A finish in site?

Last Wednesday work concentrated upon the axles. These have been cleaned, primed and undercoated. Whilst these were being cleaned, date stamps were found. The south Axle dates from 1927 where as the north axle is 1948. The south west wheel has now been undercoated as well. These are all going to be glossed on the same day, along with the north west wheel. Below is a photo of the newly undercoated south axle.

Copyright Tommy Lees 2013

Keith was busy on Saturday. All the west brake components have now been fully glossed and are now ready to be re-attached. These will be re-attached once he has finished cleaning the inside of the barrel. Whilst Keith had the gloss out, he also applied the first coat to the south end face of the barrel, now meaning THREE yes THREE sides are now in black gloss. The picture below was taken this morning before work commenced. 

Copyright Tommy Lees 2013

To today's report. Keith once again has been inside the barrel scraping the rust and dirt from inside. Its a big job and a real difference can be seen when looking in. He believes one more day inside and it should be clean, depending on results from inspection by Phil. The long term aim is to use A6071 as a water carrier for the engines, so the insides do have to be suitable. 

For me, work concentrated on taking the steam valve off the side of the tank. A few months back, Keith applied grease to release the nuts, making them easy to take off. The only reason it wasn't taken off then was it was tightly fitted. For a job that would take approximately 5 mintues from looking at it, it instead took an hour to free. Cleaning it up is going to be a big job. The main issue is that it is made out of brass like material, meaning using an angle grinder with wire brush is not a suitable method. Next week I will try cleaning it up with some Brasso. Below is a photo showing where the steam valve is attached.

Copyright Tommy Lees 2013

The main work is now focused on several areas again. The list of items to be done is growing, not shrinking and the list in summary is below.

• Clean and paint the west walkway
• Clean and paint the valve pipe (runs through the tank, only top half to be done)
• Gloss the west coast wheels, axles and axle boxes
• Clean and paint east side of barrel
• Clean up steam valve
• Attach wood blocks to brakes.
• Re-attach west side brakes
• Clean and paint the west ladder
• re-attach the east ladder
• second coat the barrel in gloss
• apply logos
• apply small writing
• attach new wagon plates
• re-assemble discharge pipes

Once all the above has been completed, then A6071 can enter service on the freight train and also be used by the GCR. If you would like to help us accomplish the list then please do email me on thomas_lees_21@hotmail.com. There are plenty of wagons for us to work on and the future of the GCR is looking bright, with a future for freight running over the 18 miles between Leicester and Nottingham. It will be like the 50's all over again, so come and join us.