Restoration diary

Mark Burrows, Jay Hirst and I were on site today.Mark carried on painting air filter frames, while Jay and I continued belling out cables in the electrical cubicle.Ian the welder had been on site last week, and had fitted new grip strips to the engine room and generator compartment floors where Mark had cut out the corroded sections, as seen in my ...

​Dave Rolfe, Jay Hirst and I were on site today.Dave had removed the stuck covers on the underfloor cab heaters in both cabs, so Jay and I hoovered them out, checked the heating elements were still good, and belled out the wiring to the switch panel above the driver's positions.We replaced the broken base of the AWS button in No.1 cab and I connect...

Mark Burrows, Dave Rolfe, Carl and Sofy Looker and myself were on site today.Mark finished removing the rust from the engine compartment floor in Repulse where he'd previously cut out the rotten floor treads, generating a Sahara-size dust cloud!. Carl drilled out a rusted floor screw in No.2 cab so I could examine the underfloor heater an...

Mark Burrows, Jay Hirst and I were on site today working on 50030. Mark cut out the last of the rotten floor treads in the engine compartment ready for Ian the welder to fit new treads, while Jay and I belled out and marked the wiring that goes to the switch panels above the driver in both cabs. Photos in this report courtesy Jay Hirst.

Jay, Mark and me were on site today. Mark barred the power unit intended for use in 50030 round three and a half times, added more oil and pumped it round. He also oiled the turbos we are storing for later use on this power unit again.Jay and I carried on belling out wiring in the electrical cubicle, finding as we went, some cables where the writte...

It is with great sadness that we announce the death of RRRG membership secretary Paul Sturm following a short illness. Paul was the first paying member of RRRG after the three founders of the group, which might seem strange for a Dutchman - but Paul was no ordinary Dutchman. Paul first encountered the British railway scene in the 1970s, around the ...

​Mark, Dave, Jay and I were on site today.Mark ground off the remains of the anti-slip treads in the gen compartment where they had rotted away or been broken off, in preparation for Ian the welder to fit new ones. He will also fit new ones in places alongside the engine walkways.Jay and I carried belling out wiring in the electrical cubicle, ...

Dave Rolfe, Jay Hirst and I were on site. We continued the repetitive and rather dull-but-necessary task of cleaning out the engine room in 50030 ready for the return of the power unit nad overhauled generator in due course.Dave had found some heavy duty degreaser spray, and we used it on the sides of the engine compartment at the generator end whi...

Carl and Sofy Looker, Dave Rolfe and I were on site on Sunday 20 June and between us we carried on scraping, cleaning and painting the engine room inside 50030, getting to about three quarters prepared and undercoated.

We are pleased to announce that issue 46 of the RRRG newsletter is now available to view, but until issue 47 is released it will be exclusively available to members of RRRG logged into the website with a valid username and password. At the same time, non-members can now view the picture gallery of the power unit lift from September 2020. Issue...

​Mark Burrows and his son Robert, Jay Hirst and I were on site on May 16th. Following on from the work done by Ian Williams that we talked about previously, we carried on repairing the bodyshell of 50030 taking the opportunity of better internal access whilst the power unit is out. Mark and Robert continued on the outside of the no 1 cab around the...

As we've mentioned in previous posts here, one of our key tasks recently has been to fully repair the bodyshell of 50030 to make it fully watertight and ready to have its overhauled electrical machines installed. We have been hiring well-known locootive welder Ian Williams for this. Recent work has been to the roof and body sides of 50030. Many yea...

A key priority for us now that the power unit is out of 50030 is to get the bodyshell watertight. There's no point us putting overhauled mechanicals and electrical machines back in there if they are only going to get wet! The same applies to the cabs as we move on to refitting and restoring the controls and air pipes behind the driver's desk. We've...

Like many UK preservation groups, RRRG has been affected by the coronavirus crisis and government-mandated lockdowns. Along with all of the other groups at Rowsley, for a second prolonged period from late 2020 until early April 2021, we have not been allowed to attend Peak Rail to work on our locos, other than essential maintenance. This has basic...

Once again our newsletter editor Andy Rowlands has turned out a new issue of our news magazine "Raconteur", issue 45 - this one packed with pictures of the big engine lifts on 29th September 2020 (plural, yes, as two engines had to be lifted!). This issue is currently only available to paid up, logged in RRRG members.Chairman Mark give...

With grateful thanks to technical officers from the Class Fifty Alliance, a highly professional operation by contractors Steve Foster Cranes, the generous patience of our hosts Peak Rail and technical members of RRRG, on 29th September 2020 we successfully lifted the power unit from inside 50030, removed turbochargers from the ex-50008...

​Following our first working party after the enforced COVID shutdown on the 27th and 28th June, we held our second pair of working parties on the 4th and 5th July.Dave Rolfe, my son Robert and I attended site on the Saturday, and Dave was also there part of Sunday. Dave pumped oil round the ex-50008 engine on both days and barred it ov...

Dave Rolfe, my son Robert and I went to Rowsley on Sunday 28th June (Dave was also there the day before), this being the first working party for about 3 months since the national lockdown was put into place.I took to site a number of items of anti-virus PPE and at the request of Peak Rail, our new working procedure required to take account of ...

It is April 1984 and 50030 is approaching Bristol Temple Meads from the south west, passing beneath the Bath Road overbridge in this shot by an unknown photographer taken from the end of the platform. Unfortunately we can't identify much more such as the exact service that Repulse was hauling, as the sub-par lighting conditions make it difficu...

To help pass the time during the current lockdown, we've been going through the RRRG image archive to pick out some workings from the BR careers of our two locomotives. We'll be posting these occasionally to hopefully stimulate a bit of discussion but also just to show some photos that have probably never been seen before. The date is 25th Jan...