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!