Work continues in Pentrefelin on Class 127 Driving Motor Brake 51618. The bulk of the exterior panelling behind the driver's cab is now in place and trial fitting of the first passenger door has now been undertaken. The new panels are supported by completely new framework.
The 'B-Exam' of the Class 104 has been completed and a number of jobs arising have been transferred to the Deferred Work Register. These include a badly-worn final drive dog that will have to be changed at some point in the future.
An 'A-Exam' of the Wickham units has now been started and was about half completed. Investigations have taken place into the sticking Pascom chain on trailer 56171 but without any great success, despite removing the chain and dropping part of the ceiling to find out what is wrong.
Unfortunately given the inclement weather that has engulfed most of North Wales, and the Midlands in snow, not much has happened at either site this week. Hopefully things will be back to normal by next week.
It has been a quiet week with the only movement at Llangollen being of the Class 104 which was hired by the railway to 'condition' the rails in advance of the Santa operation. This consisted of running up and down the line between Llangollen and Glyndyfrdwy a number of times to remove the rust. In the event the work wasn't successful and the first steam Santa train slipped to a stand on the bank the following day.
While working on Class 127 Driving Motor Brake 51618 it has been discovered that the driver's side cab corner is also badly corroded and this will be cut away to repair the supporting pillar. Drawings for the parts required are being prepared and should be off to the fabricator this week.
Over at Butterley a team spent Wednesday working on commissioning the Class 108 unit which has recently been transferred across from Llangollen. A broken vacuum hose was exchanged for a new one, the levels topped up and a couple of minor repairs done. We then undertook three test runs down to Ironville and back, leaving the unit in a fit state to be used should the necessity arise. The Class 141's anti-freeze levels were also topped up, one engine having lost its mixture when we changed some hoses earlier in the year.
