LMSCA News 2006
Here are news updates about LMSCA activities and more recently, links to updated pages on the site.
[ recent news | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 ]
2006 Synopsis
The LMS carriages either owned by the Association or privately owned but in its care have all been employed for departmental use and consequently some are substantially modified from their original layout.
Our voluntary members have pursued a policy of collecting spare parts from withdrawn LMS carriage bodies still extant and located on farms and in the gardens of private residences. In this respect we have been very successful and many missing artefacts are now in our care. Without any covered facilities for the repair of the wooden bodied carriages and in order to progress more quickly we built the LMSCA workshop to provide our own undercover carriage repair facilities. This was achieved by raising funds through the membership, donations and commercial activities in association with Peak Rail and not least by a lot of voluntary hard work.
2006 Has been another year of solid progress.
7828 NRM Third Open — progressed albeit slowly due to pressure of other work. The roof has now been restored using new timber to replace that affected by rot. Repair to the coach ends has also been undertaken.
6720 LMS 1929 BCK has received some attention. Externally conservation work has been undertaken. The side panels have been repaired and broken windows either replaced or blanked off. The sides and roof have been repainted black. Internally the guards area has been cleared of departmental additions and new guards partitions installed. A period 1 gangway door recovered from our BG has been re-fitted to this end.
Woodworking machinery installation — Much of our time this year has been spent installing the donated machinery. The shed workshop had to be completely reorganised to achieve the required space. New electrical supplies and control gear appropriate to modern safety standards has been purchased and installed. We now have all the basic machinery we require for the workshop. The only other item we really need is a spindle moulder.
Dust extraction — Installation of the new machines has brought with it the requirement to deal effectively with wood waste and dust created by the new machines. Last year were fortunate enough to have a large dust extraction unit donated to us. Over several months the workshop has been fitted with a piped dust extraction system leading to the extractor located in a new building adjacent to the main shed. All this work has been done in house by volunteer effort.
New lighting — A new and more efficient external lighting system has been installed. The old one was very expensive to run and some units had failed
2741 Midland saloon — Work has continued on this saloon. The roof and three sides are now complete externally. Interior panelling is being carefully removed for cleaning, repair and re-polishing. A temporary lighting system has also been installed
Attention to the garden area — We have a number of self set alder trees adjacent to the shed which are part of our grassed area. Some of these have become unsafe and have been removed. This took us several weeks to complete and clear up. Part of this area will eventually be covered by our proposed carriage storage shed.
Continuing conservation matters — Purchase of new tarpaulins to replace older torn ones has enabled us to secure the condition of several coaches in our collection from the worst effects of the Rowsley weather system.
For more details see copies of 'Droplight' and Quarterlight in the News section.
And what for 2007? — Having accomplished all this with very limited resources in 2006, there can be no let up in moving forward and some of the challenges for the new year include progressing the LMS Carriage Exhibition, development of a plan to construct a much needed carriage storage shed, more progress on the NRM's LMS Period 1 third open 7828, completing the Midland saloon 2741 and a restart on the BR CCT. There's still plenty to do then!
January 2006
Progress on the Midland Family Saloon
Following on from news that the we had acquired a Midland railway Family Saloon last June, a few dedicated members have been hard at work beginning the conservation of this important artefact. The roof has been stripped of layers of canvas and felt and recovered with a tough plastic membrane. Work started on the ends to refasten the original boards and beading and this is now complete. One side of the vehicle is now well on its way to being repaired and by repairs to framing and body panels as well as repairs to windows and doors. Fortunately a large amount of original material has been restored with only the larger mahogany panels below the windows being replaced with suitable plywood. The beading has taken much time to repair on this side but is now complete and the volunteers were able to complete the painting of the ends and achieve the undercoating of one side before the weather precluded any more progress until 2006 and warmer times.
Work has not stopped during the winter as doors have been repaired and much work to the internal features such as the ceiling and internal panelling is now being progressed at a rapid rate. It is not intended at least for the immediate future to re-establish the body on an underframe. For this to happen the entire body will require dismantling as the present state is insufficiently strong. However it was decide early on that the work which we undertook would not compromise any future re-instatement to full working order. Any features present will only be conserved with the exception of structural woodwork and features required to ensure the body remains watertight. Work will continue at current rates during this year and hopefully we should have most of it finished by the end of 2006 - volunteers permitting! For more information and photographs on this vehicle see the '2741' pages elsewhere in the website.
Workshop reorganisation and expansion
It has long been our desire to acquire appropriate machinery which would enable us to perform most of the wood working operations in house, using voluntary labour. Late in 2005 we were very kindly offered some such industrial quality machinery from Rolls Royce at Derby. We arranged a viewing and quickly chose several items of equipment which would largely fill this requirement. The items were a large planer-thicknesser, A smaller thicknesser, a circular saw, a dust extraction unit, a press and three woodworking benches. Due to the large amount of space required for this equipment it was necessary to reorganise the workshop areas. We 'out'd' several lesser used items and filled up any remaining unused space. The result has been a complete recast of the wood working and metal working areas. Currently we are concentrating on installing the larger machines which will be connected up and in use as soon as possible.
Other projects also currently in progress
7828
Progress on work for 7828 has been held up due to staffing changes at the NRM and its priorities of having to deal with matters concerning more pressing projects. We are now pleased that communications are restored and supplies are beginning to arrive for the restoration of the roof structure to begin. Browse the '7828 Diary' by Harvey Coppock for more information on this project.
The LMSCA visitor centre
We are pleased to say that late in the year work commenced on this project which has of necessity been dovetailed into the major workshop reorganisation mentioned earlier. Browse the 'Visitor centre' pages for more information and photographs.
The LMSCA exhibition for LMS 1501
Two of the Trustees are at the present time spending much time away for Rowsley hard at work gathering together and collating all the information with which to progress this project. Although no physical work has yet been started much 'homework' and research ahs to be completed first. To this end a visit has been made to the NRM library archive before it closes due to reorganisation and much written material has been produced to expand on the theme of the exhibition which is relate an overview of LMS coach history called 'Story of the LMS coach' from its formative ancestry to the final British Railways examples.
