There has been a great deal of progress with Gloucester Trailer 56097 during the Christmas period.
The recently-fitted body skin has been primed and painted, gloss green on the outside and black on the inside, giving an idea of what the vehicle will look like when it's finished.
All of the floor covering in the centre saloon has been removed and fortunately the floor underneath seems to be in good condition. The original floor is a combination of wood, cork and lino and this will be replaced with a new floor made of exterior ply.
At the rear of the coach the water filler pipes have been returned to their proper place, having been restored. In the workshop the gangway components are being rebuilt, some are having to be built up with weld and then turned back to size while others are being rebushed. The exterior ring of the corridor scissors has been needle gunned back to bare metal and repainted.
The joiner has delivered some more of the wooden components for rebuilding the window areas on both the Gloucester and also Cravens 56456 and these are to be fitted during January.
May we take this opportunity to thank you for all the support we've had this year. We wish you and your families a Happy New Year. Watch out for our first news feed update of 2016!
With Christmas approaching work has wound down prior to the holidays, nevertheless there's still plenty going on.
At Llangollen the rebuild of the front end of Class 108 trailer 56223 is coming to an end with the application of the gloss green paint, which will be followed by the traditional cream lining.
The team at Butterley have completed the welding of the bodyshell of Class 100 Driving Trailer 56097. The replacement roof edges have been fitted and welded in and the remaining doors have been rehung. With welding completed the opportunity is being taken to get some paint on the bodyshell prior to the fitting of the windows.
Our joinery contractor has completed the wooden pieces we need to fit round the windows of the Gloucester and has also made some of the components for the Cravens trailer, 56456.
As this will be the final Newsfeed report before Christmas may we take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy festive season.
At Llangollen we have been working on the refurbishing of the interior of Class 104 Driving Motor Composite 50528. The rear section of seating is being removed and sent over to the trimmers while the seats themselves will go for shotblasting and powder coating. We normally are able to send spare seats and then swap them when they are ready but unfortunately this section of the unit has some unique seats which are opposite handed and so we do not have any spares. The opportunity was also taken to carry out some repairs to the heater ducting, and also to deep clean the lino, a job much easier when the seats are missing!
An "FP" exam was carried out on the Wickham in preperation for it to run at the Winter Warmer gala, although not as involved as the other exams we carry out on the fleet, it still took a couple of hours for our team to work through the job sheet. On this occasiona the exam was uneventful with no significant faults found which required attention.
At Butterley work is ongoing on the roof edges of Class 100 Driving Trailer 56097. As can be seen by the photos there is corrosion in this area which is being cured by cutting out the old metal and fitting replacement panels which have been pre-bent to the new shape. Originally the panels were riveted on but we have come up with a neat solution which involves using dome-heat bolts which look like the original but which serve no useful purpose otherwise.
Despite the poor weather it has been possible to progress two of the major jobs, Class 108 trailer 56223 at Llangollen and Class 100 trailer 56097 at Butterley.
Now that welding is completed on the front end of 56223 the lights and other parts have been refitted and a start has been made on painting the front end, which has now reached undercoat stage.
At Butterley the outer skin has now been welded onto the centre section of the Gloucester trailer, meaning that almost all of the major structural work has been completed. Repairs are now ongoing to the edge of the roof on the driver’s side.
Inside the vehicle all the parts that have been stored within have now been removed to a place of safety so that work can start on ripping out and repairing the remaining floors.More of the single windows have been reinstalled following the delivery of new wooden frames from the joinery contractors and another team is reassembling the aluminium sliding lights for the remaining windows.
The website has been updated with our list of running days for the 2016 season. The list can be viewed here.