting the package limits to suit our speed of 25mph.
We very often set the limits to suit 100 or more mph as this removes the irregularities to a greater extent. However the applied design will be to suit 25 mph max.

 

Well now "Train Maintainer Hornsey" perhaps you would like to share your knowledge of the engineering issues at the West Somerset Railway with all of us. Bit of a difference between a full time transport workshop full of people who mostly turn up to do the minimum required for the money, and the West Somerset Railway which has loads of decent people doing a fine job for nothing. We note that you do not currently volunteer for anything?
Regards
Bob

 

Morning shunt...

 

In what way? It always seems about right on the loco.

 

Just found this little snippet. It's good to see that the WSR is appreciated. A message from the PRCLT. <BJ>

Dated 2nd August.
''6233 has arrived at GWR's St Philips Marsh depot in Bristol in preparation for working the next Royal Duchy for RTC.
A special thanks to West Somerset Railway for the accommodation for its unplanned stay at Bishops Lydeard''.

 

You called ?

 

Can’t the rally site be used more than once a year. For other events. Superb location.

 

A good idea, and I think the railway would agree with you.
The trouble is that events take a lot of people a lot of work to plan, organise and run, and very often there's just not enough people to do the organising.