Turn 101 - Fireman on the 4MT: Fish and Chip Train

Now this makes a change - not the fish and chip train, but the Standard 4MT which I have not fired for months - and I've never had a firing turn on it.

There's nothing in the yard when I sign on at 16:25 though - the loco is still in Sheringham, probably taking on water.

The Class 20 is here though, on the diesel pit:

The 4MT appears on time at about 16:45 with Driver Paul, Fireman Gary and Third Man Tom on board.

They've had a grand day out by all accounts, and have left me with a hot fire, a lot of pressure, a full boiler and a full tender. They've been using 50% fossil coal and 50% ovoid Wildfire all day, but since the ovoids went on top of the fossil coal when they filled the tender, there's nothing left but ovoids for me this evening. We dropped the pan, but we didn't clean the fire.

Wildfire is a smokeless alternative to the bituminous coal we usually use, and is a blend of anthracite, coal and petroleum coke. Anthracite is is a hard, compact variety of coal that has a submetallic lustre. It has the highest carbon content, the fewest impurities, and the highest energy density of all types of coal, and Petroleum Coke is a final carbon-rich solid material that derives from oil refining - so what we have is essentially a blend of more energy rich, lower ash, low sulphur, low chlorine and higher carbon coals. You don't see much ash or smoke, and it takes longer to give up it's energy as heat.

So we went down to Sheringham with a tender all full of ovoids, largely on the heat from the firebox as I had lots of pressure, heat and a full boiler. Driver Fozz stopped near Bridge 303, so that we could use a bit of steam and make a bit of space by pulling up the 1 in 100, to the top of Dead Man's Hill.

Given that I knew it would take a bit of extra time to come around, I built the fire 15 minutes before departure and we moved off a few minutes late, in good shape - or so I thought. Over the crossing I fired fairly heavily but it was obvious that it was taking a while to come around as it wasn't making steam as it usually does and the recovery going back down the 1 in 100 was a bit marginal, so I had the dampers wide and was firing heavily as we went up to Weybourne.

We were struggling to maintain 180 on non stop up; the fire was roaring and it felt like there was a hole. In Holt, I had a good look but found a nice even fire with no hole showing that was making good steam after several additional firings on way up - so this fuel seems to take much longer to heat up. Fozz reckoned the roaring was more to do with the fact that I had the dampers very wide.

The trip down was ok, with lots of water as of course we would be disposing after taking water in Sheringham, but the light engine trip was not making the steam I expected. Back at Weybourne and on the pit, it was obvious that the back end was a bit clogged up with a fair bit of clinker:

I resolved to clean the fire, or make sure it was clean before I took the engine over from another crew again.

Turn 100 - Fireman on the 9F: Lunch Train

A slightly unusual day - what started out as a third man turn on the four-trip yellow service turned into a firing turn on the two trip lunch train. There were two new cleaners, so despite the roster change I turned in at the usual 06:00 to help light up. 

The yellow service was to be hauled by the 7F, which I had expected but as the lunch train was originally scheduled for Cromer, I thought we might get the 4MT - but no, CME Keith had decided to roster the 9F to try out a blend of the new 'Wildfire' coal from CPL.

Since the lunch train wasn't due off-shed until 11:11, new Cleaner David and I prepared and lit up the 7F, raising steam until it was time to transfer my attentions to the 9F a couple of hours later.

The 9F had had a warming fire in it, which Duty Fitter Alan had fed when we signed on, and when I had done my safety checks I fed it some more. It was hot, but behaving strangely - it had no vigour about it at all and was very smoky in the cab. I fed it for a while.

When Driver Nick signed on at 09:00, he suggested I go and look in the smokebox - he'd spotted a lot of soot around the firebox door spy hole and realised that there was something preventing the draft going - of course I didn't have the pressure to used the blower. Opening the smokebox door revealed a spark screen almost completely clogged with ash - typical when there has been a warming fire in a loco and something I would have seen if I had lit it up myself. I swept the ash off with a broom and the effect was almost instant.

Before either loco went off-shed, CME Keith called the firemen together to give us a briefing on the coal we would be using - 50% fossil coal and 50% Wildfire ovoids. He's gathering data on loco performance when using this renewable fuel and instructed us to fire the bed thicker than normal, more frequently than normal keeping the dampers open and observe the result. The ovoids seem to be strong - they don't shatter and seem to retain their shape on the grate, giving good heat without so much smoke and ash - there certainly wasn't much ash in the smokebox of the 7F.

Part way through steam raising on the 9F I had a call from Driver Ed on the 7F, who was about to bring our breakfast up on the first train. They'd somehow gone off-shed without their lamps and discs - I went down to the lamp store and prepared a set for both locos, leaving theirs by the bridge where I knew they would stop.

We went on to the pit for the inspection and to have a look at the ash pan - I had a look and a poke around with a rake and decided that we had plenty of capacity for two trips. We took on coal, just one scoop onto a tender that I has previously raked flat. Driver Nick handled the blowdown while I went to get changed.

Down in Sheringham, we backed onto our set in platform 3.

The first up was very good, with plenty of water and steam. I had made up my mind to try to avoid running with too much water. For the second, were were late off as the signalman was struggling with the points - apparently the compensators in the points rodding struggle at certain times on a sunny day when the rodding is in the shade on one side of the compensator and in the sun on the other.

The second up was not so good - 180 all way. I fired several more times than I would expect to - struggling with a hole in the back corner and really should have filled it more before we left and then avoided firing the middle back until I'd fired the corners again. Trying to keep the pressure up, I was also running short of easily-reached coal, and didn't really have enough pressure to use the injectors...

The lesson here is be more prepared! With all the waiting time at Sheringham I could have pulled more coal down and double checked the back corners. I must always remember to fire the back corners before you fire the middle back - because you can't fire with the heat from the door raging at you. However, we did make it up OK, and Driver Nick was happy that I had realised there was a problem and got us there.

There had been a couple of fires during the day, one near Kelling which had been put out by the DMU driver and one at Holt station, in the four foot, which I put out with the slacker pipe. The problem is the 9F doesn't have any ash pan screens and we could see ash on the brake rigging when we made our inspection later - it drops out of the pan when the damper is open.

By the time I signed out, it was almost 18:00 and in a few minutes I would be out of hours - you have to be a bit wary of coming in early. If we had had a problem with our train I would have overrun...

Turn 99 - Fireman on the WD: Gin Train

 Following hot on the heels of turn 98, a full day on the WD, comes a evening gin train. This is a two-trip service where passengers are served with four gins, mixers, snacks and dessert while we take a gentle trundle through the North Norfolk countryside.

The loco we are rostered to is the WD Austerity 2-10-0 that I was on yesterday, and we are relieving the daytime crew. It's late up to Weybourne though, because today the BR Standard 9F 92203 has returned to the railways from a visit to the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway, and our loco has hauled it up to Weybourne.

Fireman Carl from the day crew cleans the fire and I help clear the ash pan. Cleaning the fire always leaves it pretty cold, so Driver Peter shovels some coal into the back while I load our bags onto the footplate and make sure my dampers are closed.

Climbing aboard I open the blower to bring the fire on, and fire the back corners some more as we leave - we are very late and have around 20 minutes to get down to Sheringham, hook on and take the first train up. By the time we are ready to go I have a good fire, hot enough not to need any more attention until we crest Dead Man's - I've got a full glass as well. Before we go though, the catering team appear with our plate of snacks - some cold meat, crackers, cheese and olives.

We make two round trips and as we prepare to depart for the second down trip, Driver Peter leaves the footplate to 'make some enquiries' and returns with two portions of cheesecake.

Before we go, I jump off to take a picture of the WD's safety valves. I run this loco against the red line a lot of the time and rarely have problems with it blowing off - and someone has suggested that's because it's fitted with the old-fashioned spring type  - it clearly doesn't, since these are the pop-type safety valves used on the other BR Standards.

On the way down, while checking the fire I'm surprised to find a brick out of the arch on the grate:

The rest of the arch is in place:

There's nothing we can do about that until the morning. 

We come down into Platform 2 at Sheringham, and the service train is ready in platform 1 for the next day - so we can't run around. We wait until the station pilot has pulled off the stock, and we head back to Weybourne.

On the way up, we have to stop a couple of times to put out sleeper fires, These are invariably 'end of life' sleepers where the centre is very rotten and fragmented - ideal kindling, but our ash pan is again not sealing. I put them out with my clean water bucket, filled from the fireman's side injector.

Disposal goes well, and I have the boiler full over the top nut when it's stabled. There's no way I can get that firebrick off the grate though.

Turn 98 - Fireman on the WD

 Another Wednesday, another, though unexpected, turn - this time a firing turn on a yellow service, for which we are assigned  to the WD 2-10-0 'Royal Norfolk Regiment'. Unexpected because a roster change at the weekend's Mixed Traction Gala meant that the rostered fireman for today wasn't available, so in response to a request from the Operations Management team I stepped in, eager to get another firing turn in.

Today, as I stroll down the yard with Cleaner Nick, who will be out on a DOTS on a chartered vintage set hauled by the Y14, we find Wissington out in the yard. She's almost finished and has been on test, and she is off to the Middy (Mid Suffolk Light Railway) at the end of the month.

Arriving at the WD, it appears that yesterday's crew didn't take any coal, and to prove it there is a pile of dust in the tender with a few lumps for me to light up. Lighting up goes well and doesn't make much smoke (I use a lot more wood than I used to), but it takes a while to come around; Fitter Alan is after two glasses blown down as the WD is near the end of it's washout cycle but there's just not enough heat - not helped by the lack of water in the boiler when I arrived. I've emptied the tender.

We take coal before we blow down, just to have a fighting chance of getting ready to leave on time.

Blowing down produces sauna-like conditions on the footplate!

Driver Andy and I make four uneventful round trips with no slip ups and no blowing off, though as usual I have the glass full. It's a habit drummed into me by my training and it's proving hard to break, but you just can't run the water too high in the Y14 and the 7F.

There's lots of photographers about.

I say the day was uneventful, but on the third up as we approach the level crossing a pedestrian, who has been waiting at the lights, decides it's a good idea to walk out in front of an approaching train. I see him first as he is walking from my side and yell to Andy to stop - Andy has seen him too and operates the vacuum brakes to bring the train to a halt 100 yards short of the crossing. The pedestrian gets a lecture, which as usual falls on deaf ears. Safety is number one priority on the railway and crews are taught to avoid distractions, like firing, in dangerous locations such as this.

After the fourth trip, we take the loco light engine back to Weybourne where, in a change of plan, we are relieved by the crew of the Fish & Chip train. We had been scheduled to dispose the WD but the shed staff have decided to use the WD for the chipper rather than the Y14.

There's a sign of things to come in the yard, as coal becomes difficult to find - a lorry load of eco-coal:

I wonder what that will be like?

Mixed Traction Gala

 No railway turn this week, and no turns at the 2022 Mixed Traction Gala either. This week my activity (apart from delivering a box of Black Prince books to the shop) has been limited to helping close the crossing for the DRS Class 37 37401 'Mary Queen of Scots' to get from Network Rail to the NNR.

Here she comes now:

After she had come across, we closed the gates and moved the barriers back to their storage space by Sheringham East Signal Box. I took this next picture in Platform 2 at Sheringham:

Turn 97 - Fireman on the WD: Fish & Chip Train

 An unusual turn today, and one I must practice. Most of my turns are service trains - light up, four round trips stopping at Weybourne and then dispose - all very routine. I came a bit unstuck on a trip last turn firing a non-stop up service at normal line speed, and running out of pressure part way. I'm quite used to non-stop services but they tend to be Norfolk Lights Express trains which are limited to 3 mph through stations which gives you plenty of time to fire, but I'm now thinking that I can improve my experience by rostering for different services.

Anyhow, today we are reliving Driver James and Fireman Owen who have had the WD Austerity 2-10-0 90775 out all day. Our job is to take the loco to Sheringham, pick up the Fish & Chip train and take it one single round trip to Holt and back before disposing the loco.

The current coal burns through very quickly and it was my job as fireman to build the fire up again and fill the boiler, which was showing half a glass. The fire was very dull over perhaps half the grate. Before we went off-shed, we had clear instructions from Chief Engineer Keith to make sure we thoroughly cleaned the clinker off the firebars and to fill the boiler as high as we could before stabling the loco.

I built a good fire, and started to fill the boiler; by the time we got to Sheringham I was ready to go, though we had half an hour to finalise our preparation. Half an hour came and went, and the guard came to tell us that a party booked on a table for two had turned up with fourteen people and the catering staff needed to find twelve more portions of fish and chips. I had to keep my almost ready fire under control, so I closed the dampers, closed the blower down and opened the firehole door. I suggested that it would be a good time to wash the floor as I knew the slacker pipe would use some steam and keep the pressure down a bit - so the cab got the scrubbing of its life.

We ended up being ten minutes late, but there was no blowing off. We did leave rather suddenly but I fired a little before the box and again over the crossing, and by now I had a full boiler. I fired again going down Dead Man's and used the injector on the way into Weybourne where we had a 5 minute layover to allow the signalman to switch the box out of service and go home - we would operate on the Long Section Staff for the rest of the evening.

Having got out of Sheringham in a bit of a hurry, I was pleased to see my water level at the top of the glass when we stopped at Weybourne. The fire was burning furiously, but as I have written before this coal burns through very quickly and I wasn't going to let Driver Christian and myself down by leaving a hole, or a thin fire for a run up the bank. I put another round on and held the pressure using the injectors as we got up to line speed. 

The fireman's side injector is quite slow, and we were hovering around the red line as we went up; the injector was on full time as we entered the cutting, yet I still had only 3/4 of a glass as we went over the top. I left it on and fired the thin areas.

We arrived in Holt with over 200 psi and 3/4 of a glass - quite a good performance. I ignored the fire as we ran around, as we had two footplate passengers and it would have been dangerous to start throwing a shovel around, but I did top the water up a bit.

After we hooked on, another footplate visitor appeared who had visited the Bure Valley and the Wells and Walsingham Light Railway earlier in the day. He was 11 years old, and I encouraged him to look at our Youth Development Club on the web - and encouraged him to use my shovel to put a couple of loads in after I had fixed a leaking glass on the fireman's side water gauge.

We had a non stop journey on the way down and we started with the boiler full and the fire thin - we were at 185 psi as we started and I built the fire up, not wanting to be short of heat when we came to dispose, and we had plenty of heat and water as we finished our duty by shunting set B into platform 2.

That done, we made a gentle trip up to Weybourne Light Engine, with the boiler filling and the fire low, but steadily making steam - I was not going to let it go cold. It was full and sitting at 220 when we arrived.

Next stop, the ground frame hut. I operated the ground frame as usual to let our loco in, but Driver Christian later reminded me not to pull off the signal on lever 4 on way in - if there had been a loco in the head shunt, you would inadvertently let it out and potentially cause an accident.

On the pit, I was pleased to find the water bobbing around at the top of the glass. My next job was to fill it a bit more, and clean the fire. There was, as Chief Engineer Keith predicted, a lot of clinker clinging to the rear two sets of bars. This had to be broken up with the bent dart and the pricker before raking the fire over.

To round off the day, we spent a while with small rakes cleaning five trips of ash out of the pan. I've never seen so much:

At the de-brief, Driver Christian told me he was quite happy with the turn - his only criticism was that the fire had been a bit like the Himalayas at times - not very flat. He also said that he would fire when leaving Sheringham but be done by the time we got to the box - contrary to some folks views, that you should let the firebox do the work until you are over the crossing - however, when you are over the crossing there is very little time to fire before the driver wants to open up...

His last comment was to encourage me to sign up for more different turns, like gin trains, fish & chip trains and Santa's, to vary my experience. Next turn? a gin train on the 16th June. More than two weeks away!