Back in February, we dug stray ballast away from the signalbox's front apron to reveal the rusty and now-redundant cranks and wheels mounted there. We carried on digging, and went straight through the rotten timbers, exposing the concrete pit underneath. Since then, the pit has been open, making it awkward (and potentially unsafe) to get around the building with a wheelbarrow.
Today, we were delighted to entertain one of our comrades-in-arms from the Cutting 'Edge gang. Armed with a chainsaw, to be specific, which is exactly what we needed to make the pile of rotten sleepers sitting on the nearby lineside fit that hole.
Judging by size and length, these seem to have come from a pair of points (or a crossover?) nearby - but are almost all rotten in places. We used the best ones to build the new flight of steps earlier in the year, so it took a bit of head-scratching to find enough length in reasonable condition to cover the pit. We did just-about manage it though, and carefully fitted the timbers into place. Although they aren't in an ideal state, 6" thick boards are entirely overkill for supporting the weight of a person over a 4' gap, so we do have a bit of leeway in that regard.
In the afternoon, we returned to the digging that has occupied the last few weeks. The build-up of soil behind the box is nearly gone, and the ditch steadily approaches its final profile. To cut to the chase, this week, we found:
- Even more bottles and jars
- A very rusty glasses case
- What looks like a waterproof electrical junction box, containing ceramic fuseholders, sealed with tar
- Another gravity-lock cover
- A white plastic telephone termination box
- A mystery length of three wires, with an unusual connector on one end (perhaps part of a car's wiring loom?)
- More bits of the lever frame, and a tappet from the interlocking
- A slightly dish-shaped iron ring, possibly the reflector from a lamp?
- A small flat tin, maybe for tobacco?
- Another bucketful of uninteresting broken glass
- A 6' length of cast iron pipe, once a downspout?
This latter took a good deal of shovelling to remove, but was blocking the path of the reinstated ditch, so had to go. We noted from the build-up of silt in the lowest point that parts of the ditch are already gathering water, presumably from the recent storms. This could well be because, while the embankment seems to be made of porous sandstone (and ballast, and ash), the underlying land is clay, preventing water from soaking away.
Last among the many photos this week, a slightly blurred view of the front apron as we found it in February. Is it any wonder the timbers were rotten, with all that grass growing on them?
