We are back after the Bank Holiday break with a short update.
Work has continued on the various ongoing projects at Preston.
John Davis is seen here driving out rivets on the shovel plate in the new tender tank for Wootton Hall.
Howard has been measuring up for new axle box lids for Caliban.
Paul Balshaw is seen scraping rust from Fluff‘s frames.
Examination of FR 20’s cylinders and piston rings has continued with some debate now as to whether the rings actually need changing. Underneath, the job of cleaning frames and motion continues.
Alison provided us with some leftover cakes a week last Wednesday from the previous night’s Trustees’ meeting, a photo of which we include for Adrian’s benefit(!).
The seven wheelsets that were sent away for machining were finally delivered back to Preston last Friday afternoon, which will open the way for further work on Wootton Hall‘s tender, FR 20’s tender and Caliban.
Finally, over at Embsay, Keith and Fred have been undertaking a wash-out on 5643. Keith will also be going back this Thursday and next weekend to attend to a leaking gasket on one of the superheater elements and to prepare 5643 for traffic again. Meanwhile, as locomotives do when they know that you are dependent on them, Cumbria broke a spring which took two days of hard labour for Embsay’s gang to sort over the last weekend.