The Electrical Volunteers Report Sunday 22-7-2012.

[asbibby]

Saturday saw Jonathan come in again to do more work on our own electrical tools, extension leads, etc. PAT testing and carriage plug work.

I came down on Saturday as well, but in the late afternoon to help steward the "Raise the Roof" concert organised by the Trackside staff. About twenty odd working members turned out to marshall the music festival and after a briefing by Andy Morriss our General Manager, on our duties for the evening, we were then issued with orange tabards and staff badges. The music itself started around 18:00 hours, I decided to marshall the foot crossing at the north end of BBS, it was close to our workshop and far enough away from the music to allow me to listen to the bands without resorting to the provided ear plugs.
It was well attended and everyone appeared to be enjoying themselves, plus it was a pleasant evening late sunshine and not cold, we will have to have another music festival next year, so we can raise even more roofs and eventually erect the "Mumps" canopies on some our Stations without platform cover.

Onto Sunday, Jonathan, John, Len, Chris, Simon and myself met up in our workshop for an early brew, Len and Jonathan went to test out the fire alarm call points in BBS and the Trackside and recorded their findings.

We then collecting all the gear we would need for finishing off the job we started at Summerseat last week, this entailed drilling the brickwork of the electrical cubicle about five inches to accomodate the conduit we had prepared to link up with the adjacent signalling cubicle.
The brickwork was drilled and the conduit fitted into the signalling cubicle, we then recovered the drop wire cable that had been temporarily wired previously and fed the drop wire cable through the newly installed conduit and reconnected it in the signalling cubicle.
The power unit was switched on and the DC voltage was checked at 32 volts going up the cable to Ramsbottom, all we have to do now is to connect up at Ramsbottom signal box, the run back timer and test the circuitry out to see if we can then remotely switch the station lights at Summerseat on, watch this space.

Lunch was the taken in the lovely sunshine and surroundings of Summerseat Station.

It was nice to see the Jinty on test being assisted by Sapper we caught this train up to Summerseat and caught the same train back to BBS, on arriving back in BBS Jonathan, Chris and Len started PAT (Portable Appliance Testing) testing the many electrical tools in the permament workshop. The were quite a few tools which failed and we made a start on repairing them, Illegal plugs i.e. not shrouded, damaged mains leads, cable restraining devices broken and damaged and contaminated plugs. These will be retested and then put back into service, PW staff bear with us on this it is for your protection. All passed for use electrical tools will be fitted with a tested label after PAT testing and the findings logged on a computer database.

John and myself meanwhile went to the C & W shed to heat shrink some heat shrink tubing containing glue on four carriage plugs, these will be fitted on one of the long term carriage restoration jobs. We also recovered some carriage plug covers for stripping down and repainting.

An eight foot fluorescent tube is required for the C & W office, we will fit this next Tuesday or next Sunday.

Chris, Jon and myself then started to repair some of the electrical tools from the PW department, ready for retesting next week.

After all that we had a final brew and quit for the day, Jonathan, John and Chris will be back on Tuesday to finish off installing newly refurbished lighting in Bury North tunnel with Simon.

[marflow]

Nice to see the wiring completed at Summerseat for the platform lights. I take it you managed to obtain a key for the LOC. Out of interest, was it B212? What cable pair number is being used for the project?

Look forward to seeing you all next week. We can hopefully do the link at Rammsbottom.