On Saturday the valve was fitted to the repaired No.2 end buffer beam pipe and I decided to do a cursory brake test.
I had to temporarily blank off the Air Train Pipe (ATP) and main res feed pipes to the missing No.1 cab FV3 valve.
The compressor was run from batteries until it cut off at 100psi.
Then in air brake mode, I opened the FV3 Auto Air Brake Valve in No.2 cab and it gave an ATP pressure of 72.5psi so spot on!
Moving the brake controller to the initial, full service etc positions caused a corresponding reduction in ATP pressure and the bogie pressures also then came up.
It was noticeable that the bogie timing is now much slower than previously, possibly because the triple valve is now feeding two bogies, so hopefully these might now be somewhere nearer specification.
Then selected Normal Vacuum mode.
Although only No.1 exhauster runs from batteries it created 21" of vacuum ok and it also sped up when the high-speed button was pressed.
The vacuum and bogie pressures seemed to respond to the controller ok.
Continued to play with the brakes until the batteries ran down!
All fairly encouraging though.
The formal brake assessment will be performed once the FV3 valve is delivered and the remaining internal pipework repairs are completed.
On Sunday, I cleaned the motor on No.2 Exhauster in anticipation of the formal brake assessment and also cleaned out much of the years of accumulated debris in the exhauster bay. Loads of congealed oil and general gunge, lovely!
Brad is continuing his painting inside the engine room.
This weekend the high level coolant and Serck hydrostatic system pipework between the engine and cooler group was tackled.
After some initial scraping to get off the loose paint, Brad applied paint stripper to the pipes and then went for lunch!
After lunch, I assisted him to scrape off and wire brush the resultant loosened paint and then after wiping off the remaining paint stripper and any oil, a coat of red oxide primer was applied throughout.
Brad also painted the repaired ATP pipe on No.2 buffer beam with a coat of Signal Red.
Following recent developments at the DEPG, the return to service of 33 057 is likely to have been raised in importance.
A formal announcement is expected soon.
