The Trust has a fleet of thirteen YC-class ballast wagons for future use on the Rimutaka Incline Railway.
Around 200 wagons of YC, YF and YH classes were withdrawn from service during 2007, replaced by a fleet of 40 modern YJ-class bogie hopper wagons. The Trust’s plans to construct and maintain the heritage railway will require a ballast wagon train. This was a rare and not-to-be repeated opportunity to acquire a fleet of suitable ballast wagons. The Trust is grateful to the many individuals and organisations that have sponsored a wagon or transport thereof, including New Zealand Community Trust, Pelorus Trust and Winstone Aggregates; and also to ONTRACK for the opportunity to purchase the vehicles.
News to share on our key projects. Our volunteers have put in a lot of time over the winter months, including upgrading yard track that will connect to the workshop, rust repairs for the cab of Ohai Railway Board No.1, repairs and repainting two of our fleet of ballast wagons, Gumdigger carriage frame repairs plus some essential rail vehicle shed work.
During July and August 2018 we have concentrated on finishing internal lining for our workshop shed. A big thanks to Rimutaka Trust for funding a final order of ColorSteel cladding and fastenings to fit rails through the workshop floor.
Another ballast wagon has been repaired and painted, bringing the number that have been restored to six.
In September work started on repairing and restoring a sixth ballast wagon - Yc877. The ongoing programme of work is lifting the overall presentation and standard of the 13-strong fleet. The hopper, underframe and running gear receive attention, and care is taken to clean down and paint the hard-to-reach areas.
Another ballast wagon is in the paint shop. Rust and old flaking paint has been removed with a needle-gun, making short work of this laborious job.
Individual components from shunt locomotive ORB #1 are also being prepped and painted, including areas of the frame, headstocks and sand boxes.
We have also added a lot of backfill into the floor area of the workshop extension to our shed, using a small rubber-tracked excavator to move around 20m3 of hard fill.
A few photos from recent weeks follow.
Ballast wagon Yc 817 is undergoing a rapid transformation, with topcoats applied and signwriting under way. Trust member Ron Jones has been the mainstay of this project, tirelessly scraping down the layers of old paintwork and crud and painting. The panels at each end of the hopper have been removed to permit easier access to the underlying equipment and framing, all of which has been given 'the treatment'.