4th May 2010

Once again time is passing far too quickly and it is time to write about the latest "goings on" with D5401. The loco has recently taken part in the annual April diesel event at the GCR with great success and no faults. The high light of the event was both the saturday evening beerex triple header with 25035 and visiting 26007 from the Barrow Hill Museum and the same combination on the sunday afternoon.

However the group have been making some good progress behind the scenes making our spare "low hours" turbocharger fit for further use in D5401 this is once again another attempt to cure the low power problem affecting the 27 during its preservation years. This has taken some considerable time to prepare which has resulted in all studs and nuts/bolts replaced, basic checks and a repaint before the item was transported to Loughborough for a turbocharger exchanged. This job has been planned for a while and was eventually undertaken at Loughborough yard on 2nd May 2010.

Most pipework was either loosened or removed before the exchange day, with the loco shunted onto Loughborough shed the coolant was drained into barrels and with help from the shed staff and their loadall machine the roof was lifted off and placed on the floor. Next the remaining pipework removed and the loadall lifted the old turbocharger clear of the loco. At this point the team was split into three groups -

Group 1 was degreasing and painting the area where the turbocharger lives 

Group 2 were in the process of cleaning all the surfaces on the replacement unit ready for fitment

Group 3 (with a considerable amount of help from the shed staff) removed the exhaust stack ready to be re-fitted on the replacement turbocharger

Around 3hrs were spent trying to get the short length of pipe from the small excess pressure tank on the side of the turbocharger to the exhaust stack to fit. Considerable amount of heat, hammers, angle grinders, head scratching and frustration eventually meant we succeeded. From there the turbocharger was then fitted, bolted down and nearly all the pipework re-fitted and the roof re-attached to the loco in about 30 minutes. Steps were then taken to pump the coolant back into the power unit, water pressure tests revealed an old flexible hose needs replacement but a temporary measure was taken to ensure water tightness. Finally about 5pm the loco was fired up to test our handywork and all was good with just 2 exhaust pipe gaskets need replacement and the old water pipe requiring replacing. So successful was the work the loco was driven back into the siding from where it came that morning.

Still some minor tidying, fettling work needs to undertaken and painting touch-ups to finish the job completely before a test run around the end of the month is planned when time permits.

12th March 2010

As expected any maintenance work slowed considerably during the harsh winter weather we all experienced during the first few months of this year but work has not stopped and various jobs have still been undertaken.

The outstanding wiring problem in the fire alarm sensor circuit was found and fixed, considerable time has been spent on finding the long standing starting problem the locomotive has experienced since its original return to traffic in 2002 and this too was found and fixed, alots of other minor jobs such as moving the fuel pressure gauge to a point in the pipework where is won't get shaken to bits when the loco is running. The cooker in Cab No1 has been removed, heavily de-greased, cleaned and painted ready for refitting once the secondman desk has been restored. The Smiths mileage counter on axle No2 was removed so it could be repaired, this turned out to need some serious repair work and our spare unit was robbed of parts which one working unit was made out of two broken ones using following the correct overhaul process. Unfortunately overtime the original counter appears to have collected rainwater during its time and found its way past the main shaft seal into the axlebox bearing, which has resulted in the grease becoming contaminated. So this has been heavily cleaned, bearing inspected, packed with new grease and a new axlebox cover gasket fitted along with the rebuilt mileage counter reset, repainted and replaced.

At the time of writing the air tanks/pipework have been stripped and visually examined for their 3 yearly assessment and all found to be in good order, the system just needs the pipework replaced, pressured tested with the boiler inspector to sign them off for another 3 years. One problem that has finally become a headache is the condition of the locomotive starting batteries, these haven't been in the best of health over the last few years and thoughts are now turning towards replacement. Quotes have been gathered and as expected with the considerable rise in metal prices over the last few years they are not "cheap" to aid us in raising the funds needed the Northampton Type 2 Group is going to be selling a small number of spare parts in the near future to help us in our venture. Please take the time to look at our For Sale page and view the items that are avaliable.

Photos to follow shortly.......

13th January 2010

Well as it turned out D5401 was repaired in time to take part in the Great Central Railways Winter Diesel Event, this was thanks to some considerable effort by our resident electrical man who spent endless hours pouring over electrical schematics to try and find the problem. It turns out the fault lies within the Start Control Circuit. So the locomotive could take up its original rostered turns, a temporary measure was taken to ensure the locomotive started up correctly. During the event the locomotive ran very well considering the extremely cold weather with temperatures not rising above Zero all day. The next booked workings are for the railways 1960s Gala event at the end of March and the quite period will be taken for a number of maintenance tasks including repairs of the electrical fault and turbocharger strip and inspection and a list of other small jobs as well. 

3rd January 2010

Happy New Year to you all and hope 2010 will be a good year.

An poor start for D5401 in 2010 has meant thanks to an electrical fault the locomotive has been withdrawn from next weekends line-up for the GCR winter diesel event. At this time investigations are ongoing and no cause has been found yet, the cold spell isn't helping matters either as everything is very cold or frozen and you don't tend accurate meter readings when testing various components. The groups other locomotive Class 25 D5185 Castell Dinas Bran will take the Class 27 place in the timetable.

23rd November 2009

At present not alot of work on D5401 is taking place at present due to other commitments in the winter season, but the cab No1 restoration is slowly progressing with more parts removed from the Secondman desk for repair and painting at home. There is a couple of pictures added to the gallery that I have been promising for sometime.

20th October 2009

This time of year work mainly is spent by various diesel groups either preparing their locomotives for winter seasonal running or draining down the water systems for "Winter Hibernation". D5401 has been prepared for winter running as this has been the case for many years now. The previously ordered Anti-Freeze has been added to the coolant system last week and other than one minor but irritating water leak on the pipework from the new settling tanks to the combined motor pump (triple pump) no other leaks have been found, not bad considering the vast amount of work done to the system over the last 18 months.

The starting problem appears to have been solved once the time was taken to trace the wiring circuit, a high resistance joint was found on two wires on a start contactor (SC1) these were cleaned and the power unit was started with no problems or battery charging required.

Cab No1 restoration continues in the quite period, the Secondman desk has been stripped of various components and taken away for restoration at home and much time has been spent stripping old paint work and hovering the years of muck/rust and general clutter that has collected under the desk over the 47 years. This always seems to turn up one or two artefacts:

 1 complete "new" spare cab button with assoicated colour for Start/Stop/Sanders/Back Cab Horn,

 One length of 1.5inch diameter air pipe, 

 Various bulbs of different shapes and sizes,

 A "new" plastic cover for a electrical block joint,

 A used 1980s Embassy fag packet and many other items as well.

Pictures will be added of the work recently undertaken shortly.....

15th September 2009

Well, another running summer season is coming to an end. There is only a couple running days which involve D5401 and these dates shall be advertised soon. The extremely successful GCR September Diesel Event is now behind us and throughout the three days the Class 27 behaved itself very well and a few good shots and youtube videos to show.

At this point steps are being made to add anti-freeze (which is already on site) to the water system ready for winter running (i.e Santa Specials and the January 2010 Winter Gala). We have finally confirmed the low power fault as a limp turbocharger, we have suspected this for sometime but other testing was done to discount any other issues, so we now need to make arrangements to get either the present turbocharger repaired or repair one of our spare units, more on this project soon.

The Class 27 seems to be suffering from poor starting at present that has gotten worse through out the season, which we are at the point the loco won't start without some battery charging beforehand. Extensive testing of the battery cells has shown all is well and they are in good condition, a couple of minor wiring faults found during inspection have been repaired and it is now believed the fault lies with the electrical start contactors, further testing and repair work is required.

12th August 2009

Photo gallery updated.....

28th July 2009

The Class 27 has seen scheduled maintenance work during latter part of May and all of June during the "quite" period of diesel running at the GCR. A large number of jobs have been tackled such: 

- Cab No1 DSD foot pedal removal/repairs/heavy cleaning/repainting/refitted.

- Cab No1 DSD foot pedal housing, this is a fibre glass moulding that has been damaged for some years and was removed/repaired/strengthened/cleaned/painted and refitted.

- A DSD fault was traced to a defective coil in the EP valve and since has been replaced with a good spare unit.

- A yellow buffer beam hose has been replaced as the original has seen better days

- A defective coil in the power unit govenor was identified and replaced with a good spare and the long standing problem of starting the engine has been resolved.

- Fire alarm detectors in the engine room replaced with new holders/sensors/conduit and new wiring installed

- Progress has finally been started on painting Cab No1 in original Vellum/Deep Bronze Green colour scheme

- The intercooler core was exchanged once again as it was suspected the item we changed last November was blocked as well.

- Brake rigging adjustment to take up the wear in the brake blocks

Many more minor jobs have also been addressed aimed to improve the reliability of the locomotive as time goes on. Since the intercooler core has been exchanged again (and for the last time!!!) we had hoped that this would solve the low power problem as it did for 25035(D5185) unfortunately this was not to be the case. Much time has been/will be spent investigating other possiblilities and we feel that it is a combination of smaller issues. But the 27 is serviceable once more and completed the two day Mail by Rail event in mulitple with the Class 25 D5185 with no "new" faults. Thoughts are now turning to hoping to get the loco stronger for the September diesel gala.

25th May 2009

Currently the Class 27 is stood down from active service for the time being, the time is being spent catching up with maintenance work and external paint refresh. More details to follow soon.

6th May 2009

Since the last update in March much has happened to the "Baby Sulzer".

Firstly the problematic AVR finally gave up at the GCR Diesel Event on Saturday 25th April, just before the departure of the locos second trip of the day from Loughborough. Luckly the loco was still moveable and a decision to remove the loco and park it in the carriage sidings for further inspection.,which the collective decision was made "knackered once and for all this time". For the techincal minded amoung us the AVR is a moving coil Brown Boveri item and the moving motor tracks the current from the Aux Generator and maintains a steady 110volts to run all the systems on the loco by moving 4 carbon brushed arm along segments that are attached to a resistor bank, thus shorting each resistor out when the carbon brush tracks each segment that it is attached to.

Bascially four segments were badly pitted and caused arching between those four and the carbon brush arm when the engine is idling, unfortunately it all heated up and melted the four segments together and destroyed the carbon brush all in one go.

The plan was to remove the offending unit and take it away that evening in the hope we could repair/recommission a spare unit ready so the loco could resume it duties the following day. We were very lucky and found an excellent spare unit that needed a bit of attention. After a early start on Sunday 26th April the spare unit was attached and once the loco was started it worked perfectly and the loco completed its rostered turns that day.

Secondly thoughts are being turned to adjustments to the brake rigging and anti-slip control repairs and fire sensor system re-wiring and minor external touch-up painting during the summer period.

Lastly away from the loco some more progress has been made with the spare steam heat generator with the plan to hydraulic testing. A spare water pump that has been deemed in better condition than the unit fitted was exchanged with much fiddling and the associated fuel pump was cleaned and checked as well. Next on the list is the main motor that drives the fan and water pump, once again as time allows.

The locos next working is GCR 40th Closure Anniversary Event 9th & 10th May 2009 (standing in for 25035 which is currently under repair)

26th March 2009

To date the Class 27 has worked 6 days from the end of February to present. Two days on the 12:15 departure from Loughborough, two days at the excellent Nene Valley Diesel Event and two days for the GCR 1960s Event. These have been throughly enjoyable days with thw locomotive behaving extremely well considering its recent issues with the Load Regulator.

The Nene Valley Railway made us feel very welcome and I wish to take this time to thank them for this and the team that run this railway have many years of experience and this shows in there everyday operations. During this event D5401 did double head with Gerald Bodens Class 40 D306 and Neil Bodens Class 47/0 47270 SWIFT . The comments, press and photos published so far have seen this event as another success and our team are thankful for being part of this.

The Class 27 is once again safely back on GCR metals and has taken duty on the recent 1960s Event. The diesel fleet were mainly booked for freight workings and once again this appears to have been a excellent show giving a small insight to what the railway network use to run.

Work hasn't stopped behind the scenes and during all of the above, work has been identified on the loco that is going to need attention shortly on the electrical side. Various spare cab fixtures and fitting have been taken from store and are being restored to replace the items currently on is use, such items as cab seats, sun visors, AWS cab equipment, gauges. Correct colour paint has been obtained to ensure at least the internal cabs will be painted as per original build.

Work has also been seen on the recently purchased Stones Vapor Steam Heat Generator, An indepth examination has revealed that the coils appear to be sound and the associated equipment isn't in bad condition. So the decision has been taken to hydraulic the coils to finally determine there condition to see if the unit is still useable. This work is slow and it is expected to take some months to find out this answer.

The Class 27 next book workings are on 25th & 26th April for the GCR diesel event.

4th March 2009

D5401(27056) was loaded up on a lorry today and made the journey to the Nene Valley Railway, I believe the loco has now safely on NVR metals. A couple of small jobs have been attended to in the last week, mainly the AVR making the individual resistances segments that are in contact with the Carbon brush arm a excellent clean surface once more to avoid any more minor arching/sparking. The loco has been cleaned outside and needs a little tidying in the cabs ready for the weekend.

Hopefully it will be an excellent event and I hope to see you there.

9th February 2009

To date D5401 has been in service for 4 days already this year, not all of them with out issues.....

The GCR "Steam Heat Van" weekend in January was D5401 first time in service for a considerable while and it showed. Various minor issues showed themselves, issues that didn't stop the loco being serviceable but niggling none the less. Most of these have mostly been addressed and signed off as repaired. The loco is being prepared for its short visit to the NVR diesel event in early March 2009, a couple of minor repairs to the power unit govenor have made the loco stronger and behave like it should.

8th February was a bad day in terms of running, the Automatic Voltage Regulator (AVR) decided to stick at Zero and stop charging the batteries and an air lock in the fuel system shut down the power unit at Rothely station, the loco was declared a failure and dragged back to Loughborough by steam locomotive Standard 2MT 78019, rather embarrassing moment for any locomotive owner/group....... These problems were quickly dealt and the loco was fit for service once again by tea time but too late to resume any passenger running for the day.

As ever the list of minor jobs never gets smaller and each of these jobs will be attacked one by one, the loco is also showing external signs of a minor repaint in places won't go a miss either, but I will have to wait until dry and warm weather.

5th January 2009

Happy New Year to you all.........

Much has happened since the last update at the beginning of last month (Including Christmas). The final parts of the intercooler were re-assembled and the water system pressure tested and successfully held its water with no leaks (one more job off the tick list). The fire alarm system has also recieved some attention and after some poking with an electric multimeter a broken wire was eventually found in a plug for the removable roof section, also the suspect fire alarm relay was changed for a repaired spare and this system also now works correctly.

The above jobs done the loco was started-up with a small crowd watching on the 27th December 2008 and after 2hrs running it was deemed a success. So a test run was organised for the 3rd January 2009 and with the hectic festive season now behind us my time has been spent starting to degrease the entire engine room ready for a lick of long over due paint during the summer/autumn period of 2009. The 2nd January was too be a bloody cold day with a fight trying to put water into D5401, having to contend with a frozen hosepipe and small bore pipes on the loco this took 3hrs and after more battery charging (lead-acid cells do not like cold weather) the Class 27 loco was started to be warmed up for the following days test. 3rd January was a good day and 3 round trips to Leicester North station were taken with 2 trips having Class 45/1 D123 as support "in case of failure" and this too was successful with the replacement intercooler allowing the charge air from the Turbocharger to let the power unit wind up to full power on such a small load. So fingers crossed D5401 is fully serviceable for it first booked passenger services since November 2007 (14months ago).

9th December 2008

The last few weeks have seen some good fortunes for D5401 in the 2009 season.

The first and well known piece of information currently on the preserved diesels grapevine is the visit of D5401 to the Nene Valley Railway for its March 2009 Diesel Event. I wish to take this moment to say thank you for the NVR to consider asking for the hire of this locomotive in the first place and I do hope the event will be a success.

Secondly after many months of endless phone calls and various emails we were able to collect our recent purchase, which it is hoped to the overall condition of this machine to be repairable and made operational during 2009 (no specific date).

A complete spare Stones Vapor Steam heat Generator for 27056 (for the technically minded a O.K4616 series machine which has 3 coils arrangement compared to a standard steam boiler with smoke tubes surrounded by water). This item has not been in a Class 27 locomotive for a considerable amount of time and has suffered from open air storage. But the complete condition and it is evident the coils appear to be in sound condition. It has been transported to its new home and initial work has been undertaken to stop any further corrosion. We are lucky enough to have enough spares to make one good machine out of the present steam heat generator currently in D5401 and the recently purchased example. Due to the cold weather no attempt is going to be made to hydraulic the coils to test their condition as this needs to be in warm weather, so the machine is in dry storage until the spring of 2009.

Final work on the intercooler on D5401 is drawing to a close with the small leak on the bottom end plate sealed correctly and the fire alarm fault still needs to be traced and rectified before Christmas.

A couple of photos for the festive season has been added.

26th November 2008

Time has been spent on piping up the recently installed cleaned intercooler core. After a few hours bolting thing together and adding some water. A pressure test later and some battery charging the Class 27 was started successfully on the 25th November around lunchtime(ish), only one small leak worth mentioning which will be sorted shortly. The fire alarm relay/circuit continues to give grief and this shall be addressed shortly. Now with only a small number of "minor" jobs to complete and fingers crossed pending anymore problems/issues a test run will be cobbled together soon.

Once again some of the future ideas/thoughts/plans are going to becoming to a successful conclusion shortly so please visit again soon for an update.

There is no pictures added to this months gallery as there wasn't really anything worth taking a picture of.....

Also other Class 27 related news:

27007 successfully started-up for the first time in 8 years at the Mid Hants Rly on the 23rd November. Many thousands of hours have been spent on conducting an in-depth mechanical overhaul, much bodywork still needs doing and some electrical work but a major milestone in a long term project.

:- http://www.watercressline.co.uk/tw/pages/dieselco.htm

:- http://railways.national-preservation.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=17081

18th November 2008

Much progress has been made since the last update last month. The Class 27 suffered an air lock in the main fuel pump on arrival to the GCR after being unloaded so the power unit promptly shut down and eventually was rescued by D5185 (25035) a day later. A little priming of the pump and all was well again. As mentioned before plans have been forged to exchange the intercooler with a cleaned example, this is hoped that the Charge Air created by the Turbocharger is much higher before (2.5psi) and thus the full 1250bhp can be reached. The "old" intercooler core was stripped down and was made ready for removal on 5th November by myself and Martin H and sometime was spent hoovering and cleaning the cabs as well. The "new" intercooler core was collected by John Pepper from the N&LR who spent his spare time making a set of new brass spacers and bolting on the top Water end plate and then transported the completed core to Loughborough. The 15th November was the day we were able to have use of the Type 1 Locomotive Companys large "A" frame at Rothley carriage shed, much organising before hand meant with a excellent team of willing helpers and with John Pepper driving D5185 as the loco to tow D5401 to Rothley.

Once the fibreglass was removed the already loosened intercooler assembly was lifted out of the loco to the ground on two wood horses for stripping. Once again with all the kit to had this job took around 2 hours to remove the large air duct casting and exchange the core and bolt the assembly back together. Before the assembly was returned to the loco we decided to "raid" the recently opened "Ellis Tea Room" at Rothley station and after some food and tea we felt the need to finish the job quickly when John Pepper pointed to the sky at a large black cloud. The only time that Nigel Ball of the T1LC got on the roof to help replace the fibreglass roof section the heavens opened and very quickly we all got soaked (apparently Nigel appears to be a jinx as the same thing happened when the intercooler core was changed on D5185 a year ago). With this well planned job completed it was argeed that D5185 can been drive from D5401 using the Blue Star Multi-Jumper cables, So after removing a few fuses and taping up the fire alarm relay (which went pop at the wrong time) power tests done we got a path back to Loughborough Shed. I must say it is strange thing to be on a leading diesel loco with no engine running, moving the power handle back and the back loco pushing doing all the work. Well at least it proved the Multi-Jumper system still works.

The intercooler assembly still requires final piping up at a later date, the power unit filled with water and the loco started-up for testing, the fire alarm relay needs replacing as the coil decided to burn a small hole and also the fibreglass roof pins that hold the roof onto the loco body are extremely corroded and only fit for the bin, a new set of pins need to be manufactured. Once all this is done the loco can go out for a test run or two. 

24th October 2008

On Wednesday 22nd October D5401/27056 was loaded on to a low loader and has left the N&LR for a period. By 9am the following day D5401 was safely on GCR metals. An agreement has been reached where the GCR has accepted D5401 as part of the resident diesel fleet for a period of 10 years. The locos original base at the N&LR still remains but after much work and a great deal of expense over the recent coolant system overhaul we need to start putting some money back in to the kitty. The GCR have kindly offered us the running time we are after and thus the move to the GCR for the foreseeable future.

The work involving the overhaul of the intercooler is still planned for mid-november and this will entail use of the GCR equipment which has been also agreed. Once again more progress on this "little" job to follow in due course