NEWS UPDATE No. 117
There is truth in the old military axiom; “Assumption is the mother of all foul-ups”. This was brought home to this writer recently when an acquaintance, (thankfully nothing more so), muttered in a matter-of-fact manner that “there’s not much happening on a railway over the winter”. Apart from initial astonishment followed by a strange urge to cause this unimaginative and uninformed person a modicum of distress, the response was tempered to a reply in the most polite but sardonic way possible.
In a similar manner to a much praised (or reviled) film by the Monty Python team, virtually nothing happens apart from, that is, copious amounts of work on the two locomotives which have been undergoing their rebuilds after their ten-year complete strip-downs, the mammoth programme of track relaying and renewal at Llanuwchllyn, commissioning and collecting new castings from Liverpool for new injector wheels and chimney tops, multiple sessions of track maintenance down the line, the BLR Trust spending a huge amount of time dealing with the bureaucracy of the extension, cutting back foliage growth to improve the views from the train, plus myriad other small but essential jobs too numerous to mention which have to be finished before the season starts. In conclusion, the leash on sarcasm was slipped a little with the comment; “Not much at all, you ought to drop by and see for yourself”. The offer was met with indifference!
The mammoth track renewal programme at Llanuwchllyn involved the lifting of almost all track from just beyond the station and past the Heritage centre to the end of the old station yard, and this would have been easier on a like-for-like basis. But the old track in situ was a mixture of 30 and 35 pound rail, and the plan was to replace this mixture with brand new 50 pound rail, purchased from a company in Cardiff which obtains it from, of all places, Spain. This rail is used by the Talyllyn Railway as well as others. The benefit of substantially heavier rail is that it is intrinsically stronger and the extra stiffness makes for a much smoother ride, especially over the joints, which will cut down on maintenance and make life easier on the loco’s springs.
Included in this magnum opus were the two sets of points at each end of the station platform, and our Chief Engineer Rob Houghton spotted that the two main points, by the water tower/coaling station and the loco shed, were actually of slightly different rail weights, thus a bit of substitution took place to remedy and equalise the situation. No rail is ever wasted and surplus lighter weight items can be reused in sidings.
The other task was to insert a set of points east of the Heritage Centre/Carriage Shed so that access will eventually be afforded from both ends of the building. Here, a new set of 50 pound points were spliced into the main running track and in time, the track in the Heritage Centre will be connected, also with a short head-shunt. In the meantime, there has been the ballast to be put back in place, lots of grading with the BLR home-made and extremely effective ballast ploughs plus tamping and final alignment.
In the same way that a model railway is never finished, work is always ongoing on the BLR.
The Boilers for Alice and Holy War are ready to be re-installed into the frames once they have received their hydraulic tests and then comes the big task of dealing with all the fittings and adjustments. But our engineering team of Rob Houghton and Dan Laidlaw have done this operation so many times that what looks like a daunting job to the uninitiated is actually bordering, dare we say it, on the routine for them.
On top of getting everything finished, there is the nervous wait for the boiler inspector to make sure everything is in order, and in time for the big party scheduled for the end of April, about which we will comment later.
During the winter, new castings for injector, wheels and chimney tops were commissioned from Merseyside Castings in Liverpool. This was a joint effort as the Ffestiniog joined in on the order for their loco, Velinheli, another common sense move that happens so often between Welsh railways.
Alice has had her new chimney top fitted and very smart it looks too.
Work on the Bala Flood Defences has progressed very well indeed and, as we have commented before, the co-operation that the BLR Trust has received from Natural Resources Wales has been inspirational. Trust Chairman Julian Birley recently took a guest and our two engineers on an inspection tour, the highlight being that NRW has almost finished this huge project and has also laid the track-bed for the extension along the top of the new defences from almost the main road to where the footpath diverges along the edge of the lake and the extension will gently drop down alongside the rugby club and through the trees into the new station yard. As Dan Laidlaw’s photos show, the track-bed is ready and it is now planning permission that is eagerly awaited.
News on the Avonside loco is good as work is progressing well. The boiler, which is being built locally, has received some major parts, namely the front tube plate and inner firebox which have all been prepared and approved by the boiler inspector as ready for assembly. This means that welding it all together is well advanced and we hope to report on progress with the running machinery in a future update.
Passenger services start on the 14th February and what a delightful idea to present someone with a Valentine’s Day Gift of a ride along the beautiful lake. There will then be seven further days of trains in February with all details on the BLR website. It will be so good to see (and smell) our little Hunslets on the move again.
Future events
These start with our St. David’s Day Specials on the 26th February which are free to anyone who presents paperwork containing a local postcode. However, because this service can be booked up very rapidly, tickets will only be available on line and a special code will be issued during the preceding week.
Then there is another period of frenetic maintenance and preparation activity until scheduled services start on the 1st April, after which three major events take place.
7th - 10th April – The annual Easter Services and Easter Egg Hunt which is always a delight to children of all ages!
22nd April – The annual Race the Train spectacular where paddle-boarders are dropped off by train at Pentrepiod Halt and set off to the sailing club at the other end of the lake. Whilst it may sound like a one-sided affair, there have been some remarkably close finishes over the years and the noisy encouragement from the train has to be heard to be believed!
29th – 30th April – We need no excuse to celebrate, with a typical BLR extravaganza, the return to steam of Alice and Holy War after their ten year strip-downs. On days like these, anything can happen (and usually does) because we will be able to feature up to five Hunslet locos in steam. Likewise, multiple-heading, a BLR favourite, is definitely a possible maybe!
And finally……. photos appear regularly on the BLR Staff & Volunteers page on Facebook. But occasionally, one absolute Duesie comes to light and we include it here.
It shows Arthur Laidlaw, (recognise the surname?), on the footplate of one of our Hunslets. As his parents commented, it was a spontaneous appearance, truly one in a million.
The BLR takes enthusiastic volunteers of any age, and this little chap will go far.