It isn't often we get five Saturdays in a February, so we made the most of it. With so much going on, I'm sure to have forgotten something - but here goes:
The southern door for Hotchley Hill is not finished, but not far off. We bedded-in the steel and wood panels for the top half of the door, and screwed them into place. The plates covering the lock-hole were drilled, tapped, and bolted down. We made a start on the keyholes and the holes for the handles, but the final work on that will have to wait until next week.
Doubling-up as weights to help the upper panel sit tightly, were a stack of freshly machined fishplates, provided by our friends in the Engineering Dept. For context, it turned out that there is a surplus of fishplates suitable for the majority of rail joints, but very few for the dense track-circuiting required in the station area. Track circuit boundaries need insulated joints, and so the 'plates have to be a little smaller, to accommodate a plastic liner. It seems like a simple job to mill them down to size, but the cost in time is substantial!
That cupboard for Asher Lane, seen last week, is nearly finished, too. This week it was filled, sanded, cleaned-up and primed. That leaves painting, and screwing it to the wall.
Nearby, a two-aspect signal head was lit-up on the bench for aligning the optics. This will soon become the Home for Ruddington Fields, mounted on the big gantry, facing Asher Lane. The group will also include a shunt signal, and route indicators. The framework to hold all these is coming-on well. Two steel beams have been cut, drilled, and painted. Ready to bolt onto them, is a modified bracket to hold the theatre box above the main signal head. That's painted too. It will be possible to test-assemble all of these on the ground, which should make life much easier when it comes to installation.
Lastly, a photo of the Austerity parked outside the shed, in the sunshine, a moment after it stopped snowing. The day's weather seems almost as disparate as our projects!
