No update last week as I was otherwise engaged on the Wednesday but a double dose this week.

On Sunday afternoon Mike Waring and I met down at the railway and spent the afternoon bolting the handrail stanchions onto the stairs.  the first task was to make the square shanks on the old coachbolts fit the holes so they all had to have  small amount filed off till they fitted.

Here the stanchion which has been re bent to fit within the dash, is being used as a jig to reduce the height of the shank.

Then they were bolted on but because of their placing not all the nuts fitted so a little bit of the stair risers had to be chiselled out to enable us to turn the nuts.

Fiddly work in a confined space.   Anyway we managed to get them all done and the result was this.

This was so that today, Jack, from Alton Engineering could bend the handrails to fit.  These are brass and steel 1" 10 gauge thick walled tube. Jack spent the day with the oxy propane torch bending the tubes to plywood templates that we had made 2 weeks ago.

Here he is checking the bend on one of the brass upper rails for the staircase.

The end result was a pile of bent tubes alongside the tram.

The ones for the canopy bends are already upstairs.  Now they all need cleaning up and polishing. 

Jim and Mike had a tidy up of the interior and cleaned it out and Mike then painted the floor under A side seat ready for us to refit the seat next week.   Jim continued the endless task of flatting down the paintwork.  Away from the tram the bells have arrived, from the Whitechapel bell foundry and need polishing before drilling and fitting to their base plates.  It's coming along.