A day out with the PWay gang ! BAG received a call for help from Clive to help with fishplate greasing at Gotherington for a day. Three BAG members responded - Mike, Vic and yours truly. What a load of fun we had. It's so interesting to cross fertilise with other departments of the railway, and it's an excellent opportunity to get to know new faces and swap experiences. In fact, it reminded me quite a lot of my son, who is engaged in spreading best practice between the different power stations of one of the nuclear operators.

Nine o'clock saw the three of us at Winchcombe, where we met the rest of the PWay 'Wednesday Gang', who were doing fishplate greasing on - a Thursday. Hmmmm. The members were called together using a neat little internet function called Doodle, which is an on-line diary where a task is described, and people can register to attend. I counted 12 faces at Winchcombe - this agreed with Doodle, so all present and correct !

We set off in the PW train. If the 'P' stood for Pullman, it was certainly luxury, with a buffet car attached and hot and cold running coffee and tea. At Gotherington, the equipment was unloaded; the heavier items with a hoist powered by an electric generator and the whole scheme was well equipped and organised. The train then set back for a quarter of a mile towards Greet, so revealing the point at which we were to start.

Starting the compressor

The Geismar nut remover, with Alasdair at the controls

We operated in three teams: One to undo the fishplate nuts - see above, one to prise open the fishplates and

 inject a modicum of grease,

BAG Vic on the injection team. The man with the cleanest jacket gets to play with the air powered grease gun!

and to follow up, the closure team, with a second Geismar to do the nuts up again:

The closure team, and a recalcitrant diesel engine.

In the team of 12, there was only one man who knew how to start the second Geismar, but he was at the other end of the site, and there was no mobile phone reception with which to ask him. The instructions were in Italian ! It was felt that the task of starting it should fall to a board director. It was a diesel engine, and it was most reluctant to start. After six pulls, the task was cascaded down to the next member of the gang, also without success, until yours truly drew the last straw and actually got it going, to acclaim all round. So the BAG was of some use after all.

The STUMEC Geismar, aka The Beast. It's heavy.

In the picture above you can see the business end of the nut remover. It has a two speed gearbox, plus forward and reverse, and beside lifting chair screws it can operate sidewards as in the above picture and remove fishplates in a few seconds...

...IF they are not on too tight. If they are indeed too tight, we have to revert to the tried and tested manual spanner method, and if that fails, we revert to the spanner and 'Birmingham screwdriver', as in the picture. Come on Paul, give it some welly! The greasing team stand and watch in awe.

Oh - oh, anybody notice that sky?

Once we had our rhythm up, we did extremely well and nutted and greased right through Gotherington station - chat to Bryan - and through the long loop and beyond up to the bracket signal. Then, suddenly the lights went out. An enormous black cloud hove into sight from the south. What do they smoke at Cheltenham? We wisely decided that it was lunch time, and headed quickly back to the train. Arriving there, we were greeted by a huge downpour. A very enjoyable lunch break ensued, with tea, steamed up windows and good chat.
After lunch, we removed several more difficult nuts and a second large cloud appeared on the horizon. This time we were not going to get caught out and we put on the heavy duty rain gear:

John gets his hood done up for him. Not too tight, though !!!

After reaching the bracket signal, we threw the whole machinery into reverse and proceeded down the other side of the loop. We were going well again, when there was a tap on my shoulder - the greasing team had run out of petrol and could not follow. Walking half a mile to the train, and back half a mile with a fresh jerrycan of petrol was not worth it by this time, so we called it a day and started to pack up. The problem with a mobile gang such as PWay is that you have to get yourself and your equipment on to the site, unpack and trundle it to the coal face, and at the end of the day do the whole thing in reverse.
This does not always go according to plan either:

The wheels came off at the signal box.

Outside Gotherington signal box the Geismar caught the foot crossing board and derailed its undercarriage. Five men stare at the job, four are required to lift the beast back on to its carriage. Who is the lucky escapee?

There are two alternatives to the Geismar: By hand...

Or, why not like this, with an motorised impact wrench. Didn't ask, did you?

Behind us, some last minute adjustments are made to fish plates close to the frog, where the Geismar doesn't reach. Who designed these things anyway, there's no room in here at all?

You can let go now, Doug !

At the end of the day, we loaded everything back in to the train. They have a neat, home made little undercarriage here, which allows them to roll 'the beast' along the ballast without lifting.

A great day out, with a bunch of fun guys. They have great plans for getting to Broadway.... more will be revealed during the volunteers meeting on November 1st ;-). Our railway is an exciting place to be!