Mid Hants Railway Operational Matters

Was there a special charter last night with 506? When we were returning from the Swanage Bulleid festival along the A31 after about 8pm 506 was coasting down the hill from Medstead with a van and one carriage.

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Yes, it was a private charter.

 

Thanks

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Ey Up, I'm back again, after having had me self a weekend away in Nora Batty country!

And so another Saturday dawned atop the hill, and four liked minded souls gathered to continue the battle with the troublesome trucks........ namely steel Highfit B481682, where one of our number carried on with his sterling work of taking back the old paint work, and getting two more sections into red oxide.

That left Muggin's 'Ere, me Oppo and me Mucker to try and progress things with LMS van M517317........ we had things on the to-do list, but these went out the window when it was realised that what we wanted to do, wouldn't be possible until the south side exterior longitudinal was fitted to accommodate the door runner...............

Cue a day of frustration where one lump of wood tried to defy us until it had been repeatedly fettled, as each time we thought we'd got it right, it would throw up another problem!!!

Eventually we finally managed to get the damn thing temporarily clamped and bolted into place, and then came the 'fun' of trying to fit the door runner onto the protruding bolts........ its a rather large lump of metal that when combined with gravity, didn't want to go on to the locating bolts, without the three of us doing our best weightlifter impressions!

Once we'd got the damn thing up and secured, we noticed just how badly it was bowed - something that didn't help us when trying to hang it on the bolts, so we got out an acrow prop, and hopefully over the coming week, the prop will take the kink out of it, and once the door is hung on it, it will operate smoothly.........

Soooooo........ it took three blokes all day to hang one lump of wood and a lump of steel - the term troublesome truck certainly fitting!!!

@Stinch it was good to see you again yesterday - looked like you were having fun on 506.......

For once, I did pick up the camera - so some pics......

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53778424212/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53779773805/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53779675819/in/dateposted-public/

The steel Highfit coming on.



The external longitudinal trial fitted to work out just what was needed and where.......



The external longitudinal and the door runner, replete with acrow, finally up, albeit temporarily!!

 

We are visiting the 50's and 60's event tomorrow. I am guessing that the loco roster will be 41312 and one of the class 20's on the two train service to fit the theme as the website roster hasn't been updated yet.
There is also a steam Gala on the miniature railway at Ropley this weekend. Looking forward to travelling on the miniature railway as we have not been on it before. Does anyone know what the visiting locomotives are for this weekend?

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It's 506 and D8188 today.

 

Latest YouTube video is now available to watch. It’s an interesting video to watch.

 

We had a very good day at the All Change! event at the railway yesterday despite the interesting weather conditions. We got stuck at the road works traffic lights in Ropley for a long time on the way down where we encountered a really heavy torrential downpour with hail stones and flooding thrown into the mix. We started our day with our first ever ride on the miniature railway. There were 3 locomotives in action with them each taking turns top and tailing the trains. The driving conditions proved to be challenging in the wet with both loco's frequently slipping. My Dad and Sister really enjoyed their trip on the miniature line as they both stepped off with wide grins on their faces. Are there plans to extend it any further?
There was an impressive range of vehicles on display at Ropley (Some pictures below). 506 and D8188 were hauling the two train service as mentioned above. 41312 was in steam and moving around the yard by the end of the day to take up Dining train duties in the evening. 35005's boiler was in the yard for testing.
It was good to see both trains well filled and the refreshment kiosk at Ropley doing very well. The West Country Buffet was also really busy. When we went to get some chips in the afternoon they ran out while doing our order and the kind lady serving us replaced my chips order with a bacon bap which was much appreciated. The end of our day was marked with another biblical rain shower as we returned to Ropley behind the Class 20 on the last service from Alresford.
Hopefully this event has been successful enough to be repeated as I think it could grow into a fairly big event in the future.
Thank you to everyone at the Railway for a very enjoyable day out once again.

 

Well, its Sunday again, so it must be time once again for my ramblings on what the hardy souls of the Saturday Gang managed to achieve, or not.... atop the hill yesterday......

Depending on which weather forecast you saw on Friday evening, we hedged our bets and deemed any outside painting etc out of bounds, something that proved to be a good idea as it was a day of more showers than sun, and some of biblicle proportions including haill!!

That meant having to find jobs for a bunch of blokes primed to take back old paintwork........ sooooooo........ they were given the job of removing the brakes and rigging from the steel highfit, as the whole lot needs an overhaul due to excessive play, which usually means there's too much wear in them, and given we can't remember if they've ever been done, it probably means they haven't........

So, lets just say the lads tasked with the removal had 'fun', and they would have found the rigging and blocks to be buggas, given they're clasp brakes!

By th end of the day most for the north side rigging and blocks were off, and lets just say, what's come off is going to require a fair amount of work to make them good again.

Elsewhere, on the LMS van, two new fillets were produced to close the gaps on the south side exterior cladding, and the matey producing these also gave me Oppo some training on how best to produce the frames for the new south side door.....

That left Muggin's 'Ere and me Mucker to get stuck in inside the LMS van and figure out just how we're going to fit the internal cladding........ its something we've done quite a few times in the past, but given things with this vehicle seem to move, it was a case of starting again, we knew what we wanted to do and how we wanted to do it, but every time we showed things up, they jsut didn't look right, even with finding an angle finder level!

It took us the morning just to get the center baton and a bottom plank into the right position!!!

THe afternoon was then spent fixing the baton into place along with cladding planks along the bottom, which is more involved than you realise, as we have to undo any bolys securing the cladding to the frames, drill through and bolt up again, drill pilot holes for six screws per plank, and then secure each plank - we've worked out that we've the best part of another 1000 holes to drill..........

By the end of the day, we'd fixed six planks into place, only another 116 to go.........

Some pics from yesterday.......

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53794932091/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53793989532/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53795151848/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53795243754/in/dateposted-public/

The north side brakes and rigging off the steel highfit.


A mornings work in progress - levels & center almost found, and things clamped into place!



The afternoons progress........

 

For those who don't wish to use Facebook. <BJ>

''Don't miss a visit to the Ropley workshop viewing gallery and take a look at the team's progress on our current projects. Here you can see 35005 Canadian Pacific, the new build tender for 75079, 53808, the new tender chassis for 34007 Wadebridge and more. The workshop team are always working on multiple projects, with something new to see every visit! Plan your next visit here: https://i.mtr.cool/umiwsnvoop''

 

Great to see such a lot going on!

Are you able to let us know what the set of frames next to 35005 are?

Chris

 

92212

 

Didn't Swanage used to be in there? Is it now outside?

 

Hasn't been in there for a loooong time. It's under a tarp in Ropley headshunt.

 

So here I am once more in the playground of the broken trucks
One more experience, one more entry in a forum psot, self-penned..........

Otherwise known as Medstead up yard....... and I really must stop mis-qouting Marillion.........

Any road, with yesterday atop the hill becoming a tad on the warm side, we had two rather troublesomesome trucks in our sights......... namely the steel Highfit and the LMS van......

On the steel Highfit, the aim of the day was to get all the remaining brake rigging etc off........ four of the lads spent the entire day wrestling with it, and given the amount of play in the rigging, it put up one hell of a fight, but by the end of the day, all but a few bits and pieces were off!!

Me Oppo has taken a load of bits home to get them fettled, the rest will be cleaned up on site.

Over on the LMS van, the first job between Muggin's here, Me Oppo & me Mucker, was to take down the recently trial fitted south side door runner and exterior longitudinal, so that the longitudinal and the two new external cladding fillets could be primed and bought into undercoat, a job me mucker decided to undertake in the shade, leaving Muggin's 'Ere & me Mucker to carry on fitting the internal cladding planks inside an increasingly warm van....... to that end progress was slow, but we managed to complete the row we'd started last week, plus sort out the remaining planks into some sort of order........

Didn't bother with the camera yesterday as it was too warm, but we did have a fouple of interesting visitors to Medstead last weekend........

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53810699369/in/dateposted-public/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/duty_druid/53810373716/in/dateposted-public/

Lumps of wood basking in the sun.



First row of internal cladding finally fitted.



Brake system on the Highfit all but off......

 

Swanage is currently residing with 73096 under a green tarp up the end of the "new" yard at Ropley as seen in this screenshot from Google maps:


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Thanks, must have gone past a few times during the gala but not noticed it.
I assume still ownership issues have stalled things?

 

Yes, the overhaul was stopped due to uncertainty around ownership/shares.

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Will has just posted another In The Loop, this one has 35005's boiler being warmed.

 

Another great YouTube video by the film unit team.