The focus is still on greenery (and fruit)

Fortnight ending 12 September 

It's holiday season for Volunteers so work has been a bit sporadic over the last couple of weeks. 

Tuesday 1st Sept 

Working close to base today, Dave and Nigel cleared the drain on the down side crest in Winchcombe Cutting. This will help when we come to trace the 24" pipe to make sure it runs where we think it does. After that, they leapfrogged the station and carried on clearing the ditch in Winchcombe Yard, that's the downstream end of the same drain. 

Photos from Dave 

Winchcombe cutting down side crest drain 

The new gully on top of the 24" crest drain 

Some Chapter 8 barriers left by the contractor recovered to 
Winchcombe Yard 

Normally by this time of year, there's some water in the down side ditch, it seems that there's a late dry spell as the ditch is bone dry. It does make clearing it a lot easier though. 

Winchcombe Yard down side ditch 

Down side ditch cleared 

Thursday 3 Sept 

For a change of scenery, Andrew and Martin headed out to Stanton and Culverts 11A and 11B. There's still a lot of work needed up here to get Culvert 11B up to standard and to join the outlet from 11B to the spur installed into 11A last year. Some of the materials are on site and some are at Toddington and Winchcombe, the problem now is that the funding and effort to complete the work are adrift. It hasn't been forgotten, that's the main thing. 

Photos from Andrew. 

The first job was to clear the roadway so that the gate could be opened, it's still a bit askew since the incident last month. 

Stanton Yard entry gate 

Culvert 11B down side low mileage inlet 

Culvert 11B down side high mileage inlet

Culvert 11B exit before clearing 

Culvert 11B up side exit pipe
under the boundary fence 

Culvert 11B up side outfall 

Headwall on the down side crest at 8m 20ch 

Chamber lid recovery required 

The base camp turning area near Bridge 11 was cleared and some hazard tape put up around the chamber and up side cess headwall, just in case anyone tries to drive over the lids 

Up side cess drain 

Up side cess headwall next to the base camp site 

A sure way to predict the winter weather is by the abundance of fruit in the hedgerows and trees, it's a sure sign of a bad a winter, and it sure looks like there's a going to be a severe one this year. 

Pears

Sloes

Still some blackberries about 

Even more pears 

Most of the pear trees along the line are leftover from orchards that dotted the area, they are usually the small hard pears used for juicing to make Perry  

Monday 7 Sept

Back on the culvert clearance as a note arrived at Drain Gang HQ to say that the consulting engineers have been engaged to carry out the visual inspections on the Culverts. That is those structures which are larger than 18" (450mm in new money). Anything smaller is technically a Cross Drain. 

The Monday gang started at the Broadway end working south, first stop Childswickham Road then onward down to Stanway Viaduct.  

Photos from Dave 

Culvert 2A Childswickham Road up side 

Culvert 2A up side headwall 

The sleeper bridge on the up side 

Culvert 2A down side 

Culvert 2A inside 

Next stop Little Buckland bridge for Culvert 4A...

Down side toe drain (Not Culvert 4A) 😕

Nigel at Culvert 4A up side headwall 

The cracked end of Culvert 4A up side 

Another leapfrog down to Culvert 11C just north of Stanway Viaduct.  

Culvert 11C Down side, no headwall 

Culvert 11C down side inlet 

Culvert 11C is on the 'To Do' list, the embankment has slipped at some time and engulfed the headwall, there's a length of 24" galvanised pipe extending the inlet end. Erosion has moved the inlet stream south of the culvert end, so the inlet stream is at an acute angle, It needs some work to rebuild the headwall and construct a channel similar to that at 11A. 

The up side end outlet stream has been constricted by a tree and this has caused a significant silt build up in the culvert, It needs redesigning to ensure that bore is self cleansing otherwise it may block up. 

  

Culvert 11C up side headwall 

Culvert 11C up side outlet ditch 

Friday 11 Sep 

The Friday gang were at Winchcombe armed with a plan today, the plan went a bit off course as the job took longer than expected. A pallet loaded with bags of 40N concrete mix was delivered before Christmas 2019, it was in readiness for new chamber lid manufacture - this would have been done before now if Lockdown hadn't got in the way. Some of the timber for the 1.8m lid moulds was cut last year ready for assembly as well, today was the day to assemble the moulds.  

Roger measuring up on the mobile work bench 

Drilling holes for the threaded bar  

Oops, threaded bar is a bit too long 

1st assembly almost complete 

First 1.8m long lid mould finished 

Who knew that concrete mix had a Use By date, well it does! and there's only 6 days left to use the whole pallet before it self destructs. There was a concern that the wet may have penetrated the bags as the pallet has been stuck outside for over 9 months, only 1 bag has been found spoiled so far. 

40N Mix Use By 12 Months from 17 Sept 2019 😨

The cement mixer was having a run out for the first time in ages 

What every well dressed man about town is wearing this year
(Photo: Roger)  

Filling the moulds 

Vibrating poker used to get the air bubbles out 
(Photo: Roger) 

9 Bags of 40N later, the first 3 lids done 

The belated spring cleaning bug has struck, possibly brought on by the fact that someone was looking for an essential bit of kit. Hence, the tool chest on the Transit got a clean and sort out, possibly for the first time since we got it. 

There might be something alive in here 😉
(Photo: Roger) 

Only 12 shovels, is that enough for 2 people 
(some are differing sizes and shapes) 

Woe betide anyone who makes a mess in there now. Perhaps the cab will be next for the valet treatment, although that may be a step too far 😟

Summer is over, it's official

Week Ending 29 August 

Another 'Bitty' week, still nothing to get our teeth into. 

Monday 26 Aug 

The early week team of Dave and Nigel were in action at Royal Oak again, this time it was clearing the vegetation along the crest drain. It's going to be excavated at some stage to replace the stone layer on top of the pipe to improve the interceptor qualities of the drain. The water coming off the fields needs to be diverted away from the cutting slope, the crest drain should be doing this but neglect has allowed the stone to become clogged with earth and the water just shoots over the top. 

They started with the new drain from the crest down to the cess on the down side.

First batch of photos from Dave. 

Nigel out finding chambers 

A bit of silt build up 

New plastic pipe runs into the cess chamber 

A bit more silt building up in here 

Crest Chamber on the site of the 2016 land slip 

Nothing running in from the land drains 

Nigel stops to sign autographs for the fans 

A couple of investigative holes were 
dug to check on the pipe 

SGW Pipe looks to be sound 

Monday was the best day to be out and about weather wise, the rest of the week wasn't as pleasant. 

Looking back along the crest 
Malvern Hills in the distance 

Rush to get the crop in before the forecast storms 

Thursday 27 August 

Team Thursday (Andrew and Martin) had another day at Royal Oak, this time they had a change from vegetation clearance by doing a bit of shovelling and block removal. It's about making a start on the temporary improvement of the down side cess by removing every 5th horizontal block. This opens the way way for the ground to drain into the the cess pipe. Plans are underway to find a suitable way of filling the voids created, otherwise things like people will fall into them. More importantly they will fill with silt and cause more problems. 

Report and photos from Andrew. 

Down side crest to cess chamber cleared 

Not much of sump in this one 

Cess chamber cleared, it didn't look that much from the top 

The end of the cess drain is suffering a bit from limescale build up, it may look like a lava flow, but it's solid. 

Chamber between the cess and Culvert 24A

The line of removed blocks in the down side cess 

Rain stopped play after lunch, it started to hammer down so sensibly the team abandoned work for the day. 

Friday 28 August 

The rain was still coming down, so it was another short day. It did bring a change of scene though. The mission today to was discovering how the Winchcombe Cutting crest drain gets to the stream at the down side edge of Winchcombe Yard. The highways authority are planning to replace the deck on the bridge at Winchcombe Station, hence we need to know where our pipes are. 

Our Structures Engineer arranged for access to the old Station House garden so that we could have look in a chamber in the corner. 

Roger and John looking for the chamber 

Bridge rail lid on the chamber 

Par for the course today, going good to soft 

Checking where the road gully drains to see where 
the water runs 

The gullies along Greet Road run into a chamber that has an opening broken into it from the field on the tunnel side of the road. from there the water runs over into the chamber in the Station House garden. 

Surface water form the road gushing in 

Dye test in the Station House garden 

On the cutting crest the last chamber before the bridge was opened to run some dye down to prove the flow route 

Water flowing in form the ditch in the field 

Air bag used to bung up the flow down to the cess 

Bio-degradable marker dye 

Dye from the crest running through to the house chamber 

Roger tried tracing the pipe with the divining rods, but a water main runs along the road over the bridge which tends to interfere with the process 

Looking for the drain run 

Cast marker plate in the footpath above the drain chamber 

Next step will be to run the sonde through from the garden in each direction to get a better bearing on the pipe. 

Is there more excitement in store for the week ahead, we'll have to wait and see.