Spring (?) cleaning

Meteorologists regard the first of March as the start of spring. So as this is a leap year, we have to wait one extra day. But the first day of February showed signs of spring. So a good time to commence a sort out of our corner of Winchcombe Yard.

Thursday 1^st February

First of all, we split into two team of three. First team (Dave, Martin, Jonathan) headed to Bishops Cleeve. Their main task was to install a replacement blue mesh chamber lid on the up side of cross drain 40B, making good the robo flail damage. Also attended to was the strimming of the vegetation around the up side cess chambers between Pecked Lane and Two Hedges Road - the stretch we missed in the previous weeks. Finally the entrance gate by the nursery and the two gates across the vacant trackbed at Pecked Lane foot crossing were given some attention. They all now open and close easier.

The other team of three (Ian, Roger and Andrew) started work on the rebuild of the lower end of the low mileage up side wing wall of the River Isbourne bridge. First task was to clear vegetation from the area. On the slope this was mainly previous cut brush which just required shredding. Then the extent of the repair was determined, and the soil behind the displaced coping stones removed. There was one surprise - what we thought was a broken coping stone turned out to be one that had at some point been replaced upside down and back to front! Five coping stones were removed and cleaned, plus old mortar from the wall removed. Our initial plan (but revised – see below) was make the rebuild in stages, to reduce the amount of shuttering required and reduce the total number of coping stones that are sitting on wet mortar on a downward slope.

What first looked like a broken coping stone was actually one inserted upside down and back to front. We wondered when that was done!

Trench behind the copings and first five removed.

 

The two teams joined up from late morning to start the tidy up of Winchcombe Yard (or at least the bits of it with our team's materials). Jonathan took the minidigger to the far end of the old workshop to clear the area of vegetation cuttings - this exposed a good hard surface. The other five sorted bricks, metal grills, blue mesh covers and concrete chamber rings into neater and tidier stacks. Main objective was to remove old pallets which had become rotten or broken. There is now a pile of these and other burnable wood which will go to the steam locomotive lighting up wood pile at Toddington. After lunch some work with the telehandler was done to move some of the heavier items to better places. Definitely like a Chinese puzzle - but we avoided moving from A to B and then back again from B to A. One of the almost full dumpy bags of building sand decided it did not want to move and promptly spilt (bags going rotten is another result of items being stored for too long). Fortunately we found two better condition bags to in which to transfer the sand. Two half full bags are easier to move than one full one!

East end of the old wooden workshop.

Looking west.

Looking east. Once the pile of old pallets and other wood is gone, we will be able to get the vehicles to the shed door again.

 

Thursday 8^th February

Certainly not a spring day today! The six team members attending certainly earned their wet weather bonus. Despite the weather, which improved slightly, from atrocious to just tolerable, we made more noticeable progress in Winchcombe Yard.

Far too wet to consider any work on the wing wall of the River Isbourne bridge (and the river level was up to the bottom of the wall); and similarity too wet to seal cracks on Stanton aqueduct with mastic. So it was more spring (!) cleaning in Winchcombe Yard - plus some progress on replacement milepost manufacture. We now have three replacement heads ready (9¼ for Toddington north, 14½ for Prescott Road, and 15½ for Gotherington loop); one bridge rail post complete and two bridge rail posts just requiring painting with hammerite. The long lengths of bridge rail recovered from Cheltenham two weeks ago were moved to the far end of the old wooden workshop [thanks to C&W for loan of a four wheel trolley to do that - it needed a good hose down before returning].

Outside when not too wet; we sorted through a pile of debris near the gravel bin. Broken bricks went into dumpy bags for use as infill. Rocks went to strengthen the ditch embankment. Concrete and tarmac was piled separately. Some of the remainder was spread in the yard to reduce the depth of the puddles.

We made three trips with trusty LWB transit to remove items. First a full load of old pallets and other bits of small wood went to the steam loco lighting up store at Toddington. Then the stack of 5 concrete chamber rings went to Stanton; these will be used to raise the chambers on the 11B to 11A upside (another task for a drier day). Finally some of the waste concrete and tarmac was taken to Elliot’s at Bishops Cleeve - they very generously have agreed to dispose of this free of charge. (Many thanks to Steve at Ellliot’s). This saves hiring in a concrete crusher - would have needed a big one to handle the items with reinforcing bar.

All old pallets removed.

This was late afternoon when the rain was not very heavy and the puddles had receded. Not often do we need the telehandler lights!

Dumpy bags filled (well partially to avoid splitting) with broken bricks. Scrap concrete pile in foreground.

With S&T moving the replacement bracket signal for Cheltenham Racecourse; the area just outside the old shed is now a lot neater.

Wildlife report: As expected on a very wet day - not a great deal. A red kite and plenty of gulls were spotted over Winchcombe. The most numerous creatures were the spiders in the old wooden workshop!

Thursday 15^th February

A reduced team this week - just four of us. However useful progress on several tasks.

First for the early arrivals was to take the LWB transit to C&A tyres at Winchcombe garage for the nearside rear wheel to be swapped to enable replacement of the tyre which had a slow puncture. Another early job was to check the River Isbourne - both flow level and flow speed. Both were OK to enable work on the wing wall later.

Next job was to load the remaining concrete debris from near the old wooden shed and take to Elliot's at Bishops Cleeve for disposal - again many thanks to Steve at Elliot's for allowing this. On the way back we collected four containers of lubrication oil from J Taylor Vehicle Services for use in the railway's road vehicles.

Then on to Stanton where we positioned the extra concrete chamber rings on the 11B to 11A up side diversion chambers. All of the chambers are now proud of the surrounding land so should be visible to flail operators - but we will add some marker posts. Also we need to add clips to secure the blue mesh covers. Amazing to note the flow of water through the new diversion pipe - with the amount flowing out noticeable more than that which flows in from the down side. Besides the marker posts, the only item remaining on the up side is a touch of ground re-profiling by bridge 11. Hopefully we can start on the down side in a few weeks time – as long as we get some dry weather!

The intermediate chambers on the 11B to 11A up side diversion are quite deep - eleven concrete rings plus two brick courses and one block course.

This time last year we had just started digging the trench for the 11B to 11A up side diversion. Now complete; the chamber in the foreground is where the under track bore flows into the diversion pipe.

Next stop on the grand tour was Toddington; to enable our First Response team member to measure up the FR cabin for some remediable work. Whilst there we took the opportunity to learn how to use the small portable spill kits and the (currently one) large fixed spill kit. There certainly should be more of the fixed larger ones - as these have the absorbent sausages to contain spills in watercourses.

Then back to Winchcombe for lunch - in the picnic area by platform 2. Warm sunshine, blue sky, birds singing, it certainly was spring like!

After lunch we resumed work at the River Isbourne bridge. First task was the recovery of a section of steel mesh/green plastic matting which had been wash out by the recent floods. This was retrieved from the downstream (up / Malvern) side high mileage and placed well back from the waters edge. Then we set to to determine where it had come from. We looked all around the upstream (down / Cotswold ) side; there was nothing missing. Only when we went back to up side on the low mileage bank did we spot that it had come from the corner on the high mileage bank at water level by the end of the steel piling (see the photo below). Impossible to replace with the current river level and flow. Whilst on the down (upstream) side we noticed that some similar lengths of mesh that are in the bed of high mileage ditch (that comes from behind Churchward House) had been forced upwards - probably by deposits of silt building up. Another job to add to the list needing dry weather.

Where the floods have dislodged the section of mesh on the downstream side of the Rive Isbourne.

Finally on to the main task of the day - up side low mileage wing wall repair of the Isbourne bridge. We have changed the plan here to demolish all the loose copings and bricks before rebuilding from the bottom up. We completed the demotion, and most of the cleaning up of the coping and triangle shaped bricks which we will be able to reuse. Hopefully with drier weather we can commence rebuilding next week.

Martin (left) on demolition and Dave on brick & coping cleaning. Rebuilding will take a little longer than the hour and half demolition!

Also waiting for drier weather is the filling of the cracks on the inlet side of Stanton Aqueduct. We had all the materials and tools for this yesterday - but too damp for the mastic to be applied.

Wildlife report: Very much signs of spring! Skylarks and Herring Gulls at Stanton. Red kite over Winchcombe Yard. On the ground - or rather below ground on the Isbourne wing wall plenty of woodlice and millipedes. Plus a small frog who was carefully encouraged to hop away from the work site.

First amphibian spotting of the year.