NVR Wagon Group

With the completion of our exterior works to ex-LMS “Octopussy” CCT No.37071, we have been free to be able to begin new wagon projects. We await a shunt to remove the CCT from our workspace in the shed and bring in the first new projects for attention, but until this has happened we will be able to make little progress with the running fleet. In the meantime while we are waiting, we have turned our attention to a couple of static vans in a rather publicly-prominent position in the platform at Wansford, which desperately require some cosmetic attention to remove the ‘scrapyard look’ they have had for several years.

First up is 12T British Railways ‘Vanfit’ No.B777654. This one has particularly badly rusted ends which we will attempt to clean up to a repaintable state. Despite initial appearances the condition of this van is not actually too bad, and a cosmetic makeover should make a big visual improvement.

The two/three lower planks to each side of the doors could really do with replacement, but they are solid enough to withstand being patched. This approach  is not something we would normally consider with wagons for the running fleet (unless the patch repair was really small), but for the purposes of a quick cosmetic smartening-up of a static vehicle we felt it worthwhile and the patch will provide a better base for painting. The plywood patch seen here (centre-right) was itself life-expired!

The plywood patches in the process of being installed. We are having to be particularly efficient with materials at the present time, hence the use of several off-cuts for this job! If you can help us with the very important job of fundraising, please contact us via email or our Facebook page – without fundraising we will be severely limited in what we can achieve with the wagon fleet and we would really appreciate your support.

By the end of the day we were able to clean up and prime both the wood and metalwork to the public platform side of the van. Unusually for NVR vans the roof covering is in good order, and needs no work. The doors will be rebuilt as soon as possible, and the vehicle will be repainted in ‘fitted’ (vacuum-braked) brown livery. At some point in between projects, the corrugated steel ends will also be tackled.

We are very pleased to report that our long and thorough project to rebuild and restore LMS CCT No.37071 back to its James Bond “Octopussy” filming appearance is now complete! The externally finished vehicle has now been handed over to others who have kindly offered to complete the interior fit-out to the required standard. In the process this frees us, as the Wagon Group, to commence work on our main focus of refurbishing and restoring vehicles for the demonstration/photographic running rake, with particular emphasis on the 12-ton vans, in order to gradually reintroduce the NVR BR van train as time and funds allow. This latter point is particularly important at the current time, especially being something of a ‘non-essential’ project, so if you’re interested in sponsoring the restoration of, or part of, a van (or two, or more – no upward limit!) then please contact us via e-mail or our new Facebook page, or come to see us when we’re on site.

The full complement of lettering and whitewall tyres as worn by these vehicles in the “Octopussy” circus train sequences.

Side door ironmongery is now complete, the finishing touch to the exterior (apart from a good clean to remove the dust!)

Our new Facebook page has now gone live, which we hope will be a way to communicate more instantly with our friends/supporters/interested bystanders! Please follow us at the link below or in the sidebar (right, below the calendar):

https://www.facebook.com/nvrwagongroup

Some progress has been made with the small final jobs as we push the James Bond “Octopussy” wagon towards completion. Unfortunately by their nature some of these items are not particularly photogenic or interesting in themselves but have been included for completeness!

The last areas of rot in the top rail were cut out and new timber installed in their place, and a little filler was applied where necessary to the bodysides.

Some fixing loops have been installed to edge of the roof line to provide a secure fastening for the marquee at ‘Santa’ time, seen here in primer.

Curved packing strips were added to fill the gap between the top of the end doors and the underside of the roof. All these components above have since been painted up to topcoat.

The stencils for the European-style lettering as carried by these vans for the filming…

…lettering now applied (albeit a poor quality mobile phone photo taken in the dark!) This is as accurate to the vehicle’s livery for the filming as we could manage, we believe at least 90-95% accurate, which is not at all bad considering the severely limited source material we had available, including reference to the film itself.

The Wagon Group is indebted to Roger Gurney, who has sent us some beautiful recent images of our goods train in action. A selection can be found on our ‘Gallery’ pages.

The February Steam Gala seemed to go well, I understand Saturday was the busier of the two days partly due to a poor weather forecast for Sunday (and indeed it turned out to be bitterly cold, and later in the day, persistently wet too…)

Above: 4-4-0 No.62712 “Morayshire” was extremely popular during its visit, and ran a number of charters with the ‘blood and custard’ Mk1 coaches and a shortened goods rake. Here it is in an almost timeless view on the Friday evening before the public gala at Peterborough, and very well it looks too, even if these locomotives rarely hauled goods trains in service (although their use on coal trains was not unknown). A pity the weather was somewhat uninspiring, but the participants seemed to enjoy themselves and hopefully got some decent shots into the bargain.

Above: One of the freshly-painted MoD wagons, specially painted into BR livery in order to bulk out the shortened goods rake and participate in the event and associated photo charters, seen in the daylight.

Above: The shortened goods rake in all its glory, front to back: SR brake van No.55550, BR Insulated Banana van B881987, BR Vanfit B759852, SR ‘Highfit’ S5869, BR ‘Shock open’ B721890, MoD ‘Highfits’ 4730 and 4726, and BR standard brake van B954024 bringing up the rear.

Above: 0-6-0ST No.1982 “Ring Haw” at the head of the goods rake. On payment of a supplement visitors were able to ride in the rear brake van through the tunnel to Yarwell and back.

Above: “Ring Haw” looks at home as it marshalls the goods train within a few miles of its former stamping ground during its industrial career, serving at Nassington quarry. Our very own “Jacks Green”, sister loco to “Ring Haw”, was in the yard on display so the pair were reunited for the first time in preservation since “Ring Haw” departed for pastures new at the North Norfolk Railway. The two locomotives are named after local woods near Nassington, a couple of miles or so from the NVR station at Yarwell Junction. (Photo courtesy of Philip Halstead).

Above: The unusual ‘country set’ formed for the event, originally intended to be hauled by Gresley ‘N2’ No.1744, which in the end was unfortunately not able to attend the event. This set saw some of the first runs of newly-restored BR Mk1 coach No.4466. As seen above, 0-6-0ST No.22 was substituted for the ‘N2’, although it could be said that the set looked a little incongruous! Maybe next time we can have a vac-fitted van ready to take the place of the 3-plank ‘Medfit’, which would look better in my view. Still, the concept seemed to be successful, and is something that I hope to see repeated at future events. (Photo courtesy of Philip Halstead).

Following on from the previous update below, and as hoped, we managed to get an opportunity to repaint the second MoD wagon, No.4730, in time for the February steam gala and associated photo charter next weekend. Both wagons have also been fully lettered and their underframes cleaned and painted to give a very presentable final appearance.

Above: Freshly painted and lettered No.4730 rests in the shed before being formed into the goods rake.

Above: No.4730 in the foreground, with No.4726 behind, also fully painted and lettered ready for use. A big improvement to our eyes.

Above: Despite our brief and intense focus on the MoD wagons since the New Year, our continuing project, LMS CCT 37071, has not been forgotten. The end steps are now fully installed, and the locking bar mechanism fitted to both ends. Only a few more working sessions are required to complete this project, and the exterior is now very nearly finished, as seen above. The biggest job left now is fitting-out the interior for storage purposes.

Above: No.37071 now has whitewall tyres! (As per its appearance in “Octopussy”).

For a long time now our project updates have been focused solely on our active project to cosmetically restore LMS CCT 37071 to its appearance in the railway sequences of the 1983 James Bond movie “Octopussy”. Work on this project has been progressing well, with the end of the job clearly in sight. However it has had its ups and downs along the way, and the lack of variety in our work has been trying at times, especially when we take a moment to consider all the other freight vehicles on the railway that desperately require our time and attention. With extra demands shortly to be placed on the goods rake during the Steam Gala of 21st/22nd February and the associated photo charters, it suddenly became necessary to try to add more satisfactory vehicles to the rake in time for the event.

With the above in mind, we decided to bring forward the cosmetic improvement of the Ministry of Defence wagons, a project we were planning to undertake shortly after completion of CCT 37071. As they are in generally excellent condition, we believed one of the pair, or possibly both, could be cosmetically repainted in a relatively short timescale, a ‘quick win’ after the marathon slog that has been 37071. Their modern green and yellow livery has always jarred with us, especially when one could be clearly seen behind the BR ‘9F’ 2-10-0 at the Autumn Gala last year. Although these wagons were built for the MoD in 1963, they are direct copies of the 1950’s BR Diagram 1/044 ‘Highfit’ 5-plank open wagon. Although they have unfortunately had some modifications over the years, they are clearly of ‘steam era’ wagon outline, and a repaint into BR livery would suit them well and enable them to blend in to the existing wagon fleet.

Above: MoD No.4726 in ‘as received’ condition, displaying the somewhat unattractive modern-image yellow ends carried by these wagons in later MoD service.

Above: No.4726 part-way through the cleaning, derusting and patch-priming process.

Above: Philip applies the finishing touches to the BR fitted livery, a vast improvement in appearance to our eyes and much more appropriate for our 1950’s/60’s era BR goods rake. Lettering will be added if we get time, and time and weather permitting, we hope to give sister vehicle No.4730 similar treatment before the gala. Whilst a little more work will be required in future to sort out a couple of other issues, this can wait until after the completion of CCT 37071 in the next few months, and this wagon can help bulk out the NVR goods rake until we are able to restore some more wagons to run with it. As ever, funding is always required (however small!) – please consider donating to our cause, thank you.

An extremely productive working session saw all four Wagon Group working members on site simultaneously – I believe this is a new record for us! Several smaller jobs were ticked off the list, with particular focus on the remaining items of ironmongery that required installation.

Above: The ‘here’s one we painted earlier’ original steel door threshold strip was installed in the opening side doorway, to protect the ends of the new floorboards from damage during use. The side ladder, an original item added for the “Octopussy” filming, was also reinstalled at the same time as it shares the same bolts. This will largely be hidden from view when the van is in the platform, but it’s nice to know it’s there as we’re making every effort to exactly replicate the James Bond movie guise of this vehicle in every detail.

Above: We continued with fitting the external ironmongery to the ends of the vehicle, including the end door strap hinges, the remaining brackets for the footstep (filming modification), the black personnel door handle (another filming alteration), the angled plates to the top of the doors, and the door locking bar to one end. The end footsteps were cleaned, primed and painted black, to be fitted next time (they are seen here just resting on the brackets). The chains for the retaining pins were repaired and painted ready for fitting (these can just about be seen hanging up to dry at bottom left). The new bolts and screws were painted with topcoat so they blend in nicely with the bodywork, and apart from fitting the chains and the end steps, the ends are now just about complete.

It’s been quite some time but an opportunity has finally arisen to start posting some of the backlog of updates that have accumulated over the last few months. A lot of progress has been made since the last update, with completion now firmly in sight – below is a step-by-step report to date, in roughly chronological order.

Much of the focus since the last update has been on smaller ‘finishing off’ jobs, including making and installing the door fenders seen here. Note the coach bolts that require cutting to length, although this is a relatively ‘small’ job, it took several hours to complete.

It was a very long time coming, but here it is: the final bolt! Hundreds of these have gone into the bodysides to fix the new side planks. Again, many hours of work undertaken.

Another ‘small’ job; filling the various screwholes and flaws in the bodywork planks to give a good finish to the final topcoat.

The interior lining undergoing installation in preparation for the finished vehicle’s static storage role, with the unclad stud-partition wall to the foreground.

Weather strips and fenders have been reinstalled to the drop-down flap on the ends.

A few bolt holes were inaccessible due to the grab-handles that had been added to the frame for the “Octopussy” filming. As they were few in number and solid fixing was provided elsewhere, we cheated and glued short bolts in place for a satisfactory cosmetic appearance.

The remaining planks have been added to the dummy side doors, and once painted will be indistinguishable from the opening doors on the other side.

The interior lining is now complete, the partition wall seen here (the side door jamb, painted red, can be seen to the far right).

All the exterior ironmongery was recovered from the old doors, which were too far gone to be of further use and had to be disposed of. The recovered metal parts were then cleaned, primed, and painted in red topcoat ready to be installed back in their rightful place on the van.

We have topcoat! It’s amazing the difference a coat of paint can make, its really starting to look the part – what a transformation!

The unrestored western-end headstock…

…needle-gunned then primed.

The special hinge at each end, shaped to provide a personnel door for the “Octopussy” filming, was reinstalled…

…and the side door hinges have been fixed to the dummy side doors to complete them.

The roof hatch is now installed, as are the timber roof ribs, all added for the filming to ‘Foreignise’ these ex-LMS vehicles to portray a circus train in East Germany. During the railway sequence in the film, Roger Moore as James Bond slips out of a gorilla costume and escapes the villain’s henchman through one of these hatches – naturally a chase ensues, although it is never explained how he managed to get out of the ridiculous costume unnoticed…

The hatch and roof ribs have since been painted with grey topcoat although it was unfortunately too dark to get a photo.

The western headstock has now been topcoated with underframe black.

The end step, a filming modification below the personnel doors, has been installed at the eastern end, with that for the other end prepared although not yet fitted.

The end grab handles have also been refitted, and some of the end hinge strapping has been bolted down.

This final image from Philip provides a good summary of how the vehicle now looks, although the grab handles and end step seen above have since been added. Compare to how it looked when we started, pictured on the Railway Heritage Register about a year before we began work: http://www.ws.vintagecarriagestrust.org/ws/WagonInfo.asp?Ref=777

This bumper report brings us up to date, with only a few more sessions required to complete the vehicle… hopefully I won’t leave it so long before the next update! However, work on the project is always ongoing even if the website is somewhat quiet!

A combination of personal commitments and my study undergoing extensive refurbishment have made it difficult to maintain website updates recently, although I have acquired a backlog of material to be posted as soon as things settle down to normal – which won’t be long now!

Briefly, LMS CCT 37071 has made very good progress in recent weeks, getting that much closer to the finishing line (so expect a bumper restoration update soon)!

In the meantime, apologies for the delays and thank you for your patience.

The above photo more-or-less covers everything in this report! Despite the short nature of this update however, a fair bit of work has been completed. The roof canvas has received its final coat of undercoat, and is now ready for the topcoats to commence. The dummy end doors and the dummy side doors have been painted up to undercoat, and the horizontal lines have been scribed into the ends to give the impression of the end door structure and “Octopussy” personnel doors. This can just about be discerned above the buffer of the Class 14 diesel in the foreground. The holes have also been drilled for the final bolts in the bodyside, which can be fitted at the next opportunity.