Fences, fences

Three groups out today, two at Toddington and two in the shed at Winchcombe.

Toddington 1

This is the result of the previous fence replacement, all new wood.

In order to further stabilise the wooden fence, it was decided to add grandfather posts.

Here are Rod and Terry installing one of the posts.
Grandfather posts are made of concrete and have holes for bolts in them. They give fence posts extra stability, and as they do not rot, they last longer in the ground level area where the decay usually occurs.

This photograph shows two of the grandfather posts in place, and in the foreground some of the Postmix that was used to fix them in the ground.

Toddington 2

The second team at Toddington was working on the renewal of the picket fence, which is now almost completed. They did the easy bit in earlier weeks; now they are up against the second hand book stall which is parked really close to the fence.

Pete, John, Jim H, Jim M, and Austen set up a little workshop on the 'Parlour Road' where the final two panels needed cutting to shape to cope with a change in the ground level.

This photograph shows how the ground dips away, and the second to last panel had to have a diagonal slash cut into it.

Jim M on the Kango

An area of ground also had to be broken up with a Kango to allow the fitting of a new post.

The new post was duly concreted in. Although the fence is now fully in place, another 4 posts need replacement as they are rotten at the base. That's a lot of hard work with the Kango and the mixer. The ground below is difficult to dig as it is full of debris.

In this last one you can see the final part of the job completed. The change in ground level by the concrete pad, and the proximity of the mobile bookshop are evident.

Winchcombe

Here a new fenced compound is being constructed next to the Weighbridge hut. (an original from 1905).
The fence is being put up to hide the green Grundon bins, which otherwise detract from the GWR atmosphere we are trying to achieve.

It looks like another 8 panels are needed to finish this one off.

A new title

A change in the blog header today, to mark the morphing of the Building and Services department into the new Construction and Maintenance department. Members of the former Broadway Area Group have been invited to join. The blog address will remain the same, so don't worry, your bookmarks will still work.

Four volunteers from Broadway came yesterday to help with the repair of a fence - see below.

To begin with, a quick shot of two short benches made up in the C&M building at Winchcombe. They have cast iron seat ends of two different generations. The upper one is the original scripted type in use until 1934, and the lower one is the more modern 'shirt button' type, which was in use for a relatively short period from 1934 to 1942. The company was nationalised in 1948, and a few seat ends were even cast with 'WR' on them. So one needs to pick ones period.

One bench will be placed outside the Winchcombe visitor centre (Winchcombe being a 1950s era station) and the other in the picnic area at Broadway, a station of 1904.

The Transit van was out and about today with John and Jim H shuttling things hither and thither. Firstly to Toddington with some concrete posts for a fencing job tackled by Rod, Terry, Ron and Keith. Then to Broadway with a supply of 2'x2' slabs, and to collect the motorised auger for use at Toddington.

A dip in the roof of the admin Portacabin has allowed water to accumulate.

A quick inspection of a leaking roof in the admin building was made, before returning with the van to Winchcombe, where some roof sealant was picked up. This was taken to Toddington to patch up the leaking area.

After patching up the leaking roof, the old car park fencing panels were collected and taken to the loco dept lighting up store on the other side of the Toddington site. There followed a quick trip to the building site next to The Pheasant pub to collect some broken pallets for the loco dept.

Here you can see the Transit backing carefully along the approach road leading to the store of pallets behind the camera.

Finally the Transit went back to Broadway again to collect surplus Heras fencing and scaffolding planks to take them to Winchcombe for storage.

In the workshop Bruce continued with his running in board and Ken was making up more fence panels.  Barrie was at Toddington surveying his next job, a replacement door to the C & W store on P2.

Meanwhile, Pete, Mike, Austen and Jim M were digging a hole in P1 at Winchcombe looking for a  water leak.

They found it OK, and know what is required, but to fix it will mean switching off the station water supply. This will therefore have to wait for a non running day. The leak is only small and not considered urgent for the moment. 

The same gang then went on to start digging holes for a new fence to hide the Grundon bins in the car park at Winchcombe.

Whilst at Toddy it was discovered that a blue badge driver had run into the brand new fencing installed only last week.  

 Luckily the contact with the fence was made where a post still needs to be replaced, so no lasting damage has occurred.

To close with here are some shots of the Broadway gang of 4 at work on the fence repair at Toddington. Due to the height of the fence here the post holes need to give the taller posts a good foundation.

The auger has seen plenty of use at Broadway, so the team is well experienced. Here we see them excavating the holes for the tall fence posts.

Whiffy Toddington

Almost all of the gang of 11 worked at Toddington today, with just one volunteer beavering away in the workshop.

By the car park at Toddington work continued replacing 25 fencing panels with a stock of new, manufactured in the B&S workshop at Winchcombe.

The run of new, starting at the loco shed end, has almost reached the station end now. At the end of the day there were just 3 or 4 left to do.

A few of the posts had rotten feet, and these have had to be replaced as well. With some difficulty, as they were embedded in concrete.

Here is Martin trying to break out the concrete from a rotted post, using an SDS drill.

In this warm but slightly less sunny weather lunch outdoors is very pleasant. Here is the gang with their picnics next to the Flag & Whistle, and not far from their next job - behind the toilets. Nice.

Also with this nice warm weather, the back of the toilets has been a bit whiffy. It's hard to tell exactly where a smell is coming from, so three potential sources were tackled.

Firstly, the breather pipe here was extended above the guttering (grey elbow bend) so that any smells being vented would do so higher up.

Secondly, an old hole in the concrete was identified. This was filled with new concrete, as visible by the dark grey patch at the bottom of the pipe.

Finally, Martin and Phil installed a new manhole cover. That should do the job, it's now air tight.  Or rather, smell tight.

Let's hope that cured the whiffy problem. No doubt another picnic in close proximity will be arranged for next week, to test the new arrangements.

Lastly, we should not forget Bruce, the stalwart who stayed behind in the hot B&S workshop at Winchcombe. Bruce continued with the manufacture of a replacement running in board for Winchcombe. From now on, no more peeling plywood letters, the next generation will be aluminium castings made from 12 inch GWR originals. We have already used replica GWR castings at Broadway and at Hayles Abbey halt.


BTW, did you know you can get an email advising you when a new blog entry has been made, by adding your email address into the box at the top right hand of the blog page. Works a treat.