Turn 46 - Cleaning the B12, disposing the 4MT and fitting a running board to the 9F

 Another Wednesday, another cleaning turn. A very nice morning, unseasonably cold but little wind and very sunny saw myself, Fireman Paul and Third Man Sam turn out with Fitter Rudy for a routine green service day. 

Fireman Paul had been on site since 05:30, and was frantically getting the B12 ready - odd, as the 4MT was supposed to be in service. We learned that hero Fitter Rudy had spotted a broken spring on the trailing axle on the drivers side during disposal the day before, so they had hurriedly lit a warming fire in the B12, which was what Paul was raking through.

With plenty of hands on deck, and being assigned to the cleaners role I left Paul and Sam to the fire and set the yard hose to filling the tender, before moving on to the boiler with a bucket of paraffin with 25% bearing oil added to it. Now that the B12 is in the last year of it's boiler ticket, we have dispensed with the usual traffic film remover and car polish since the condition of the paint is now so poor.

She scrubs up pretty well for an old girl.

Once they had gone off shed at 09:18, I spent a little while chopping rags, and put together a barrow load of wood for the next morning.

Then, back in the shed and back on to the 9F. The pipework we had started two weeks ago is now finished and Fitter Alan asked if I would help re-fitting the running board. We manhandled it back into place, and set about fitting the bolts and the various straps that keep the pipework in place:

That took most of the morning, but wasn't too difficult. We finished about 13:00

Not ready to go home, I volunteered to dispose the 4MT. I scooped a barrow of ash out of the smokebox and cleared the fire on the rocking grate, a half hour job.

More next week - back to the footplate but which loco?