LMS Patriot Project Updates

Waiting for the Grange to be finished I assume before going inside.

 

It's been some time since any updates on the project.

 

Thats probably because i dont come on Nat pres that much anymore, and i dont think anyone else from the project uses Internet forums. To be fair, it has been a fairly quiet start to the year.

That being said, i believe that the chassis is about to move into the main shed so that work can start at Tyseley as they are currently moving things around and our space is now available. This should see some really good progress over the coming months. Our volunteers have been down at Tyseley on Wednesdays and Thursdays recently organising things in the containers which is good.

The boiler has made good progress, there are loads of pics on the HBSS and lms patriot Facebook pages

And most importantly, the funding is still coming in very well. Last year we raised over 300k again (i think it was about £327k off the top of my head) and this first quarter has continued that with well over 100k raised in the first 3 months of this financial year (april to june).

Im not sure how the work is progressing up at Ian rileys on the wheelsets. Last time i asked i think it was end of summer for those to be completed. Not sure if there has been any change.

 

This bulletin reports on project developments in June 2024.

Engineering
All being well we expect the movement of our chassis inside the Tyseley workshop to happen on Wednesday 3rd July. Necessary preparation and enabling movements were expected to be carried out on the last weekend in June.

Further regular volunteer sessions have taken place in June. These concentrated on cleaning, polishing and some painting of a range of parts including various housings, expansion links, brake hanger brackets, motion components and tender axles.

More expressions of interest have been received recently about volunteering at Tyseley, which is most encouraging.



Newly cleaned and polished expansion links and housings


Cleaning and painting brake hanger brackets


Rubbing down a motion component

(All photos Anthony Pilkington)


Members Day at Tyseley –
Saturday 21st September 2024
Detailed planning is under way with our Tyseley colleagues for our first Members Day in 5 years.



Finance
Great news on the money front - our funds increased by nearly £80,000 in a matter of days at the turn of last month, just as our May bulletin was published. How did this happen?

First, we received a very welcome and unexpected new company sponsorship of £50,000 on 31st May.

Next, over £14,000 was credited to our account by HMRC (Charities) on 30th May, more than doubling our estimated £6,000 Gift Aid claim reported in Warrior 61. We had spotted an anomaly in our financial programme in respect of Gift Aid calculations, and carried out a complete detailed review, with this result.

Then an individual donation of £5,000 was received on 3rd June; closely followed by a further £10,000 company sponsorship.


This was the latest monthly bulletin

 

Thank you for the update.

 

Yes thanks for the update Gav106

 

The LMS-Patriot Project is delighted to announce that another step forwards towards the completion of 5551 'The Unknown Warrior' took place on the 17th July, when the frames were moved inside the workshops at Tyseley Loco Works.


Photo by Keith Riches.

Since their arrival at Tyseley on 6th December 2023, the frames have been stored outside outside under protective tarpaulin until space was available in the workshop for Tyseley Loco Works to start work. However, our own growing band of volunteers has concentrated on preparatory work on components delivered separately to Tyseley in March.

The first work package for the reassembly will be the horn guides. The outside cylinders and wheelsets are currently at Riley & Son Engineering. The wheelsets are due back later in the year which will enable the frames to be re-wheeled.

A Members' Day has been organised for the 21st September at Tyseley. This is the first Members' Day for five years that we have been able to organise and we are delighted that our colleagues at Tyseley will be able to show the progress with 5551 'The Unknown Warrior'

 

Thanks for update, hope all is well for the project

 

It is such a shame that you have had to totally strip the locomotive right back to the bare frames, but lessons have been learn't (the hard way!) and the locomotive - when finished, will be in a much better condition for a long and successful life. You are getting very good support from your members and it shows with the fundraising.

 

The last financial year (23-24 april) we raised £328k so we very much have the members support, and we have great reserves to make good progress, we just need our contractors to have the availability of staff to make progress on the parts. Im very hopeful of this.

 

This bulletin reports on project developments in July 2024.

Engineering
Our locomotive chassis finally made it inside the main Tyseley workshop on 17th July. The move took place over a number of days and had to wait until the repositioning of other equipment could be completed – a task with several dependencies. 5551 is not yet in its final assembly position, due to other works ongoing over the next 10 to 12 weeks: but it will now be possible to start work on the locomotive once the support agreement (under active review) is in place.



5551 being moved on accommodation bogies into its present position in the workshop.

Our volunteer work continued in July. Tyseley granted us permission to work in an area allocated inside their new coach shed. This proved to be a very positive move as we could now make progress regardless of the Birmingham weather. We have been able to crack on and complete one of the more urgent tasks, which was the cleaning and protection of our motion components. We have reorganised and tidied our two containers, giving much better access to our various parts. We have also ordered a heavy-duty work bench that will provide for much easier working than directly on the floor.

image
Volunteers Keith, Ian, Neil, Barry and Anthony at work on cleaning and restoration.

Meanwhile, July saw further progress on the boiler work packages agreed with HBSS. Work has continued inside the workshop on fitting of the longitudinal stays, forming the fire hole, completing the foundation ring, and installing bracketry in the safety dome aperture. A plan is under preparation with a view to completing the boiler up to the initial testing stage in 2025.

Installing longitudinal stays.


Formation of the fire hole.



Finance
This is a taster for the Treasurer’s report in the forthcoming Warrior. We had an exceptionally good first quarter for this financial year but you will be able to read all about that in the next issue of the magazine. However, I will report briefly on our July income. Surprise, surprise - three and a half years after Llangollen went into administration, there was more positive news to report. After much communication recently with FTS Recovery, the insolvency practitioners, we have received £8566 as our share of the net assets realised. We also had a final payment of £1121 from the estate of a late member.

On the other side of the balance sheet, in an effort to keep our bank charges to a minimum, just a gentle reminder that a straight bank transfer to our account is free; but I do not wish to discourage you from making donations/payments, so if it is not possible to do it this way, then other payment avenues are available.

Sales and Events
July has been a quiet month for sales & events: the 2-day Railex Model Railway Show at Buxton which we attended over the weekend of July 6th and 7th was our only event.

Our sales were £1093; our commission sales were another £690, of which we took 20 percent as the seller is not a member. Interestingly enough, our fastest selling items were in our rummage bucket which contained items of small vehicles of low cost. The stall holder next door cleaned us out at the end of the Sunday. We are now looking for more rummage stock. We are planning to make collections of donated stock from two locations in the near future. We have agreed to purchase the remainder of a large 00 gauge collection which will be put on sale at our 3 events in August.

Thank you for your support for our Project.

 

This bulletin reports project news in September.

Engineering
The rectification work on the outside cylinders was completed at Riley & Son Ltd this month. In a first for our project, they were delivered free of charge to Tyseley on Monday 30th September by our new member and volunteer Alan Owen, using his own crane-equipped truck and trailer.



4 valve liners, 2 cylinders with liners fitted and 2 blanks on pallet safely offloaded in new carriage shed


Transport provided by member volunteer Alan Owen

The transfer to Tyseley is an important step for the project, as the cylinders have to be refitted to the frames before essential frame alignment checks can be carried out. All of the cylinder valve work including design will now be carried out at Tyseley.

For the wheelset assembly, a number of revised drawings were produced and checked, after detailed discussions involving Tyseley, Riley and Son Ltd and ourselves. Assembly work is expected to start this week at Riley and Son Ltd.

Further constructive discussion took place with Tyseley to reconcile their Terms and Conditions with our proposed Service Level Agreement, and to clarify the scope of the insurance required. A quotation has been requested from an insurance broker.

Work continued in September at HBSS on the boiler work packages. The boiler tubing has been now been ordered through HBSS, including a spare set for storage because of minimum order requirements.

 

This bulletin reports project news in October.

Engineering
Good progress is continuing to be made on the boiler work packages. Along with items mentioned in previous bulletins, work has commenced on fitting the main steam pipe and regulator system. The order for the 3rd and final work package of boiler assembly is in place, and delivery of the tubes is expected around the end of the year.



Regulator assembly front seen from inside and outside the boiler

On the other hand there is no further progress to report at Tyseley on moving to our final assembly position, because of workshop capacity. We are still waiting for our insurers to finalise their quotation, and discussion on our service level agreement and Tyseley’s Terms and Conditions is still to be concluded.

We reported last month on the delivery of the cylinders to Tyseley from Riley and Son: checks have revealed that further machining work at Riley and Son is needed, which will now be arranged. Meanwhile, machining for wheelset assembly has started at Riley and Son.


First wheel after machining completed at Riley and Son

 

5551 'The Unknown Warrior' has been moved into its final build position inside the main erecting shop at Tyseley Loco Works. 5551 had previously been stored inside the running shed and before that was on the turntable road. The move inside the main works will allow reassembly of 'The Unknown Warrior' to begin in earnest. The move had been delayed due to waiting for a slot in the busy workshop to become available.
Drilling of the frames for the spring hanger brackets can now be finished. The cylinders are due to have new valve liners fitted.
And the wheelsets have now been machined ready for pressing onto the axles.

 

Good stuff!
Thank you for the updates.

 

This Bulletin updates you with developments in December 2024.

Engineering
In last month’s Bulletin, we reported Tyseley’s plans to move our locomotive chassis into its final assembly position in their main workshop. Preparatory work for this started at the end of November, with the repositioning completed on December 10th. Funding has been authorised for the first of the reassembly tasks - the refitting of the horn guides to the frames.


5551 on No 1 Road at Tyseley

Meanwhile progress has continued at HBSS with the boiler work packages. In December the focus was on fitting the dome, the regulator and the J pipe.






Before and after – test-fitting the regulator assembly before riveting the dome in position


The J pipe prior to fitting

 

It's pleasing to see this project finally heading towards completion at last.