· Engine shed
Bringing No. 7 back
Six years, two boilers' worth of tubes and a lot of tea: how the volunteers put the line's oldest engine back in steam.
No. 7 came out of service in 2020 with a tired boiler and a cracked frame. She left the engine shed this summer in steam, with a new firebox, 64 new tubes and the paint she wore in 1925.
The boiler
The boiler went away to a specialist works in the spring of 2022 and came back eighteen months later with a new firebox and tubes. Everything else in the engine waited for it: you can’t test a locomotive without its heart.
The frame
The crack in the frame was welded, then checked, then welded again. The volunteers who did it have been coming every Wednesday for longer than some of our passengers have been alive.
The paint
We found the original colours under five later coats: a deep green with cream and brass lining. That’s what she wears now, and what the trains on this website wear too.