Narrow Gauge Railway

[rupertw]

I've been attacking the railway with the strimmer for the past couple of days, and I have made a bit of progress despite encountering trees! The strimmer was knackered to start with and has a tendancy to cut out randomly and pour fuel everywhere but it always gets going again after a bit
Underneath all this lot...

...was a railway


I made my way through to the wagon shed at last:

While it was open I took the pump wagon out for a run which promtly derailed:

The bit it derailed on has sunk down on the outside, so the outside wheel is able to get over the side of the rail. I went to the far end of the railway and the track is actually visible, which is good, but the there are sections in the middle which are hanging over the side of the stream, so they will take a bit of work!

[GeezerGarage]

This is stuff of legends! I want to come live there!

[TS]

Where is 'there' exactly? Looks like a cool place.

[ewokracing]

is that a traction engine in the background or is it a stationary engine for the belt/shaft drive?

what's the john dorey with the railway carriages in the background of the other shot?

hours of fun at your place!

[geep]

What a wonderfully atmospheric place

I would love to have a place like that. Looking forward to seeing this brought back to working condition.

As said, truly the stuff of dreams

[stevea]

Jul 12, 2010 12:56:32 GMT ewokracing said:

...

is that a traction engine in the background or is it a stationary engine for the belt/shaft drive?

...

Judging by the twin flywheels, cylinder over the firebox, no drive gears and what look like wheels on the rear, I'd sat it looks like a semi/portable engine to me.

[rupertw]

It's a stationary engine, used to power the sawmill. It was last used many years ago, and the sawmill is powered by the a tractor PTO shaft. It would take a serious amount of work to get it going again.
I'm doing the Mongol Rally and I leave in less than ten days, so I have put lots of weedkiller down on the sections I have cleared, and hopefully it will not have all grown back when(if) I get back from the rally, but there won't be any updates for a couple of months.

[Corbs]

This is incredible! All the best on the rally and I look forward to reading your updates

[dodgerover]

This just looks every childs (and quite a few adults) dream, i'm very jealous! What country are you in?

[rupertw]

Right, I've now returned from the rally so hopefully things can get going again. I was slightly dissapointed to find that the weed killer had not worked very well and it is already quite overgrown again. I thought I would make a start at replacing some of the sleepers and chose a particularly rotten one to start with. As you can see from the picture, it can't have been doing much to support the track.

[GeezerGarage]

I got excited when i saw you had posted! Looking forward to more on this. I would love to come play with the railway.

[rupertw]

Did a bit more to the sleepers. I'm not fixing them in place until I have all the sleepers in so that I can properly align all the rails.
The points are going to need more work than I thought. I had thought that there was only one rotten sleeper, but it turns out that there are supposed to be a lot more which have rotten to the extent that they no longer exist.

[skinnylew]

oooooo thats a lot of work but it'll be soooo worth it!! Should get some loacls to help out, i would if i was local! (i sincerely doubt you are in south east london though!! lol )

[TS]

you mean you don't have one of those in your back garden? Here in SW11 we all have them!

[GeezerGarage]

Sept 18, 2010 15:05:09 GMT skinnylew said:

oooooo thats a lot of work but it'll be soooo worth it!! Should get some loacls to help out, I would if I was local! (i sincerely doubt you are in south east london though!! lol )

Ditto to that!

Maybe we should do a weekender at Rupert's!?

Then again it may be counter productive... "Let's mid engine the train!"... "Lets lower it!"

[rupertw]

I've started compacting in the sleepers and properly attaching them. I've also jacked up the entire of the curve leading from the points as they were very banked. There is still one more sleeper to do on the points, but they are nearly done now.

We also made a start on the really overgrown bits of the railway along the stream. The sleepers are all metal along this bit so it is just a matter of removing the bushes. Anyway, it has responded well to a bit of strimmering.

I talked to my dad about getting down some volunteers, but he didn't seem too keen, but I might be able to talk him round.

[GeezerGarage]

Aww not good. I would love selling it to my girlfriend, yeah we er are going to the country for the weekend, will be errrr romantic... you'd better bring some dirty clothes!

[dubscum]

i will come and labour if i can take my lad on it when its done

[rupertw]

Made some more progress. All of the vegetation has been removed from the track so it is mostly visible, although it does still need some digging out. We managed to get three more sleepers properly in place today and start to correct some of the gauge issues. The main set of points is now finished, but the sleepers leading into the wagon shed have finally totally disintegrated so they will need replacing as well.
I've also been formulating plans for a petrol-electric locomotive as we have most of the bits needed to make one and it would be nice to have something more usesable than the steam locomotive. There might be build thread coming soon!

[blaine]

That is so cool, definately need to get this going again