Turn 127 - Firing the 4MT: Norfolk Lights Express

 Here it is - the last turn of the season. It's the Wednesday before New Year and the railway is running Mince Pie Specials during the day and Norfolk Lights Express trains in the evening; after the Christmas festivities are over, Driver Christian, Third Man Henry and I sign on at 15:30 to relieve the Mince Pie crew on their third down trip.

The yard is choc-a-bloc with Horace the Crane, the B12 chassis on the exit road, Ring Haw's boiler and the B12 boiler, whose tubes are all out.

All we need to do is collect our lamps and jump on the loco when it comes down. Henry has not fired to dispose before, so to give him that experience we agree that I will fire down to Sheringham and first trip, and then he will take over for the second trip and the Light Engine trip. We have a chat about preparing for disposal, so that he can get ready.

There's half a glass and a cool fire when we get on, so I set about firing and getting it warmed up again to get some water in for the 1 in 100 up Dead Man's, but it's obvious the grate is clinkered.

We run around and take water in Sheringham before setting about the grate with the irons. It's no surprise that the fire is completely clogged with great dinner plates of clinker which are cold and black on the bottom. Fortunately we have plenty of time to rectify the situation and by the time we are off she is steaming well again and we sail up to Holt having a jolly time. 

We seemed to have a lot of visitors at both ends of the trip, with passengers on the footplate at Holt and at Sheringham whilst poor Henry was trying to prepare for the second trip.

Back in Sheringham again and after hooking off we took our photo-call, but by now it was getting late and we didn't have many footplate visitors. I piled into the tender, intent on helping Henry get ready to fire the Light Engine trip and making sure he had enough coal to prepare well for disposal. Christian offered me the driving seat which of course I relished, and I tried to take heed of his suggestion from last time that I should take it easy with the regulator.

He didn't say anything through the whole trip - I hope it was OK!

Henry was well prepared for disposal and we arrive with 200 on the clock, with the fire hot and the boiler well up. There was still a lot of clinker on the grate which he dealt with with the irons:

There was loads of ash. The ashpan sprinkler was put to good use, and I stayed behind on the pit to shovel it out:

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is that for 2022, my third year on the railway. The plan for 2023 is to crack as many turns in as possible, to bring my total firing turns up to 60 and to consolidate experience. No other aims, though it would be nice to achieve full Fireman at some point - I have to complete two more cleaning turns and do an assessment, but that's all.

Happy New Year!

Turn 126 - Firing the WD: Santa Special

Well, this is a new one - almost a full 12 hours, the Santa B turn. It’s three round trips, signing on at 07:15 and off at 19:05; the B train finishes in Sheringham platform 2 and starts in platform 1, so there is a shunt every trip - not much time if you are watering as well. There’s a 40 minute break in Weybourne on the way down, where you can chill for a bit - or clean the fire if you’ve got some ovoids in the mix.

Third Man Brad had turned in at 05:30 and lit up - since he would have to leave before the end of the turn (he’d run out of hours before Driver Nick and myself) we agreed he would fire the first trip.

Leaving Brad on the footplate, Nick and I oiled up & performed the drivers inspection. Nick took care of the areas above the running plate while I oiled the valve gear and coupling rods, the pony truck and various other points. On the pit, I checked all the axle boxes, draining the water and checking the oil levels as I went along.

Part of the oiling up process is to eyeball every nut, split pin, taper pin, spring and everything else for absence or damage - I didn’t find anything apart from a wobbling oil pipe.

Brad fired the first round trip to Weybourne, which set the scene for the day - we were held on the down home at Weybourne waiting for the ‘A’ train to clear the station and we took the opportunity to rake the first signs of clinker out of the back. We’d been warned by CME Keith that clinker had delayed their disposal considerably the day before, and with plenty of personal experience of that I wasn’t going to let that happen to me.

There always seems to be delays around Santa Special workings and this turn was no different - you just have to keep the fire hot, leave some space in the boiler and be ready to turn the wick up when the whistle blows - easy on the WD. Not only were we delayed getting in to Weybourne, but getting out as well.

I fired the 2nd and 3rd which were pretty uneventful, and the buffet crew brought us two mince pies each which kept my fire going for a bit.

We lit the lamps towards the end of the second trip and got the Bardics out, and it was fully dark for the 3rd. We said goodbye to Third Man Brad at Weybourne and when all the passengers were back on board we headed down to Sheringham to get ready for disposal.

I cleaned fire after every trip - the irons were pretty hot when they came out:

Down in Sheringham we needed to shunt the set from platform 2 to platform 3, so I had a bit of time to sort some coal from the dust and get the fire hot enough for disposal. I had the boiler well up before we left and arrived with it very high, but the regulator on the WD leaks a bit and uses a surprising amount of water.

I was pleased to find it still high once we had reached the level pit, and when I had cleaned the fire for the last time I still had 180 on the gauge. A good disposal.

And that was that, home by 8. The next turn will be the last for 2022, a Norfolk Lights Express next week. All that remains is to wish my readers a Merry Christmas!

Turn 125 - Firing the 4MT: Norfolk Lights Express

 Another day, another NLE turn, this time starting from cold - there was no lunch train or Santa so Third Man Lewis arrived at 12:00 to light up, followed by me half an hour later. Lewis already had the fire going, so all I had to do was put the hose in the tender first checking to see it wasn't frozen solid, and fill up the guage lamp with paraffin. We set about the cab with rags, polishing the brass with Peek, nattering, comparing shovels and debating how much coal to take as we brough the boiler up to pressure to prepare for the two glasses blow down requested by Fitter Alan.

Having run out of coal once this year and suffering the associated heckling (probably for years to come), I wasn't too keen on 'winging it' with what we had in the tender, however tidy Lewis had made it: 

In the end, we had that plus two more bucketloads which I trimmed forward to minimise our raking later. This may have been a bit of a mistake it continuously ran onto the cab floor whenever the shovel got close to the coaling plate...

We decided to take it in turns firing and as I wanted to prove to myself, after last week's debacle, that I could properly prepare the loco for disposal Lewis took the first trip and I headed off to the ground frame. There's a loco behind that cloud:

We trundled off up the line as dusk fell, flushing three red deer out of the undergrowth on the heath. I switched on the first three generators, and was abandoned at the third while Driver Christian went off back up the line to investigate a bang he had heard while coming down over Wind Pump.

Unfortunately, that trip yielded a bit of track damage - we took some pictures and sent them to the RO, and carried on down the line to start up the other generators.

Beyond Weybourne, we entered the microcosm enclosing Sheringham and it's peculiar weather system, and the sleet came down. The fourth generator was surrounded by a stinging 25 mph wind and driving sleet, the fifth wasn't much better but was a bit more enclosed in the trees. Lewis did the last one - perhaps he was worried about the hexagenarian fireman getting cold.

Down in Sheringham we filled up with water, hooked on and started the steam heating. I took over the fire and fed it a bit so we could get it warming up while we had tea and ordered our dinner. 

It was ready by 16:50, a bit early really, but I kept the lid on it for another ten minutes without any blowing off but it wasn’t long before the crunch came - Driver Christian appeared with a second round of coffees and the news that the evening service had been cancelled.

So that was a short day.

By this time we were a bit famished; fortunately the lovely buffet crew wanted to make sure we were fed before we went, so we tucked in to our pizza, pastie and chips before heading up the line to turn the generators off.

With Lewis driving, we went up to switch off the bottom four generators since we couldn’t get to the top two and by the time we were done I had the boiler really full and the fire blazing; the boiler was still well in the top quarter when we were on the level pit for disposal. There was a lot of ash and a fair bit of clinker - it wasn’t steaming so freely on the way up; I’m going to have to work out how to deal with that. Last time I ran any length of time on ovoids I cleaned the fire every other trip.

As I write this, whilst the NLE service was wiped out for an evening the lunch service ran today (perhaps only to Weybourne) and I’ve just heard the problem has been fixed - good thing, because Passed Cleaner Lewis has his PC-Fireman assessment tomorrow.

My next turn is a Santa B on the 22nd - a very long turn with Driver Nick and Third Man Brad.

Turn 124 - Firing the 4MT: Santa Special

An early start for a change, with frozen sludge in the yard and the promise of slippery conditions everywhere, I arrived on shed to find Third Man Brad lighting up the 4MT for the Santa 'A' service, which is three round trips with relief at Weybourne on the third down by the NLE crew.

The day stared pretty smoothly, with Brad and I sharing the fireman's duties. The 4MT's regulator is passing a bit at the moment, and with the cylinder drain cocks open the position of the engine filled the shed with steam:

On the pit, I ashed out after Driver Chris had finished his inspection. The rear hopper door wasn't closing too well:

I cleared the pit while Fitter Bob coaled the engine, and we went forward to blow down while I trimmed the coal. It was a bit foggy...

We were off shed in good time, and ran down to Sheringham with Brad firing - we planned to swap at Weybourne on the down, so he'd get two firing trips and I would get one; I was quietly hoping I would get to drive the last trip. Arrival in Sheringham was a bit surprising, with the home signal set clear and the road set for platform 2 - unbeknownst to me, Driver Chris had arranged for us to go on the water crane when we arrived.

We had the usual hour to warm up the train and have our breakfast, watching the fog ebb and flow: it would need to be a lamp departure - there was no chance of seeing flags - so the loco lamps were lit and the Bardic came out.

When the time came, we were going nowhere. The cold weather had frozen the points at the end of the loop and the signalman could not pull off the section starter; we waited so long to get it fixed we ran out of time to get to Holt and had to run directly to Weybourne - and even then we were flagged over the crossing (which won't initiate if the section starter is not clear) and through the signal at danger.

On the way down, while waiting at Weybourne we learned the tablet machines for the Weybourne-Sheringham section were having problems, so in accordance with the rules we resorted to Pilotman working - Third Man Brad spent the next couple of hours as Pilotman, while I fired the next trip.

Of course by the time we had got down it was time to come up again, so after filling with water I hastily built the fire for the up trip. By the time we left I hadn't recovered enough and I was adding a lot of coal on the way up, but by the time we reached Weybourne I had a blazing fire that for some reason wasn't creating steam pressure as fast as it should. Driver Christian had a look and immediately spotted I didn't have enough in the back corners. If you don't keep the back corners well covered, the cold air goes straight into the tubes and cools the boiler. It's really important on this loco.

Back down in Weybourne I had some time to spare and went through the back with the irons - we had a mixture of coal and ovoids, and there was a lot of ash. I moved the grate on the rocking lever to shake some more through and it really woke up.

Pilotman Brad appeared on the B loco, 92203 Black Prince, and he fired down to Weybourne and back up while I drove, a bit quickly but at least my braking is improving. Running around though it was clear the loco wasn't happy with a groaning coming from the drivers side. This proved to be a loose lubricator connection to the forward piston valve. Tightening the union followed by several manual turns on the lubricator had the groaning gone and the loco sounding well again.

Next one is another NLE in a few days time.

Turn 123 - Firing the 4MT: Norfolk Lights Express

 This had all the promise of a good turn - an easy start with no prep, recent experience of the loco, and decent weather. It wasn't exactly a fine day, but there was no rain forecast and it wasn't predicted to be too cold as Driver Keith and I waited for the BR Standard 4MT to come up from Sheringham.

Relieving the lunch train crew we had a tender full of water and about half-full of bituminous coal - a promising start. The boiler was half full, with the fire just going over so I filled in the back and sides to go up with RO Josh to start the generators.

As the sun set, not that we could see it, we started all the generators between myself, Josh & Keith - fortunately, unlike the last time, all the light displays were working and we were on time as we drew into Sheringham to tie on to our train.

This bituminous coal lights up very easily, and provides some heat pretty quickly but it burns through equally quickly. Since I'd started the steam carriage warming system I'd expected to have to look after the fire & boiler water level through the hour we had to wait until our departure time of 17:00.

I'd made my mind up to try and get my usual over-firing under better control and as I built the fire in the last 15 minutes before the 'right away' Driver Keith warned my to leave myself some water space.

I tried to keep that water space all night, and to fire a bit lighter but in the event I went up on the first trip with the back end too light, and by the time I got to Dead Man's I decided to fill the back up to ensure I could use the injectors when I needed them.

We got up and back perfectly OK and the second trip was OK all the way. Starting out from Holt, we couldn't raise vacuum beyond 13" - I hastily checked the vacuum bag couplings I had made up when I hooked on, to no avail. A walk down the train revealed the answer though - one of the Pas-Com valves on the third coach was half open and audibly passing air. Closing that fixed the problem immediately.

We ran around again at Sheringham pretty quickly, took on water and headed up on a cooling fire to switch off the generators: this was where the evening started to go astray. I hadn't pulled enough good coal forward - the bottom of the tender was mostly dust and I was struggling to make heat. I had the boiler full on the way down, but it was still too cold and I forgot to account for the level pit, so when we arrived I had half a glass and the fire was way too low with 160 on the gauge.

Schoolboy error. How many times have I said that you can always get rid of a big fire on disposal but it's an uphill struggle to warm a cool one?

So, that was the first time I had made up a fire on disposal. Fortunately the 4MT will come around pretty quickly but it's still not so good to cock up when we wanted to go home. Another lesson learned the hard way!