Turn 155 - Firing the 4MT: Fish & Chips

 It's Wednesday evening, and we are on shed at 16:30 for the Fish & Chip service with Driver Fozz, a nice easy one-trip turn where you get fed!

Fitter Alan coals the 4MT for the next day - the loader is going for service and won't be available in the morning, so we are coaling today. The day crew have ashed out, and amongst to merry banter on the footplate I keep the fire hot while we wait for the Signalman to lock out the box for us to travel One Train On Line.

It's come to that time of year, at least for the chipper - the lamps are lit for a non-stop Class 1 service, though we don't need steam heat yet.

The chipper has a 30 minute non-stop trip time to Holt, which gives the driver time to eat his dinner as we chuff slowly along. The slow pace takes it out of the fire though and I'm on the shovel out of Sheringham, down Dead Man's, into Weybourne and down into Aviaries. I'm very pleased to arrive in Holt with 3/4 of a glass though.

Going down, I keep the fire hot with little & often around the box and we have more than 3/4 in the glass when we arrive in Sheringham. I fire lightly before we run around and the pressure is coming up as we take water; I fire a bit more heavily to take us up as I want to make sure I have a virtually full boiler by the time we get on the pit.

She doesn't drop below 200 psi all the way up and I'm pleased to find very little water space in the glass as I clean the fire.

Next turn, as Driver Fozz reminds me, is my assessment - in two weeks time.

Gulp.

Turn 154 - DMU Driver Training

It's been a busy week, but this turn is a bit less physical as it's a DMU Driver Training turn on the newly turned out M56182 driving trailer, restored and owned by the Birmingham Railcar Group. It's a beautiful thing:

The driving desk is a little different from the Class 101 railcars we are used to, but in detail only. All the usual controls are there.

In my previous driver training turn Inspector Dan signed me off for driving passenger trains, and I started this turn by taking the empty coaching stock down to Sheringham to collect the guard and the provisions for the buffet and then back up to Holt.

Later, while Driver Rod in the front I took a trip with the guard to establish the difference in his activity compared to operating a loco-hauled train. Essentially:

• at the beginning of the day the guard is briefed on the state of the train (windows & doors working, all equipment in the guards van present) by the driver, as the driver prepares the train before the guard arrives.
• after confirming with the platform staff that their duties are complete he uses the buzzer to signal the 'right away' to the driver - two pushes on the buzzer, which are acknowledged with a further two pushes by the driver.
• when there is a request stop, the guard takes no action with the driver - there is no flag signal at all. If there is no request stop, the guard gives two pushes on the buzzer (the 'green flag' signal) which the driver acknowledges to tell him not to stop - so the driver's default action is to stop at every request stop unless told not to.

Guard Ron signed that off on my DMU Traction Training schedule. 

DMU turns have a lot of sitting around, because of course you don't have to run around, stop for water or pull coal forward. I spent the time working on my DMU Theory assessment:

Driver Rod is very knowledgeable on DMU technology. I learned that there is a final drive dog position indicator:

I drove my first DMU passenger train as the 4th round trip:

Top tips - while you can hold the train with the brake handle in the lap position at 15" Hg, the vacuum will rise and the brakes will come off. The DMU, and particularly the 104 DTCL, rolls very easily and if you are not careful the train will move with the doors open.

Driver Rod signed a lot of stuff on my Diesel Driver Training Schedule. There's a lot more to do, particularly route knowledge in parts of the railway I hardly visit, and then there is all the DMU preparation to work on.

At the end of the day, I drove ECS to shed and assisted in the disposal of the unit. Next week I have a firing turn, then a Second Man turn, then several more firing turns in October - and then we are into the Norfolk Lights service and Santas.

That might be the last DMU training before next year.

Turn 153 - Firing the Y14

With the mornings darkening and cooling, and no Cleaner rostered I signed in at 06:00 to light up the Y14 once again. She was warm from the previous day, but not so warm that I couldn't dive in the firebox to clean her out from the inside. Someone had clearly got a new pair of safety boots as the skeletal remains of the old ones came out with the ash:

On fossil coal, the Y14 lights up easily I must, must, must remember to keep the smoke under control - two reprimands today, one from CME Keith who saw it from the village. I opened the firehole door in a hurry.

We went off shed on time with a tender full of fossil coal. The Y14 got a dry wipe all over the boiler to get the oily smuts off:

The rain started after breakfast and didn't let up. I did a couple of trips which were a bit marginal, not maintaining steam very well with the pressure doing the yoyo throughout the trip.

I drove the third, with Driver Dave on the shovel. Dave's got a lot of experience on the railway and soon made me see how I mess up firing this loco. He fired much more often, on both hills, and had a lot more in the back.

It was still raining. We put the cab tarpaulin up for the fourth, and I made sure I had more coal in the back corners - my Lucas shovel is quite long (I can reach deep into the tender) and quite flat, which means you have to concentrate on getting coal into the back corners. Cover the grate! 

We went up at 150 psi the whole way.

The jury is out on the shovel - I used the Lucas, but recalling Third Man Michael on this a couple of weeks ago a more bent shovel might be better.

Next stop - more DMU training!

September YDC

Days at the railway are not all about firing turns. Today it is the first September Youth Development Club meeting, and out job is to dispose a few locos and clean the 08, before chopping some wood.

First though, the lovely Class 104 joins the fleet on it inaugural running day:

Our first job will be to dispose the Y14 which was on the lunch service yesterday:

The group meet at Sheringham, and come up on the first train. Today it's hauled by the 4MT:

We gather the team on the footplate and go through the usual morning checks - valves, handbrake, reverser and have a look in the firebox, before going forward to clear the smokebox:

Some of the guys have birthdays in September and so will be adult volunteers in a few weeks. They get to do the firebox, as they will be doing it for real soon:

The adult helpers get stuck in too:

It's not a big firebox and they are soon back in daylight:

The 104 looks resplendent in the sunshine while we have lunch:

Driver Tony kindly provides the group with a guided tour of the Class 31 before we go to the wood pile for the rest of the day.

Turn 152 - Firing the Y14

Another Wednesday, but not too early a start for me and Driver John as we arrive to find Third Man Mike has lit up our fine steed for the day, the GER Y14. It's a bit overcast & misty but promises to be dry.

Mike cleans the boiler, I set to work on the cab.

Down in Sheringham for breakfast, the weather shows us what it has in store - a sea fret. These are mists formed out at sea where warm air is cooled by the sea, blowing towards landfall. The warmer land heats the air again, and the mist disappears leading to a strip of mist just along the coast. Typically, there will be fog on the beach and in town, but head half a mile inland and it will disappear.

Mike, who lit up and raised steam fires the first two trips. I drove the second with some excellent stops in stations, on the water crane, and at Kelling Heath Halt. Again I found myself going onto the train quite hard - but not much worse than many drivers. Next time I'll try to pressurise the steam chest, then release brake to inch forward. 

This small square of tarmac is the perfect stopping point to get the Y14 on the water column.

I fired the third and fourth; the third too heavy, the fourth better but still with the pressure varying way too much. A couple of weeks later, a very experienced Driver showed me that I'm not firing often enough and that it's OK to fire on a hill!.

We had a few troubles with the displacement lubricator, which occasionally stopped working on the driver's side. It pays to keep any eye on it through the day.

Disposal was great disposal - lots of pressure, arrived on shed with the boiler full and the fire thin. I discovered the injectors still work at 70 psi when the water went over the top of the gauge.

Turn 151 - Firing the 7F

 Another Tuesday, another firing turn, and another chance to enjoy the S&DJR Class 7F, 53809.  Third Man Ben, cycling in with a lot of time to spare had spent his morning with buckets of oil and paraffin and the engine was gleaming; the weather was a bit overcast and the picture doesn't do it justice.

We have plenty of time to get ready on this turn which makes a relaxed start to the day and we loped down to Sheringham with 140 on the clock - we have an hour to wait.

In contrast to last week, we had a tender full of fossil coal - this is excellent on this loco which is quite hungry, but steams really well if you feed it in the right places.

I took the first trip up, over firing as it turned out. As usual, I had the boiler full and the fire raging as we left Sheringham, watered on the way over Dead Man's & fired in the cutting. We had a nail biting six minutes at Weybourne waiting for the down service. Driver Mark was taking it easy - we didn't use much water as its a powerful loco and we had the Quad-Arts on the back, so I still had very high water while we waited. I resolved to ease back on the second up, and made use of the slacker and the ash pan sprinkler.

Firing again in Weybourne, we sailed up the hill easily and I was on the injectors again in the cutting, arriving in Holt with plenty of water and a fire which needed managing for a few minutes but settled to around 180 while we ran around.

The second up was a repeat performance, but I left the shovel alone at Dead Man's and arrived in Weybourne a little more relaxed.  

Ben took over at Holt and fired the next two very happily; I took over for the fourth down & disposal, keeping the water high and feeding it gently. A little bit too gently as it turned out - I fed it a lot more at Dead Man's and again, with dust and small bits of fossil coal as we went into the yard. The boiler was already full, but I wanted something in reserve so we could top it up after cleaning the fire. That few shovels of dust gave me 20 psi.

On disposal, I cleaned the pan twice - once to get rid of a lot of ash, and again after we had cleaned the fire. I thought there would be a lot of ash, since the pan had been quite full after prep, but I'm sure I didn't need to go to that effort.

Same time next week? 

Turn 150 - Firing the 7F

 It's Tuesday and it's a maroon service - two steam locos and a diesel, the Class 14. We are second off-shed after the BR Standard 4MT and I'm pleased that Third Man Henry has been in touch and will light up for us - I don't have to arrive until 07:30. It's not that I mind getting up early, but this turn is over 11 hours and if you start before your scheduled hours you will run out of time - you are only permitted to do 12 hours straight with 12 hours between shifts.

With Henry there, I was able to give the paintwork a good clean. The frames look like a job for later though:

It looked pretty good by the time we were ready to leave:

 

We took coal - a bucket half full of ovoids and half of fossil coal. The ovoids were on top, so I got to fire the first and second trips on ovoids, and Henry fired the 3rd and 4th on fossil - a lot of which was dusty.

There's no blow down valve on this loco; you treat hard water with tannin which keeps the solids in solution until you wash it out - which you do more frequently than on engines which you can blow down. These use soft water, which precipitates the solids out to the foundation ring so they can be blown out on a daily basis, which extends the washout cycle.

This loco is very sensitive to water levels, so I agreed with Driver Ed that we would aim at half to 3/4 glass throughout the day. Firing the first and second showed the engine wasn't too happy with the coal, my technique, or a bit of both - it wasn't maintaining pressure very well and we were arriving with it heading down to 140 - it redlines at 180; the water levels were spot on all day.

Having a look in the box, I realised that with a big back end in I was allowing the middle to get too thin, like the illustration from the Black Book - I've not fired this for a while and an unfamiliar loco takes a bit of getting used to; filling the hole in resolved the problem and I fixed it on the second trip.

It wasn't the magic bullet though. When people say 'big back end' and 'keep the front covered' that might work for fossil coal but on ovoids you need a lot more thickness - they don't shake down, any more than the coal in the tender moves forwards to avoid you double handling.

Next time I fire this I'll need to put a lot more in the front with more bed thickness; my back end was fine.

On the way back, I fired the front to keep the pressure up and let the back burn through - we had suspected it had clinkered and a few minutes with the bent dart proved that it had, though not badly. I cleared it out in Sheringham and laid a bit in the back end to save Henry a bit of time.

The third trip was a relaxing one for me - just a bit of hooking on & off. Henry, now through the ovoids and into the fossil coal had it just under 180 the whole way up with some smoke signals from the chimney. One of the features of using ovoids is that there is virtually no exhaust smoke, so you can't really tell when it has burned through.

Driver Ed was planning a little surprise for Henry. He'd been looking a little pale all day, mainly because he was covered in Factor 50 against the scorching Norfolk sunshine so it was perhaps less of a shock for Henry when Driver Ed claimed to be incapacitated at Kelling on the fourth up, and that he should take over. I sat back and watched as Henry took the train over Wind Pump and to a safe stop at Holt, with the miraculously-recovered Ed looking over his shoulder; all I needed to do was get a bit more water in the boiler. 

That's Henry another step closer to Passed Cleaner. 

I drove the fourth down, reminding myself how the Midland brake valve works and drove Light Engine back to shed. The stops were all good, including a yellow flag stop at Kelling; the Midlands style valve is easy to control using the vacuum, but personally I find the BR Standard combination brake valve easier to stop smoothly when you are Light Engine. 

Disposal went well; Henry was in charge under Ed's tutelage. 

I hope someone adds a chain to hold the upper ash pan door open though. 

Next turn? Same time next week, probably same loco. 

See you then.