80097 July Update

Tuesday, 12th July, 2022

Since we shared the news of our loco 80097’s failure and the launch of our ‘Sponsor A Tube’ appeal, things have really moved on.

We have been overwhelmed by the response to our appeal, with so many of our Supporters coming forward to Sponsor (or part Sponsor) A Tube. So much so that we now have sponsorships which have paid for 34 tubes in less than a week. This is a fabulous response and we are extremely grateful to you all.

Our graphics master, Alan, has devised a poster in which we are counting down from the number of tubes sponsored to show how many remain.

On the loco side - the boiler inspector visited us last week and he is happy that the large tubes are ok and only the small tubes are faulty and need replacing – a big relief.

The replacement small tubes were delivered last week and Nigel, who has been leading our engineering team, Dave and Rodney immediately set about cutting them down to size. They were joined over the weekend by Derek, Callum and Toby, who all slogged away in the heat and by the end of Sunday ALL the new tubes had been slotted into the boiler. This is an amazing feat and if you’ve ever tried threading a needle, then imagine having to locate a 2” diameter steel tube some 30 foot long through the smokebox, down the boiler barrel to locate in the correct hole in the tube plate inside the firebox. Brilliant job and well done all you guys.

The next step is for our colleague Andy to swage over both ends of each (157 total) tube, which is hoped to be done for the end of this week. An hydraulic test will check out the tubes, then the fire brick arch will need rebuilding and all the superheater tubes and steam pipes refitting.

Our best hope (with a following wind!) is that we could see 80097 back in steam in mid August.

Thank you all again sincerely for your support.