Number of volunteers 3.

After we all met in the coach Dave and Jim set about getting the equipment out necessary for finishing the new piece of TMB ducting in the engine room. It was decided that the easiest way to do it was to make four pieces of metal, two straight and two curved. The two pieces that were to make the top part of the ducting were cut out first. A cardboard template was made to the curved section could be bent to the right angle. After a trip to C&W to use the trusty bending machine the two pieces were welded in.

Meanwhile Jasons first priority was to get a piece of large diameter conduit that he could make up into an extension piece, he had got some spare lengths of the right size conduit out of the Class 14 spares lot, but the joiners were seized on and no matter what Jason tried he could not free them off, so defeated Jason instead got out the undercoat paint and painted the modified TMB duct in the nose end, inside & out.

After lunch Jim and Dave cut out the two bottom parts for the ducting and again made a cardboard template to get the bend angle right. After the parts were cut and bent they were welded in. This part is now finished bar the painting. Jason went up to Castlecroft after lunch to find a suitable piece of conduit to use and fortunately Matt Lindley had some scrap conduit from D1041 that was the right size so he gave it to Jason, who dismantled the jointing collars and cut a piece to length but then had to cut a thread onto the cut end. Not possessing the right tool for job and unable to borrow one of someone else he had to bodge the conduit by getting Jim to weld a jointing collar on to the end of the short extension pipe, with this he was able to thread it in to the main conduit that runs down the right hand side of the loco and tighten it all up now that the threaded end sticks through into the nose end compartment.

Sunday 29th

Number of volunteers 1

Jason was on his own today but had a good idea of what he needed to do, during the morning he spent his time fabricating some mounting brackets for the sanding heads for the Class 14 after which he set about sorting out the mounting clamps for the conduits on the 15. First he fitted the three clamps down the right hand side of the engine compartment after first making a couple of attempts to find the correct length of bolts, but upon moving onto the left hand side he found that the clamps came up short and were not gripping the top conduit correctly.

After some head scratching he checked the box with all the other conduit clamps in and found some spacer blocks, these were all dirty and needed cleaning up so he took them back to the coach, drelled them up then painted they with spray on primer. Once dried he took then round to the loco with the tin of orange paint and touched up painted the spacer blocks and assembled the clamps around them. When the clamp was all tight he then went around with the orange paint to touch up, he noticed that there were many places on the conduits here paint had been chipped off during fitting so he went along and touch up painted the rest of the conduits all over in a fresh coat of orange, after that he broke out the wood pigeon gloss and painted the final gloss coat onto the modified TMB ducting in the cooler group.

That done he returned to the support coach where the completed small TMB duct that Jim & Dave G had welded together the day before; Jason first went over it with an angle grinder to smooth off the welding spatter then he painted it inside and out with the green primer paint, it was then time to pack up and another days work on the loco was done.

The next working weekend is August 25/26 - If you wish to lend a hand please contact Chris Tatton