Lack of rain!

I bike ride to the local canal revealed that the water has almost fully dried up despite the recent rain. 

Talking to a member of the Canal trust it does appear that despite the recent lane and a small leak further upstream, the lack of rain overall this year has meant that there is a shortage in the canal. Have to see how things go as the Summer arrives.

Back in the depths of the Man Cave at WMD HQ, more ballasting work has taken place. Not the quickest of jobs but very therapeutic! Wonder if I will finish it before the canal fills back up?

Brakes oiff on the brake van retsoration!

This rather natty gantry crane has appeared outside the restoration shed at the Rocks by Rail Museum,

It is going to come in very handy when the tank over the boiler of 1931, the steam engine in for retubing, has to be lifted clear and John says we are close to that point now as he uses yet another hammer to loosen some parts!

Meanwhile, following the completion of the trackwork over the Winter its brakes off for the restoration of the Southern brake van. John, Hazel, Richard and Thomas were busy with whatever is needed to make this a thing of beauty again! I think it may take a while though!

My mowing duties were plagued by yet more mower issues with a crack in the deck of the mower. To stop that spreading I drilled a hole in the end of the crack which hopefully will stop it spreading any further!

After that, it was full on vegetational butchery with both mower and hedge trimmer to try to bring back some order to nature! I think nature will eventually win though!

The before.

The after.

Whilst I was at the quarry end of the site I tried taking this photo of the drag line. I don't think it will win any prizes but I like it!

Finally, on the way home up the A1 road, there was a backlog of traffic which I thought was down to a tractor. I was wrong! Never seen one of these in the UK, but this guy was being somewhat brave in traveling along a 70mph road in a tuc tuc! Just hope he didn'y have far to go!

Its great just watching trains go round!

Having spent some time adding DCC chips to some steam locos and getting out suitable rolling stock there is only one thing left to do! And that is to let them run on the layout or as Mrs. Woody would say - Playing trains!

So the 8F was coupled up to some mineral wagons....

....and the 9F to some cement wagons and vans....

...and as they circled the layout at similar speeds they kept meeting on the front board which was great to just sit back and see.

Its great just watching trains go round!

Those magnificent men in their digging machines!

Whilst at the Rocks By Rail Museum on Monday I did have, between my shunting duties, a few minutes to take some video of the Ruston Bucryus drag line excavator that I have been fortunate enough to operate in the past. In this case though, the magnificent expertise of Rob operating it, actually showed guests how these machines were supposed to be operated! Very much a case of those magnificent men in their digging machines!

The cinematic delights of this video are now on YouTube or, you can click on the picture below to watch in this browser!

A thoroughly enjoyable day!

It was a  Bank Holiday Monday so in true UK tradition it rained but luckily not until after the days events at the Rocks By Rail Museum. Blueish skies for moat of the day made a brake van ride all the more pleasant - not that I had a chance to do that!

As has become the norm I was shunting along with Dan, John Martyn and Rob and I think we gave our guests a great day - they certainly seemed interested in what was going on and came up to the quarry no doubt informed of what was going on my loyal blog reader Mrs. B who was doing Front Of House and welcoming everyone

The two jokers - Rob and Dan!

John being serious as he is in charge of driving Mr. D!

Mr. D being serious in charge of driving the wagons!

Martyn hiding with the face shovel that loads the wagons that Mr. D drives as John is at the controls!

Rob leaving the drag line excavator having given a digging show to our guests!

As you can tell it was a thoroughly enjoyable day! And to top it off we even had a Miss England semi finalist visit. No idea of her name but she was a very nice lady and was looking round the Museum with her agent who is interested in railways. We all wished her well in the finals on the 3 October and maybe we will have a future Miss England winner visit us after that!

It just looks so right!

I and the current stage appears to be a go through stages with things and the current stage is adding DCC chips to my collection of 00 gauge locos but seemingly concentrating on steamers at the moment! 

The latest project is this  Hornby model of the 2-8-0 Class 8F which like the Robinson 04 that I posted about a few days ago was designed as a heavy haul freight loco. However, like many freight locos it has a really stunning and powerful look to it.

The information at the end of the box tells us that Hornby have helpfully designed this loco for a DCC chip to be installed which makes life easy!

The enclosed instructions showed that the DCC chip plug is located in the tender and there is only one screw to undo to get the tender body off!

With the trender body off the DCC blanking plug could be removed...

...and a DCC chip plugged in - easy!

With the tender body secured back in place I upturned the loco to fit the supplied but not fitted brake rigging.

It was a fiddly but easyish job to do and adds a bit of detail to the loco.

With that done and back on its wheels it was time to program the DCC chip.

Then it was onto the layout to have a play test!

It just looks so right!

The Bachmann Plasser OWB10 with crane,

Yesterday I was surprised at having found this model by Bachmann of the Plasser OWB10 with a crane added. Having had a bit of time to look into this, my memory was right that although Bachmann released this as an 00 gauge model it is actually H0 scale, originally produced by Lilliput who Bachmann bought out some years ago. Whatever, it is still a smart looking model and as it does not run on the track with any other rolling stock, any scale differences won't be noticeable.

The crane itself is nicely done.

And the crane rotates but the arms are solidly moulded in position.

The box declared that this model was DCC ready but helpfully there were no instructions included inside. However, there was only one place a chip could be located and that was under the moulded ballast load. Sure enough, that ballast load lifts off but it is moulded in metal to add weight to the model which means it adheres well to the model.

There is a DCC blanking plug inside and I can see that it should be easyish to do once I find time! In the meantime it can pose on the layout where it looks at home!

Surprises!

I was awoken at 1.30am by a sound that I had not heard for sometime - rain! It was good to see that everything in the garden had a good soaking this morning with plants recovering and looking greener. One thing that has not recovered despite the rain is the water level in the local canal. Those who have read this blog before may know that I am a regular visitor to the local canal whilst out on bike rides but to be truthful I have not seen the canal for some weeks so was a bit surprised to the water as low as it has got. It cant be leaks as those got fixed last year!

Another surprise on my ride was this.

You don't see peacocks out in the wild usually so this was a bit of a rare spot. Not sure how it got to where I spotted it but it looked at home!

Yet more surprises with a long over due sort out of a box in the Man Cave from which this emerged.

You may wonder what it is, but conveniently the box end carries the necessary information.

I had forgotten about this model but the price ticket gives away that it was bought some time ago which I think was about 13 years ago! Anyway, I will have to delay further investigating my surprise find until tomorrow - lots of things to do on Mrs. Woody's job list for me in the meantime! It will be a surprise for her if I ever complete the jobs on that list!

 looking a b=but one thing that 

Big hammer and other things at the Museum!

After the last few months of heavy civil engineering works at the Rocks By Rail Museum, things are turning back to normal. Work has recommenced on retubing 1931 and John is finding out where he left off a few months ago.

If in doubt a large hammer is a good way to get back into the swing of things! Rumours of a swear jar in case of mishits are unfounded so I am told - but that is a big hammer!

Meanwhile, Alex is back into the depths of Ketton No1, removing more decades old cement from the running gear! He does look happy to be back on that job!

And John is glad to be back in the workshop - I think he is anyway!

Maybe he is a bit apprehensive about the work he has to do to restore the Southern brake van that is now in the workshop!

John was also doing things to the oversized washing machine, or ballast washer as it should be known as! Either that or he is organsiing the wheel barrow race!

Back to more mundane matters and with a no to No Mow May at the museum, I repaired the mower that broke last week with a new starter.

That went well and I was soon out carrying out vegetational butchery on the grass.

However by lunchtime the mower decided it had had enough and promptly dropped its exhaust cover!

Returning to the workshop I found some suitable nots and the ever resourceful John came up with one of those methods that only someone with years of experience has.

Because the bolts were recessed and the socket to fasten them deep, the nuts would not attach to the bolts. Johns answer - tissue paper! Stuff the socket with the tissue and then the nut is held in place in the socket and cant be pushed up inside it. Tow minutes later all was reattached and off I went!

This time it was down the nature walk where nature had more or less taken over the walk but not after my vegetational butchery!

I have no doubts I will have to go back as nature fights back!