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January 2010 news |
It was flat out in the workshop before Christmas, and likely to be busy through much of January as well, with the London Model Engineering Exhibition at the end of the month. I’m aware that I haven’t managed to update the news page since August, I can’t face coming back in the new year with last summer’s news staring me in the face!
From the above (and, indeed, from your own experience if you’d tried to get hold of me recently) you can probably deduce that this year has been our busiest yet. Whilst by and large this is welcome (and, indeed, we don’t take it for granted), at times it has tested us to breaking point – there have been days when there are four crates and two pallets to be packed and collected for mid-afternoon, forty emails waiting (im)patiently in the in folder, a dozen phone message blinking on the machine – and the boiler inspector due in two days, with half a dozen engines to test...
We had a good time at the Midlands Show in October, our first time exhibiting there (although I have attended regularly, either as a visitor or staffing the Stamford SME stand, in the past).
Midlands Model Engineer Exhibition
Steve and I made up a list of engines we'd like to take the week before - even after trying to be a bit sensible we ended up with thirty engines there which, whilst requiring military-like planning to crate, lift, transport and get onto the benches (not to mention getting them all home again), certainly made for an interesting cross-section of things to look at. Having tried for the first couple of days to get a photograph (all I could get was a panoramic view of people's backs, we rarely had a time when you could get a clear view of the stand), this one was taken early one morning before the doors opened.
In the workshop Geoff and I have spent much of our time working on the new-build locomotive “Stafford” we showed in finished form at Warwick . The first engine, having been round my club track so many times it not only knew which way to go but also how to drop its own fire and get back in the van at the end of the day, now serves as a demonstrator/loan engine. The remainder of the first batch sold rapidly after the show, we are starting the next batch as soon as we get back from the London Show at Alexandra Palace in January.
We had an afternoon’s excitement recently. I was sitting at my bench in the workshop when I heard what sounded like the distant sound of a giant kicking in the side of a removal van – a series of loud, muffled thuds. Looking out of the workshop door, there was a column of black smoke about two hundred feet high rising quickly into the sky – as we watched, there were a couple of vivid flashes of flame, followed some seconds later by the sound of an explosion.
The local gas stockist having a spot of bother in the back yard
It was our local farm shop, a mile distant, where we buy
dog food and gas for the fork truck. They had what started as a small electrical
fire, rapidly ran through the shop before engulfing the propane cylinder pen at
the back of the building. By the time the fire brigade arrived, thirty large
bottle of propane had already gone off, many landing hundreds of yards away (and
one actually landing about thirty feet from the local spray shop where we have
“Stafford” painted).
We had a new 4 inch scale Foster traction engine in to
test recently. It had been built some years ago, but never steamed – having
recently been painted, the builder’s small grandson wanted to see it go.
He delivered it to the workshop a couple of days before boiler testing, we had a couple of hours looking it over and gave it a
hydraulic test in advance of the boiler inspector’s arrival – everything
looked fine. Come the day, he pumped up the boiler, declared himself happy and
we put a fire in the thing for the first time stood just outside the workshop
door. It came up to steam readily and ran nicely. Injector was fine, pumped
worked nicely, all we had left was to check the setting and efficacy of the
safety valves. With a deep fire and blower full on, pressure came up to 120psi,
first one safety then the other opened when, with a great roar the engine
disappeared completely in steam, roaring out with not inconsiderable force.
I’ve never seen Ian move so fast!
When the steam cleared, the engine appeared to be the
right way up with all important bits still attached. The grate, which three
minutes before was four inches deep under a roaring fire was completely clean
– there was not a crumb of coal on it, ditto the ashpan. There was some very
wet coal in the spud pan, but the vast majority of the fire had shot straight
through the workshop and hit the back wall beside the lathe – David, who was
in helping for day, had actually seen it whizz past his boots.
The culprit was the fusible plug – it had been filled
with soft solder, which is a bit marginal at the best of times but inadequate at
120psi operating temperatures. It wasn’t helped by not having wetted the plug
– it came out clean like a cork. However, the real problem was the builder
having made the plug with a half inch hole in it – it was this produced the
rush of steam which launched the fire into orbit.
In addition to Steve, Geoff and me in the workshop, Claire has recently joined us to bring some much-needed organisation to the ever-expanding office. If you call it will more than likely be her you’re talking to (which means that your message will be taken down accurately and got to the right person who will then be chased up relentlessly to provide the information requested. Whereas if you talk to me in the workshop, I usually write the message down with the best of intentions on a piece of paper, which then frequently gets re-used for some arcane bit of trig on the milling machine before being spattered in coolant…). Claire is also largely responsible for the website maintenance these days, which means that it should look altogether tidier and better tended in 2010.
And lastly, one of my favourite pictures from this year. Steve
quite often takes an engine from the workshop off home with him at the weekend - he runs at his
club on a Sunday afternoon, a video of the day's running usually ends up
featured on his YouTube account by early Sunday evening, which must be some kind
of record for high-speed video editing. This is the little Southern 0-4-2 tank that we had earlier in the
year, Howard driving with some elan while Steve manned the camera.
29th December 2009
August 2009
- Steve joins us, Stafford running at EMR, Windmill Farm Railway, Dogdyke
Pumping Station
April 2009
- The new engine "Stafford", Alexandra Palace Show, a backyard foundry
December
2008 - Self-storage, annealing copper, Tinkerbell stone train in the snow
November
2008 - Rutland Railway Museum, Caradoc converted to a VBT locomotive,
LittleLEC
August 2008
- Harrogate Show pictures, Martin's new engine shed, lethal steam seat warmer
March 2008
- New machining centre, solid modelling software, fixing the roof
December 2007- new lathe
delivered, 7 1/4 inch progress in Dumfries, visting an interesting
engineer
September 2007 - Holiday
in North Wales, new machinery for the workshop
June 2007 - Station Road
Steam at Harrogate Show, herd of Tinkerbells, Martin's railway
March 2007 - Building a
garden railway competition, A Workshop in Herefordshire
January 2007 - Miniature
lathes and photography, Midlands Exhibition, Churnet Valley Railway, testing
small boilers
October 2006 - Updates
on part-built and projects
July 2006 - Evergreens
Miniature Railway, local 10 1/4 line, collecting the Pacific from Cleethorpes
April 2006 - Progress in
the workshop, visit to the National Railway Museum, visit to Woody Bay
January 2006 - Moving to new units, grit-blasting my hands, shiny Romulus
October 2005 - Stamford SME, Sam starts the restoration of "Pendle
Witch", Casterton Working Weekend
August 2005 -
New workshop, Thurston Pacific back from Cleethorpes
May 2005 - Berkely Light
Railway, dodgy boiler certificates, full-size ploughing engines at auction
January 2005 -
digging
October 2004 - initial planning for the garden railway
July 2004
- Fowler ploughing engines in Yorkshire
May 2004
- Moving the workshop, a 9 1/2 inch gauge garden railway
Apr 2004 - Holiday in
Shropshire & The Severn Valley Railway, LNER liveried Black 5
Feb 2004
- Refacing a Tangye slide valve, new acquisition 10 ton Aveling roller
2004 - 12 1/4 inch gauge Pacific
