Garden Railway Forum

Rumours of his demise seem to have been greatly exaggerated!

Yes, but is this good or bad???

Dear Mr Isle,

It is very pleasing to see that you are back at work again despite the apathy that some members have adopted with your postal arrangements.

However given your very part-time involvement with these inspections recently may I politely suggest that you need to review/brush-up on your auditing skills.

Whilst you have reported that the 0-6-0T locomotive "Urien" is fitted with vacuum brakes the image you have provided with your report clearly shows that the front vacuum brake hose fitting on the buffer beam is not actually connected to anything on this locomotive!

Yours,

Chris Cairns.

*shock horror*!!!!!!!!!!

Chris Cairns:95108 wrote:
Whilst you have reported that the 0-6-0T locomotive "Urien" is fitted with vacuum brakes the image you have provided with your report clearly shows that the front vacuum brake hose fitting on the buffer beam is not actually connected to anything on this locomotive!

Give us a break , I would hope you would realise that this is something of a limitation with 16mm locos, I expect adding pipework onto the back of the vacuum pipestand would be very difficult, if not impossible. Also it is very close to the railhead, to the extent that adding more to it could well mike it liable to striking the railhead. The pipes I used were from Roundhouse, and designed for the Rheidol tank, hence the fixing point for the buffer beam is not really in a good location for the Lady Anne, but it is the only vacuum pipe I've found that is head on by a bolt thread and nut. I've seen enough of the Brandbright whitemetal kinds fall off to know that they are not good on locos!

Oops , my comment was only meant to be in the same light hearted theme that Victor's inspections are supposed to be.

Like your "Urien" I have the same problem with vacuum pipe fittings which have no connecting pipe behind the buffer beam. I've been looking (on & off) for some suitable tubing (copper, brass or silicon/nylon) which could be fitted onto the end of those pipe fittings and then routed up in between the chassis frames thus making it look like they are correctly connected, but it is finding something that has the right inside diameter.

Another bit of useless trivia. If you look at this photo of AB 2088 'Sir Thomas Royden' which was on loan to the Royal Deeside Railway to run their 2013 steam services, there is no obvious vacuum pipe fitting on the rear buffer beam.



To keep its industrial look (when it would not have had vacuum brakes fitted) as part of the lengthy restoration the current owner has mounted the vacuum pipe fitting well inside the chassis frames so they are not obvious to the casual looker.

I'll now go back to lurking on this Topic.

Chris Cairns.

On a similar theme, on Wissington on the MSLR they've fitted a silencer on the vacuum exhaust up the chimney to make it slightly less obvious as again, she was never fitted with them.

May I ask where Mr Ilse has got to lately?

Chris Cairns:95144 wrote:Oops , my comment was only meant to be in the same light hearted theme that Victor's inspections are supposed to be.

Sorry, my reply was supposed to be light hearted too (hence the smiley)
More vacuum piping on locos is something I would like to look at in the future though

Mr Isle is certainly taking a long time about the next part of his report!

It has only been 4 days, a drop in the ocean compared to some of the gaps on this topic
I am hoping that the weather forecast for the weekend is correct, as it will finally allow me to get the loco in the box out for Mr Isle to inspect. After this, I expect that he will begin efforts to compile a final report for the ANLR

He will probably condemn my line at the moment

He would come to mine and say "Railway? What railway? Thats justa few lengths of track..."

Fingers crossed for the weather then. I'm looking forward to the next report.

I can't see the obsessesion with continuous brakes. The thing about vacuum is that there's nothing in it! ..... I'll get my coat!

Today the management opened the box


Inside was what can only be described as a monstrosity. It is a 2-6-0+0-6-2 garratt, built by Locobox in Cumbria, a type I have not come across before, in fact this is the biggest garden railway steam locomotive I've found so far. Quite what the railway was thinking when it purchased this I've no idea, as my investigations appear to show that the line does no have the traffic for anything bigger then a moderately sized tank engine, and more to the point the passing loops can only take 5 carriage trains!

Apparently it was acquired to help prevent another local railway from going bankrupt and I quote "to keep the engine in the area". This seems like a most feeble reason. It has just returned from what was I'm told its second set of major repairs and modifications, as it seems it was rather badly built. Final signing off test runs are expected to take place tomorrow. Despite the work done, a further long list of modifications has been drawn up for implementation by the railways own workshops, this seems like a very poor purchase to me!

None the less, I'll see how it does tomorrow. Needless to say it doesn't have vacuum brakes, although these are on the list to be fitted. I also believe that a change to the frankly ghastly colour is also to be made...

That's a brute of a loco!

Hehe "largest" hehe

If I had one of those on my railway I would be a convert to 'playing trains'. It is a magnificent beast indeed!

Yesterday, I witnessed "Scafell" in steam


The driver suddenly used the whistle. I did not find this amusing

For the first load tests, a train of 6 carriages was prepared. I decided to follow the train and view it from the lineside, also allowing me to take a closer look at the track

I witnessed the trains arrival at Afallen, running 5 minutes down on the schedule. Speaking to the crew it appears steam production was less then needed.
The train completed a full round trip, steaming being better by increasing the fuel supply. So it was decided to increase the load with 3 loaded bogie wagons.


The train towards me slowly plodding up the bank. It did keep moving, but speaking to the crew later, it seems the loco has plenty of potential power, but if you are not careful with steam consumption then you soon have to stop for a blow up.
Further tests are obviously required, looking at the setting of the fuel burner and the insulation arrangements of the boiler. The works staff have also made efforts to cure some small steam leaks around the cylinders.
I have now seen most of what I want to see on this line, and will be looking to complete my report within the next few weeks.

What a nice looking engine. But how is it fired? The firebox with the air holes in the bottom make it almost look like it is externally fired, but this can't be the case surely?