So in true fashion a shake- down run was. Organised, a mere 1.5mile round trip from my friends place to Winchester cathedral and back, there just happened to be a fair in the grounds and a 3" traction engine running a model bailer making miniature bails of hay!
We started off at my friends house. Tentatively lit a fire and tinkered with it as it warmed up, a few minor leaks to sort out but nothing major to worry about mostly fittings and a cylinder block bolt, but nothing I wasn't expecting! steam happened and we started to test things, pump, injector and hand pump all worked so that was the first major concern sorted then we moved Into will it go?.... Well... It did! And it went well..... so well infact the first major failure happened! I took off round the car park to see how it handled in medium gear and it seemed to be more than happy with a fair amount of grunt, after that I decided to give top a go! So I changed up on the run and instantly it took off! Hurtling across the car park at a good jogging pace! Fantastic I thought! As my mates other half was scrabbling to find her phone to video the occasion. Then she suddenly started making noises and wavering her arms around. ... Better stop I thought as it seemed like she was panicking fairly well..... When I turned round to see the commotion... Someone may have forgotten to lock the fire grate in... And it may have...... Shaken out .... A bit..... And maybe left a trail of fire behind me on the tarmac !!!! Apparently it looked somewhat spectacular!!
Well with that human error put right and a new fire laid a short run was in order. The local pub being no more than about. 2 mins away was the first stop, and all went well. Back to the van to re-coal and water for the long road ahead and we set off!
Wel did encounter a few minor technical problems en-route. A few bolts coming undone and the most annoying was one of the rods that attach the front axle to the boiler to steady the front axle fell off and broke, but with some on-site bodging we carried on regardless! And after a fairly good run we arrived at the cathedral in style, steam and smoke high in the air and the valves just feathering as we entered the grass area with the other traction engine was sat in a little fenced area. So we parked up next to them.
Now you would have thought that it would be a nice thing to do as talk of steam engines and engineering would be rife....... But no. These group of people were some of the most sour faced, unpleasant and rude F***wits I've ever had the misfortune to meet, the old woman's first question was did I have a boiler certificate and then went off on a tirade of stuff about how much water I had in my boiler and the injector didn't pick up cleanly and dribbled a bit which was apparently unacceptable to her, so after a short stop to give the engine some attention and check over we left in the same grand style we entered and headed home, the return journey was particularly uneventful apart from loosening the bolt which attaches the pump sprocket to the crank shaft.. So all in all... A good day!
Having just looked at how much I've written I think I'll leave this here, I apologise for the small essay!! But as I couldn't film the entire event I thought I would fill you all in on the more interesting details!
There will be a couple of short videos to come from the moments I managed to capture that I shall link up as soon as I've done it!
But for now. Peace out!
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