Working on Many Fronts - Preservation Report August 2006

from Richard Lakin

Since my last preservation report 6 months ago, our situation has changed a good deal due to the fact that the three coaches stored under sheeting at the Woodpax yard, have now been moved to the East Kent line. The move is of course covered in detail in a separate part of the magazine.

The net result as far as the preservation team is concerned is that we now have SEG volunteers working at three different sites, which is spreading our existing workforce very thin indeed. I will not in the future be able to give any first hand account of work at the East Kent Railway because living as I do in Portsmouth it is too far for me to travel on any regular basis. However I will do my best to keep you updated by keeping in touch with Graham Cornell who happily is now making a good recovery following his major heart operation and will be leading the work at Shepherdswell on the East Kent line.

Concerning activities at our other sites, the motor coach 11201 at Horsted Keynes has now been out in the open and receiving visitors for 18 months or so, and it is fair to say that the weather is having an impact on it; remedial work on the coach is in fact taking more of our time than we had originally expected. Details of the work we have undertaken is covered in Bob Burrows article "Preservation plans", so I will concentrate for now on work on our third site, Acton where the third motor coach 11187 resides.

It has become apparent to us that the management at the Acton site are rather more keen on health and safety than was ever the case at St Leonards. For instance at St Leonards we thought nothing of clambering up on the roof of a coach, as indeed we do at Horsted Keynes, but the museum staff themselves at Acton are not permitted to do this, and equally we have been told that we cannot do so either. This is not such an inconvenience as it might seem because the coach is covered by very substantial tarpaulins, and of course we made a particular effort to re canvas and paint the roof before leaving St Leonards. However it does mean that the periscope and ventilators cannot be re fitted until after the coach leaves Acton.

The first job we have had to do was to produce a safety case for our work at Acton. Basically this is a table of all the types of jobs we are going to do, what dangers are associated with these jobs, and what measures we will take to reduce the risk of injury while doing them.

As an example, one of the perceived risks is falling while entering or leaving the coach. This is a subject fairly close to my heart now, as on the very last day I was working on '87 before leaving St Leonards, I lost my balance and fell while stepping down from the guard's compartment, and gave my ribs a nasty bump. Our mitigation action for this in the safety case, was to refit the step boards, and provide steps at our main point of entry and exit. To this latter end I decided to cut down a pair of old steps I had at home, so that these could be bolted to one of the step boards. I must explain first also, that being a country bumpkin I had no great enthusiasm for driving into Acton , so I carried these cut down steps (about 5 feet high) on the train from Havant. This would have worked out perfectly well except that I found that London Underground, just like the main line is subject to week end engineering closures, with bus replacement services! I found myself therefore in the rather difficult situation of struggling with the steps, plus a tool box and ruck sack with my lunch, onto a crowded bus, changing at places I had barely heard of like West Brompton and Hammersmith. Eventually however I did succeed in reaching Acton and fitting the steps. These steps have worked out well in practice, they can be lifted up and tied to the door handle when not in use, before re covering with the tarpaulin. In hindsight it is something we should have done years ago at St Leonards. I must say that taking extra safety precautions will I am sure in the long term be more benefit than nuisance.

In addition to the new steps, several of the step boards have now also been replaced, in particular the long one under the driver and guard's doors on the blind side. This board is about 10 feet long, the one for the driver's side of the coach is still at Woodpax, we will have to take it up some time, but I do not think I will try to take it up on the train!

As a footnote, the return journey on the evening after fitting the steps, also found me travelling by bus back to West Brompton to get back on the underground, the streets were jammed solid with traffic and we were considerably delayed, because Chelsea had been playing my local team Portsmouth at Stamford Bridge . I heaved a sigh of relief as I eventually got back on the train at West Brompton , only to find it was full of drunken supporters who had been either celebrating, or drowning their sorrows after the game. These rival supporters were then mouthing at each other, and scuffling, creating great apprehension amongst the remaining travelling public. I did not own up to any allegiance, and was not sorry to get off, as much as anything to escape the smell of beer - a rather interesting day!

In the few days that we have worked at Acton we have concentrated mostly on clearing out the inside of the coach. Large amounts of spares were kept inside it at St Leonards as we worked mostly on the outside of the coach, and in the time running up to our leaving, we added a good deal more that had been stored loose in the depot. The net result is that when we wanted to start working inside there was no room, so we had to set about the task of separating the stuff we wanted to re fit on '87 from the rest which we did not. I am amazed at how much we do still need to retain; there are of course all the seats to be refitted and a lot of internal plywood panels. Some of these panels are in a reasonable state but the remainder are beyond hope, the damp having penetrated between the layers and the inner side can be quite rotten. A couple of the worse ones have been taken away to use as templates, but the remainder have been thrown away.

In addition there is still quite a significant amount of equipment still to refit to the outside of '87 e.g. junction boxes and the windscreen wiper. We spent a couple of Saturdays piling the spares we did not want up along one side of one saloon, and then hired a van to move them all down to the Woodpax yard at Sheffield Park. The day we chose was about the hottest of the year, and we estimate that there was a good two tons of equipment to move. It took four of us all day to load and unload and we were all pretty tired afterwards.

At present we believe that we have reasonable security of tenure at Woodpax but of course we previously believed that to be true for the three coaches! The group has now purchased a stores van at the East Kent Railway to take some spares, but we would certainly need more storage if we had to take everything out of Woodpax.

As I write the inside of '87 is now sufficiently clear for us to work inside, and indeed a start has been made replacing some of the rotten framework in the coupe at the leading end of the large saloon. This framework forms the backing for the internal plywood panelling described above.

The London transport museum at Acton is not in general open to the public but there are several open weekends per year and since '87 has moved there have been two of these. As part of the open weekend we have un sheeted the front end of '87 so that it is on view to the public and the SEG sales stand has been erected alongside. The Cor motor coach which is in effect a country cousin to the Underground stock, has attracted a good deal of interest at these week ends which can only be good for the group.

As I hinted earlier, the splitting of our activities into three different locations has resulted in a definite shortage of volunteers; Graham Cornell is working at the East Kent and receiving some help from EPB preservation group volunteers there. This is in fact a reciprocal arrangement and I am sure cooperation between our two organisations will grow, now that we are sharing one site. Dick Coombes is also helping Graham, as well as working with Bob Burrows and myself at Acton and Horsted Keynes.

One of the major successes with exhibiting 11201 at Horsted Keynes has been the number of people who have come forward to help on the sales desk and by talking to visitors; however there has been no such surge in the numbers of people willing to work on restoration. Now we are working regularly at Acton and Shepherdswell there should be more opportunity for people who are interested and who live reasonably close to one of these locations to join in, St Leonards was rather out of the way for many members I am sure.

The preservation of 3142 was the original reason for the formation of the SEG, even now without it there would be very little point in the SEG continuing. This is the only pre war Southern emu still in the south of England , and it is up to us in the group to keep it alive, unfortunately it cannot continue without more help from people willing to do preservation work.

I am sure there must be many members who are put off by the thought that they do not possess the necessary skills to make a contribution. This I can assure them is totally false; myself I am a complete amateur in railway terms, and knew nothing about the structure or operation of the unit before joining the group. That was 10 years ago, I am sure I have learnt a great deal in the mean time, and now feel able to tackle almost any job on the coach. The type of person to whom the job would appeal most, would be those who have an interest in either modelling or DIY, the sort of challenges we face are very similar to those that would be met in one or other of those two fields. However even if you have no experience in either modelling or DIY, there are many jobs still to be done which require only patience and a determination to get the job finished, it is in fact surprising how much it is possible to take on, once one has got a couple of jobs under one's belt.

I can honestly say that I have very much enjoyed being a member of this team, both from the satisfaction I derive from getting some part of the job completed, and also from the friendship and camaraderie that goes with being a member of a group such as ours, working towards a common goal.

At Acton we will be working almost entirely on the body work of 11187, there being no real facilities to do major work on electrical or mechanical equipment. However at Shepherdswell there is an opportunity to get involved with almost any type of work as the plan is to bring the other motor coach 11161 up to running order. The longer term future of '87 is not decided but the most likely outcome is for it to move to the East Kent to rejoin its sisters once the body work and internal fitting are complete.

Let us hope we can keep this unique unit in existence for many years to come.

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