Rother Valley Railway

The rail for the Bodiam Extension was as is often the way with the K&ESR very complicated. The existing rail at preservation from just outside of Northiam station to Mill Ditch bridge (about 2 of 3 miles) was still S&ECR 91 1/4lb rail which required non standard chairs, keys and fishplates as it had a very different profile to the standard BR 95ib bullhead rail. At the time of the Bodiam Extension most of the fittings were absolutely shot and had to be disc cutted. Beyond Mill Ditch bridge the line had been relayed by BR with standard 95lb bullhead rail but much of this was on a type of experimental steel sleeper that by the time of the Bodiam Extension were rotted through.
At the time of the project EWS had a scheme to hugely expand the Uks freight network (all those class 66s that were never used) and this meant that secondhand rail absolutely skyrocketted in price and was limited in supply.
The project manager was able to source a minimum order of UIC rail from an Austrian Company which was cheaper than the price of UK secondhand rail at the time. This was actually as you have said milled in Poland. This was laid almost in its entirity with a few spares heading out from Northiam and extends to just past Padgehams Curve. It was laid on secondhand BR SHC clip sleepers, from there onwards to Bodiam its the "original" BR 95ib bullhead rail relaid on concrete sleepers. This is still the situation 25 years later.

 

You asks about the various rails we will use, and have in stock, for the 3.4km long ‘missing link’ at RVR - all of which will be 113lb flat bottom rail laid on concrete sleepers with Pandrol fittings.

The 970 track metres of new 113lb rail we delivered to the eastern end of the ‘missing link’ at Junction Road last Thursday comprised 620m track metres of new rail delivered from British Steel at Scunthorpe and 350m track metres of new rail we had in our stocks at Robertsbridge. Track metres equates to the length of track that will lay (and so twice that is metres of loose rail).

Harold is right that we already have significant stocks of track material. That as over the last ten years or so we have been fortunate to have funds available to take the opportunities of 'freebies' as and when those opportunities have arisen. That as freebies aren't really free as RVR have the cost of lorries and cranes to collect the material, usually on a Sunday afternoon, as and when they arose from weekend mainline relaying works. Much of what we have in stock came from a site in east London that had been relatively recently been laid but after a couple of years formation drainage issues were discovered. That then needed the track ripping out on Sunday closures as assembled track panels cut into short lengths to clear the site with speed of work of essence, the drainage issues resolved and replacement long welded rail bought in for rapid mechanised relaying to ensure completion by close of play each Sunday evening. The rail RVR inherited has little wear on its head and so is ideal for our work. Those track panels came complete with concrete sleepers and all their necessary fastenings and over the years gave us nearly all the rail & sleepers we need.

Much of those second-hand track panels came in 30 foot lengths, which we weld into 60 foots using contractors working at Robertsbridge so making them ready for reuse. Some came as 20 foot, or shorter, panels – which have provided many of the concrete sleepers we will use but the cost, and practicality, of welding those short rails into long 60 foot rails is no longer economic.

So, we are moving all the 60 foot rails that have been welded together in the past by RVR from Robertsbridge to Junction Rd, which along with the mentioned small quantity of new RVR stock rails acquired opportunistically three years ago, to create space for the contractor to do the remaining welding needed on the rest of the 30 foot rails at Robertsbridge. As further of the 30 foot rails are welded into pairs they will also be delivered out to the railhead until the entire 3.4 kilometers of track is ultimately laid so we can all then go for a ride!


Mike Hart

 

Thanks for the explanation Mike.

Are you able to cash in the rails which were too short as scrap, or perhaps you already have?

 

British Steel rails arriving at Junction Road in preparation for,,,,,

https://rvrailway.blogspot.com/2025/07/British Steel -1.html

 

Further update on the Station building

https://rvrailway.blogspot.com/2025/07/station-building-291-late-jun-25.html

 

Will you be welding up into CWR or remaining as 60ft jointed?

 

60ft panels. Mike

 

Personally Id be pretty relaxed about the jointing, with new rail the joints on the Bodiam extension have held up pretty well in 25 years when the lines only used as a standard heritage line. Its swings and roundabouts. Theres probably only a couple of joints that have caused problems. Certainly as a 'Global' K&ESR wed have been better welding up some of the bullhead joints with unlimited funding. obviously being in the sunny south we dont suffer from the "its grim up north permafrost"

 

New update today - click here - showing progress with the section between the A21 and Salehurst.

 

With bridges 15 & 17 being so close together, are we allowed to ask what is or was bridge 16?

 

Good question. I just blew up image 7 from the "Salehurst section 2" link above and peered at it for some time, but I can't see any trace of anything.

Possibilities:

• It existed but was filled in and every trace removed many years before the line closed
• It was planned but turned out to be unnecessary and was never built
• A gap was left in the numbering to allow for a structure if required

I wonder if the answer is known or lost in the mists of time? We await with interest.

 

Possibly a culvert so listed as a bridge, but not visible if you're looking for bridge spans, abutments etc, because years of debris has filled it?

 

Looking at the documents submitted with the TWAO it is listed as a bridge rather than a culvet [culverts are numberes as 'bridges']. I wonder if what is referred to as Bridge 15 in the recent blog entry is in fact Bridge 16 on the plan. We have to remember that access to the land was not possible when the plans were subbmitted so what was actually 'on the ground' may differ from the submitted plans. The blog does imply renumbering will take place.

 

When the Rother Valley Railway was built from Robertsbridge to (now) Rolvenden the railway was said to have 24 bridges and the ministry report on the opening said the railway included 9 bridges and 15 culverts. Im hard pushed to come up with any geographical scheme that would have seen bridges 15 or 16 at Salehurst.
Ive a fair idea of which were the 9 bridges but i think at least 1 and possibly as many as 3 have ceased to be bridges in the preservation era, as a consequence of the rother Levels floods schemes of 1966-80 reconfiguring the water courses to the new pumping stations. If 2 of those bridges wernt in fact part of the original 9 theres a spare 2 bridges to use between Austens Bridge and the (new) A21

 

OK, I've been drawn into this puzzle. May have solved it (or at least supplied more background). However, I'll give you another to work on.

Bridge numbering sometimes has something suggesting '2011 numbering' - maybe this was when the digital record was being amassed/entered ?

The URL for bridge 17 mentions bridge 16, so whoever was entering the info digitally was thrown by something. Text calls it a culvert

Bridge 17 - A first look at this culvert | RVRailway News

The map of the route below shows Culvert 15 and Bridge 16 in close proximity, so someone knew there were two features and distinguished between them - or weren't sure so entered one of each allowing a deletion.

Explore the Rother Valley Railway using a map and illustration.

The same map has no pin for #22

 

I'm afraid its all much more boringly simpler than that. There never was, nor is there planned to be, a bridge between those numbered 15 & 17 mentioned in the Blog entry! Not even a culvert pipe. Its a numbering error on the RVR design plans. Simples! Mike Hart

 

It's where the Brigadoon and Avalon went over it...

 

I don't know whether the original RVR/K&ESR used bridge numbers but I suspect not. BR (Southern Region) provided bridge numbers using precast concrete markers. These numbers were in the 2000s.

 

And there was me thinking it might have been the underbridge for the Junction Road Dual carriageway from the 1960s DoT plans that the ORR were still insisting was built as a contingency much like the Litchfield Canal Overbridge on the M6 Toll.

 

Interesting - I think at the time that there was a proposal to route the A21 down Junction Road which is why KESR wasn't permitted to run past Bodiam.