Me driving the best double engine past the photographer house. Credit David F Boughey

Its been too long since I added anything to this blog for reasons I’ll explain during what may turn out to be a bit of an epic update if the mood to write persists.

The last post included my forecast roster for bygones and the following  week with a caption that said, “lets see how reality matches”. Well, I am pleased (amazed) to say the entire week went as advertised. I was going to say “a highlight” but I’ll settle for just “memorable” was the Friday anti-gravity to Dduallt. This was the weekend of storm “Amy” and Friday was Amy’s’ peak day. The AntiGrav involves pulling the slate train up to its starting point with a double fairlie, David Lloyd George, for it gravity return, this day it was to be Dduallt siding, waiting for a slot to push it off down the hill then waiting for another slot to return light engine. The hour waiting for the gravity trains slot was bleak with gale force winds driving rain that varied between deluge, monsoon and biblical.

Thankfully the wait for the light engine slot was only as long as it took the gravity train to get through Tan-y-Bwlch to where we made our way to then double head a train that was ridiculously short for a double fairlie and a single fairlie. By the time we were heading back to Boston Lodge with the empty train the wind and high tide combined to have waves breaking across the track.

Actual highlights were driving Merddin on the Thursday for what was my last time before it was withdrawn for overhaul and driving Blanche double heading with Linda on the Sunday. When double heading the Ladies I usually let Linda lead as it usually has some Linda fanatic with some misplaced belief its the superior one while I sit behind them on Blanche and push them to Blaenau with old reliable. This time the timetable mandated that Blanche lead and Linda had a driver new to double heading with the Ladies. He was full of nervous questions before we started but by Tan0y-Bwlch he was declaring it was the most fun you could have with your clothes on.

In a normal year of volunteering on the Festiniog Railway I would drive more then a 1500 miles. Our post Covid timetable has reduced the daily mileage from 56 to 44 but a 1000 miles is still what I would normally do. This year, as I have documented my wonky leg prevented me for starting the season in April when I normally would start driving.

I started driving this year at the end of June once a self care option for the wonky leg was available. I may have put some pressure on the medics as I was determined to drive at the 70^th Anniversary event. From then, until the Bygones Week end via a long weekend in Derby driving Prince at The Greatest Gathering I tried to catch up but only made it to 917 miles for the season.

So, now with the driving season done, my leg looks like this again. As someone said to me, “bit I thought it was mended”.

This is sort of extended maintenance. If you look back to http://One Step Forward – One Step Back

You will see my leg was pretty gory with open ulcers on it back in April and I was wrapped in nurse applied compression strapping with appointments twice a week. The point of the compression is to force blood to the surface to promote healing. It work, mostly, to the extent I could switch to “me” applied wraps. Think all round shin pads with 8 Velcro straps. The advantage of these being that I could skip some nurse appointments and take them on and off to have a shower. It all meant I could play trains for the summer.

Why back in the compression then? Two of the ulcers were close to my ankle and right at the bottom of the wraps so haven’t been getting enough of a squeeze. Back to compression is to try to clear these up and six weeks in its working with one virtually healed and the other a quarter of the size it was.

Its all a bit inconvenient really. Practically it means I have just one pair of shoes knackered enough to fit and usually leggings to fit over the bandages. It’s a bit painful too and is a killer of a decent nights sleep. Its like a mild toothache, whilst you’re busy you can ignore it but once in bed its all there is to think about. It being a constant is pretty tiring in itself. It does mean that most days I can’t get half as much as I planned done whilst on others turning the page in my book is as much as I can manage.  However, I plod on with projects as even an hour at them moves them an hour to closer to done.

When able though I have been busy…..

A trip to Wales for an end of season ops meeting also included some rolling stock electrical mending to this.

The problem was that it wasn’t charging its batteries despite having put an new alternator on it. It normally lives at Dinas so they brought it to Boston Lodge for me to look at. Luckily it was fine as it was outside.

I had a quick look on the Saturday in a break from the meeting and one look made left me pretty sure I knew what the problem was.  Tests on Sunday confirmed it. The alternator, whilst having a inbuilt rectifier, has a separate regulator and one look at the external casing made me suspicious of it. Tests, some a bit iffy due to the available kit and needing six hands proved it to be kaput. This bit of ancient electronics measures the battery voltage and decides how much to turn the alternator on to charge the batteries. Last I heard they were looking to get it an alternator with an inbuilt regulator.

This turned out to be the thin end of the wedge. Back in the early 80’s when I worked for BREL building new trains and playing with steam engines in Wales I was approached with, “…..’ere you wire carriages for a living? Do ours”, and so was born FRED, the Festiniog railway Rolling stock Electrical Department. It turned into a full time job for me but it was a band of volunteers too and we did things like wire up Harlech Castle (the loco not the ruin down the coast), built Criccieth Castle and the push pull train as well as rewiring most of the carriage fleet. Over the years though for various reasons the group fizzled out about 15 years ago (people grow up, get families and mortgages).

This year the fire risk had the railway turning to its diesel fleet and its now dawned on them that if they are going to rely on them then they’d better give them some TLC and the electrics on quite a few of them are showing their age.

In a pincer attack separately by the boss, the ops manager and the works manager I’ve been asked if I will do something about them and see if we can get the band back together. I am almost scared to write the jobs list because every time I do someone adds something else to it. At the moment Vale of Festiniog and Moel Hebog need complete rewires, Criccieth needs its deadmans made to work, Harlech needs a deadmans designing and fitting. Oh and we’ve got a workshop but currently its more like a slightly tidied skip.

One the EDM Models front

Its a coincidence that the work on the real Castles is coming up whilst on the model front I am producing a kit for both of them in a partnership with Fourdees.

When the quarry Hunslets aren’t sending me cross eyed I am busy designing the chassis for the two different bodies. This will do both 16.5 & 14m gauges and should be available fairly early in the New Year.

The range of tyres for print your own wheels has now expanded to four diameter in stainless steel.

There’s a whole load of other stuff in preparation too but I’ll end this missive now as its 01:20 and I still have some sleepers to glue before bed