The Forgotten End of the Railway

Although currently out of use for regular passenger trains, the 5 3/4 miles of track between Leeming Bar and the East Coast Main Line at Castle Hills (Northallerton) still sees occasional traffic, including most recently visiting steam loco 35018 British India Line. We've also got an incoming railtour on September 1st, and of course we're obliged to maintain the whole line in a useable condition should the MOD ever wish to run a freight train to Redmire.

So this August/ September sees a package of works at the eastern extremity of the railway to basically keep it going! Works include heavy spot- resleepering between Ladyfield user- worked crossing and the River Wiske viaduct, track and deck renewal through Ainderby Station level crossing, edge beam renewal at Yafforth and last but not least, upgrading of road and rail signal lights to LEDs, also at Yafforth AOCL.

The Wednesday gang helped with taking delivery of new crossing edge beams and deck units at Ainderby, after which Andy W marked- up 60 life expired sleepers at Ladyfield. Saturday saw the gang dig the sleepers out of the weed- choked ash "ballast" ready for changing, followed by another tree- bashing session to let some daylight in.

Good to see a couple of new volunteers, Steve and Dave (thank heavens they're not called Andy): we really need all the help we can get!

 

       

       

Ballasting

Having taken a back seat of late due to other pressures of work, the new loop at Leyburn has moved a step forward with completion of ballasting of the track laid so far. A hired-in JCB was used to load the four serviceable "Dogfish" hopper wagons from the ballast stockpile at Redmire, with two trips completed on Friday afternoon. The train was propelled as far up the loop as we could go with no issues encountered, apart from the usual creaking and groaning from the wagons! A total of five and a half hoppers were discharged in the loop itself, with another hopper and a half used to top up the shoulders at a couple of heat- risk sites and the final hopper returned to Leeming Bar for another day.



Michael Metcalfe supervises the wagons getting loaded



The train propels back on the first run

First run complete, and setting back into the platform before returning to Redmire

Propelling as far back as we could on the second run

We also finished moving the flat bottom rails from the west end of Redmire to the access point at the old dairy building using the ironmen gantries. The JCB then loaded a pair of sixty foots to the "Salmon" bogie flat wagon ready for delivery to Ainderby, where we'll be renewing the track and deck at the level crossing in August.

Variety is the spice of life as they say, and Saturday saw us switch to vegetation control, or tree- bashing as we prefer to call it. We tackled the public footpath crossing at 14 miles 5 chains, just east of Constable Burton loop, and significantly improved sighting for both crossing users and train drivers. A couple of big bonfires consumed the brash, with the logs stacked ready for future collection (p.way staff don't go cold in winter).

At the start of the day

Big improvement

The Leyburn gang have been carrying on the endless task of spot- resleepering, concentrating on the section between Wensley LC and Westfield UWC. They also replaced the gate at Peter Blacks UWC, where we see them posing for the photographer:

A High Profile Visitor

The big news is that we've got a visitor for the weekend off the main line, in the shape of Merchant Navy Class 4-6-2 number 35018 "British India Line". She arrived safely today via Castle Hills and completed a gauging run along the line before she takes fare-paying passengers up to Redmire tomorrow morning.

Unfortunately her arrival created more unplanned work for the track gang, this time cutting back considerable vegetation growth on the Leeming Bar to Northallerton section, which hasn't seen a train  movement since the tamper back in February, and is effectively mothballed. Mother Nature has certainly been busy reclaiming things down there....

Having worked their way eastward all week, the gang reached Castle Hills today just in time to cadge a lift back to Leeming with 35018: how's that for timing!! Thanks to all the volunteers and staff who assisted with this task throughout the week: having chipped- in for three hours on Wednesday evening, your blogger can confirm it was hot work in this weather.

Ainderby before

Ainderby after

Andy C, proving he's just as destructive with a bow-saw

Taxi!!

Who stuck that on the back?

Oh well, must be one of those buy one get one free deals

High Summer

Apologies for the long wait for a new post, but your blogger has been off on holiday down in the West Country where it was hot, hot, hot like most of the UK. I had great respect for the steam loco crews on the West Somerset Railway (yes, we did manage to visit a heritage railway), driving and firing in that heat: kudos lads! The WSR just pips Wensleydale to the title of Britain's longest heritage line, and the scenery is every bit as good and varied, from the Quantock Hills to the coastal views across the Bristol Channel to South Wales. Its well worth a visit if you're in the area.


Crowcombe Heathfield on the WSR

Meanwhile, up t'other end of the country, the WR track gang has started swapping over more good quality 109lb flat bottom rails for sidings quality 98lb ones in Redmire loop, basically a continuation of what we did in Redmire MOD sidings in the early part of the year. A total of 14x rails have been generated for forthcoming projects, including the complete renewal of Ainderby Station level crossing planned for August. Here's a photo showing "Ironmen" gantries being used to physically swap the rails with minimum human effort!

Elsewhere on the railway, the Leyburn gang has been changing yet more sleepers east of Wensley, towards Westfield Farm UWC. Some encroaching trees have also been dealt with while the team was in the area.

TIMBER!!!

Last but not least, here are some photos of the new turnout and connection in Leeming Yard in use. Another job ticked off the list!!

 

Connected Up

The new point and connection into the south road of the rolling stock shed is finally in use, and the Mk2 BSO has been successfully shunted indoors for attention. It takes its place alongside the Mk1 RMB, which in turn has taken the top spot on the pit road recently vacated by the shiny green "bubblecar" DMU. There are one or two finishing-off jobs still to do in the yard, including fitting a point lever and spreading/ levelling some of the spoil we generated, but for the moment its job done!

Elsewhere the troops have been battling the recent high temperatures to keep the railway running. Another 5mph ESR has been imposed near Redmire: while digging out to replace sleepers through an old farm crossing we discovered loss of profile on the rail foot, and once again old NER 90lb bullhead rail was the culprit. This particular rail section has been the bane of our lives this past 18 months, and the line between Preston Under Scar and Redmire is starting to resemble a patchwork quilt given the number of 95lb closures we've had to cut- in to remove defects.

New point complete for now

Both shed roads now in use

RMB and BSO. The new shed is a fantastic asset for the railway

The shed's previous resident. The newly repainted "bubblecar" is now out and about in the Dale 

All Back to Normal

The dust has settled after last week's emergency rail defect removal at Preston Under Scar. Saturday morning saw the last 4x 30ft rails, ex- Argill Farm track renewal, loaded up and trollied from Wensley to Redmire to fill the hole in the run-round loop. The first train was top and tailed, but the loop was up and running for the following services.

A quick lunch, then back down the dale in the trusty Transit to Leeming Bar to move the new yard points another step forward. These points are now in use, albeit in the "through" direction only (the back siding), and a few moves have taken place back and forth across them, including dispatch of steam loco Jennifer and delivery of a rail blue Class 33 diesel. The next task is to connect up the diverging track into the second road of the shed. 

By the end of the day we'd got the right hand switch cut- in, the associated connecting rail to the crossing nose joined up and screwed down and an acceptable alignment achieved by applying appropriate pressure this way and that with a couple of track jacks. We're very nearly on the last lap with this job now, and it'll be nice to see it finished and be able to move onto fresh adventures!

One half of the switches connected up

New point and new visitor!

Emergency Works

Planned completion of the points in Leeming Yard had to take a back seat this last week when routine inspection identified further rail defects, this time under the road bridge at Preston Under Scar. Four sixty foot lengths of replacement bullhead rail were temporarily borrowed from the run- round loop at Redmire and ferried to site on hand trolleys, with 30 foot lengths of worn rail making the return journey from Leyburn. Train services were curtailed beyond Leyburn during the day on Saturday, but the replacement rails had been installed in time to allow the evening "Gin Train" to run over the full length of the line.

First two sixty foot rails "borrowed" from Redmire loop, ready to be pushed to Preston Under Scar

The remoteness of Preston Under Scar from road access points meant some big trolley pushes, and in turn some hot and tired volunteers, but it was a case of getting stuck- in to get the railway back up and running, and our thanks go to all involved.

The opportunity was taken to change a couple of poorly sleepers while the rails were out of the chairs

Once the rails had been changed at Preston, we pushed 30 foot rails all the way from Leyburn to fill the gap in Redmire loop

Replacement rails being installed

The first use of sheradised (corrosion resistant) Panlocks on the WR?

The Leyburn gang have been busy spot- resleepering between Wensley and Westfield Farm, and this work will continue for a few more weeks to come.

And finally...........here's an interesting find: possibly the oldest rail chair still in service on the WR running line? This venerable specimen was spotted on Preston bank, proudly stamped 1889. Guessing this has seen quite a variety of motive power pass it by over the years!!

Almost as old as Mike B!