Well, today ended up becoming all about getting a decent handle on the Maldon Compound. We were expecting a delivery, which unfortunately never arrived. However, given that the weather was also quite wet and miserable, we focused our efforts somewhere we could seek shelter.

The end result was quite literally truck loads of genuine scrap steel, old pieces of timber, loco parts and trees removed to make a usable space to logically store, sort and get a handle on the quantity of items we’ve actually got.

For anyone who was questioning the funny looking piece of track in yesterday’s photo, this is the actual purpose, a pallet rack, designed to take industrial pallets, it just so happens that for that to work, the two rails are spaced exactly 2’5″ apart (which is nothing in the real world, but it is close to narrow gauge – 2’6″ and looks a bit deceptive.

It’s also been designed to have a second layer installed above to house the lighter items, such as bags of pandrol biscuits and various odds and sods.

It should be noted, all the rail used in this construction was so badly corroded in the foot it never stood a chance seeing life in the track again. The main reason for rail has been to make the thing digger proof!

Thursday’s gang will be track inspecting, leaving Maldon at 8am, walking (hopefully) all the way to Sawmill Road.

Tomorrow’s workday will be based at Maldon. We’ve got a few things happening around the depot. If all that ends up being out of the way by lunchtime, we’ll probably spend the afternoon out beginning the 6 monthly detailed track walk.

Well after setting a record this week for the most rerailing achieved in one day, we’ve almost set its opposite equivalent today with the least amount manageable… 36m of rail was rerailed today, with a closure cut in just prior to getting onto Rifle Range Bridge. We’ll be installing rails over the bridge that are long enough to get the joints off the bridge.

Anyway, we’re now well placed to knock a significant amount over when we return to rerailing in a couple of weeks.

This afternoon was spent doing a variety of tasks around Muckleford, including loading up a truck of our old 60lb rail for the Puffing Billy Railway, for use in various stabling sidings and in the museum there. We’ve had a bit of a general tidy up of Muckleford, burning a pile of scrap timber offcuts and trimmings we’d amassed.

We event spent an hour or so fishing more sleeper plates out of the pile! As yet not on pallets, but out of the dirt before the winter rains set in and turn it to mud.

Tuesday’s workday is still to be confirmed, as we’re potentially required at Maldon to unload a delivery, however we’ll confirm location on here Monday afternoon.

Another extremely successful day today, with the whole of Curve 8 now rerailed and almost all of the UP leg to Rifle Range Bridge.

We didn’t quite keep up the pace of Tuesday’s crew, however that was almost solely due to being down a couple of our regulars today.

However even just travelling over in the gang truck, the ride difference is quite incredible, very smooth and comfortable!

By day’s end, which was brought on prematurely by the rain, we’re within spitting distance of Rifle Range Bridge.

We still actually need to conform exactly how many rails we installed today, however we’re fairly confident it was 14 x 40m lengths and 1 x 18m length, a total length of 575m, which is very very close to Tuesday’s effort!

Tomorrow’s crew, depending on numbers, will either install the last length towards the bridge or just cut in the closure and then move onto a few other jobs in the afternoon. We’ll be meeting at Rifle Range Bridge, entry along Martin Street Castlemaine, around 8.30am.

Time’s running out quickly for anyone who would like to experience the existing 60lb while it’s still in the mainline, we’d recommend not leaving it until the end of June, or the majority of it will be gone!