Class 33 ‘Crompton’ D6566 (33 048) was pictured when arriving at Bishops Lydeard station on Saturday 3rd June 2023 with an equally smart-looking loco, the visiting Class 25 D7659 (25309, 25909) alongside. The ‘Crompton’ wins because she has silver buffers! Photo by Josh Brinsford © CC BY-NC 3.0
The BLUE timetable runs throughout June, featuring diesel haulage each weekend, with visiting Class 25 D7659 (25 309, 25 909) in use on Sunday 11th June and again on 24/25th June, and a Class 35 ‘Hymek’ working in between on 17/18th June. For details of planned DIESEL-HAULED public services, see the DIESEL RUNNING DATES page on our website.
LOCO NEWS:
Class 52 D1010 ‘WESTERN CAMPAIGNER’ – the loco has been prepared for the ‘great outdoors’ and will be emerging from the Loco Shed at Williton some time tomorrow (Wednesday 7th) and will be placed on display for the whole of the diesel gala. Her ‘A’ cab will be open to visitors and we will also be engraving more names on her bodyside as we catch up with the SPONSOR A PATCH donations that have continued to come through in support of the D1010 RESTORATION APPEAL.
In between all of the preparation, we have still been making progress on the restoration and we will cover this in more detail after the gala. We have revised the schedule for her RETURN TO SERVICE as follows (for details, join the DEPG and read the article in our quarterly Newsletter):
To continue our rate of progress requires FUNDING and we give our thanks to everyone who has supported D1010 by sponsoring or donating during these difficult times. If you are able to do so, please SPONSOR A PATCH because there is plenty of recently-added metal that still needs engraving. Photographs and certificates of sponsorship will be sent out to all who have sponsored this phase of the restoration work, and we are applying more resources to catch up with this obligation and deliver the documents. Click the image below to sponsor a patch. Thank you in advance for your support !
See our CAMPAIGN for CAMPAIGNER web page for more details. We still have a lot of work to do on this massive locomotive, so PLEASE DO COME ALONG AND HELP IF YOU CAN !
Class 33 D6566 (33 048) – fully serviceable, and available for the gala.
Class 33 D6575 (33 057) – fully serviceable, and available for the gala.
Class 35 ‘Hymek’ D7017 – fully serviceable, and available for the gala.
Class 35 ‘Hymek’ D7018 – this loco continued to receive attention last weekend as we resolve some issues that have kept her confined to barracks so far this year. The work is close to completion and we ARE expecting this loco to be available for the gala (she is booked to appear on Friday 9th). Here’s a few photos to show what has been going on:
D7018 – the transmission that was last used in 1995 was opened up by Martin and Peter to check some details around the reverser actuator linkage. Pictured at Williton on Saturday 3rd June 2023 by Andy Royal © CC BY-NC 3.0
D7018 – a view of the Mekydro transmission looking down while the engine is running. The transmission fluid can be seen splashing against the inside of the perspex window that has been fitted to aid fault-finding. Solenoid (orange cylinder) R1 commands ‘reverse’ direction and solenoid R2 commands ‘forward’ direction. Pictured at Williton on Saturday 3rd June 2023 by Andy Royal © CC BY-NC 3.0
D7018 – the Bristol Siddeley Maybach MD870 V-16 engine was running sweetly during the transmission testing work that took place at Williton on Saturday 3rd June 2023. Photo by Andy Royal © CC BY-NC 3.0
Class 14 ‘Teddy Bear’ D9518 – more progress in multiple areas, but no photographs this week as we focus on gala preparations. This loco will be available for viewing at Williton and volunteers will be on hand to answer questions and provide details about the restoration project.
This loco is the subject of a fundraising appeal so please follow this link to find out more. We need your help ! In addition to funds, we also need plenty of HANDS. If you love the ‘Teddy Bears’ and you are not already a member of the DEPG, please join us so that you can become one of the team that is going to return D9518 to fully operational condition as ‘NCB No. 7‘.
Class 14 ‘Teddy Bear’ D9526 – fully serviceable, and available for the gala.
Class 47 47077 ‘NORTH STAR’ – undergoing repairs to a broken cylinder head stud and a leaking turbocharger plenum chamber at Grosmont works of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. We will bring more details of the work being undertaken as soon as possible.
Andrew Barclay 0-4-0DH 578 – fully serviceable, and this loco will be on static exhibition at Williton throughout the gala.
If you can help by donating your time to any of these projects, then please JOIN US and come along to the depot for an introduction to what we do and how we do it. We currently have people on site from Saturday through to Tuesday and we can open on other days if we can be sure of getting at least two volunteers on site at all times, so there is plenty of scope. We have tasks of all types to suit most capabilities, both skilled and unskilled.
Many thanks to all of our volunteers who give up so much of their time to work on the cleaning, painting, maintaining, restoring, managing and fund raising for our fleet of heritage locomotives !