The loco was towed outside the shed on Saturday and an attempt was made to start the engine.
Result - total failure, the batteries were not up for it!
But at length with some battery charging, an external compressor to charge the air system and Martin F hanging on the fuel rack we eventually got it to fire.
With the engine now started, the opportunity was taken to confirm that the loco would actually move in the selected direction when driving from No.1 cab.
Since all the wiring from that cab back to the control cubicle has had to be renewed due to fire damage, it would be in rather embarrasing if the loco were to move backwards when forward was selected or vice versa!
So with a Class 33 driver in the seat and a brake created, the loco was tried for power but nothing happened.
Turned out I had omitted to re-connect the wires inside the No.1 Cab AWS Change End Switch which had been removed while the loco was at Cranmore!
So with that sorted out, a basic movement check was performed and it was confirmed that the loco moved in the selected direction.
This was initially done with only No.3 & 4 traction motors in circuit so the next stage was to bring in the previously isolated No.1 & 2 motors.
No.2 traction motor is a fully overhauled unit that was exchanged for the original fire damaged example by Brush Traction last year and who also repaired/replaced the damaged feeder cables to both that and No.1 motor.
So with the isolation links replaced, a further movement check was performed supplying current to all four traction motors for the first time and it was confirmed that they all wanted to go in the same direction!
Some difficulty was experienced with the Air Train Pipe (ATP) governor which needed to be "manually assisted" every time after the ATP pressure was destroyed but otherwise a generally positive result. Vacuum brake mode was also tried and power was taken satisfactorily without the Vacuum Pipe governor needing any attention so all seems well with that.
Martin F attended to a couple of leaks that were noted on the injector spill pipework and the engine was allowed to run for about four hours without any other problems being apparent.
On Sunday, I decided to have a look at the battery problem.
The battery boxes were opened and the triple pump was run to put a fairly high constant load on them.
After a few minutes, it became apparent that the voltage of one bank of batteries was significantly lower than the other so the voltage across blocks of cells in that bank was monitored until a rogue cell was identified, its voltage dropping to near zero.
Three spare cells of the same type were available in store so the dud one was replaced and the batteries put on charge.
If the opportunity arises next weekend, another attempt at starting will be performed to confirm whether this has proved to be successful.
Brad continues his painting of the bogie fixtures, attention now having turned to the air piping and the speedometer generator.
