Of batteries, cameras and alarms

30th July 2023

I'll apololgise in advance if your interest is solely in locos and railway engineering. This week's edition revolves around preparations for the future and preventing a repetition of the past...

This week was scheduled to be 'transport free' as Adam had holidays to cover but of course we still had an 08 on the trailer and so first thing Monday we met up to get it unloaded. Although I drove in 10 minutes ahead of the time Adam had given me, he and Ian had arrived so much earlier that the ramp was already half laid out and my role was largely to get it bolted up. Shifting 08s around has become so commonplace that I never got around to taking any photos of it - we just winched it off, pulled it out the way with the tractor unit and departed. Adam and Ian returned south, but I headed north as I was to collect some lots from an auctioneers near Barnsley. I had been here before - at least twice - but each occasion I manage to miss it first time but eventually I came away with several battery power tools, 3 boxes of hand tools and a peculiar 'rebar-cropper' which looks to have been someone's concoction using a pair of bolt croppers on a frame with an air cylinder. The bolt croppers had broken but the cylinder appears to be the same ISO standard one that I use for clutch cylinders and coming with top pivot and clevis made it more than worth what he'd paid.

Much of this week therefore i had hoped to catch up on outstanding paperwork, and sundry other things like quotes, etc. Another part of re-equipping after the break-in was to acquire some more batteries in anticipation of having more Makita battery tools. This hasn't been all that succesful so far - one auction site yielded two grinders (one worked) and an impact wrench that also worked but was a half-inch drive version of the bigger one ('Big Mak') that I use and so inevitably dubbed Little Mak - but the drill from that site, and the two that came in from Barnsley, are u/s. Anyway, notwithstanding I ordered a couple of batteries but when it came to it, one charged and worked satisfactorily and the other appeared to charge but then showed 0V and had no life whatsoever. The supplier said not to bother returning it, they'd refund or replace and I thought I'd have two more and a replacement, and 3 duly arrived. Of these, one charged and works fine, one did the same as the previous defective one, i.e. appears to charge but then the charger shows 0V and the battery does nothing, and the third appears to charge but when plugged in on a (working) drill gives a momentary flash on the LED and then dies. I've gone back to the supplier to report this and ask that if they replace them then maybe they should be checked before despatch. Their response tomorrow might be interesting.

But replacing the lost tools is futile if the miscreants return in a month or two to hit us again and we haven't implemented any improvements to deter them. One such was the matter of equipping the shed with a burglar alarm. The decision was taken that the technical offer made by the security company wasn't what I'd specified and also cited monitoring the output for which service their annual fees were such that I could see no virtue in accepting, given that they are 20 minutes away and I'm only 5. Meanwhile a search of our favourite on line auction site revealed a supplier in Walsall offering kits of various combinations, but nothing quite as I wanted. So I messaged him with what I envisaged, answered a few questions he had and he made a 'special listing' of hardware which I have ordered and should be with us any day soon. Our old friend Andy H being at a loose end is due to start installing it this week.

Not that security has been left solely to me to deal with. On the contrary Andrew had some time ago bought a new NVR (network video recorder) and external cameras as part of a plan to upgrade our external CCTV, now spurrred into action he had discovered that the NVR and the cameras didn't seem to talk to one another. He found a supplier who came back and questioned whether the cameras we had bought and the NVR actually used the same protocol (they'd come together from another supplier, so one would have expected it all compatible, but maybe they weren't). The upshot was he bought a new NVR and cameras for inside the shed which arrived late in the week. More importantly he had a meeting with the Depot Manager at Etches Park as a result of which he was donated a quantity of redundant pallisade fencing stacked up in the back of the depot, the only snag being that it had to be collected first thing on Saturday morning when the car park wuld be relatively empty.

But Adam wanted to return T1 and also nominated Saturday morning. I suggested Friday afternoon but that didn't really work and so the only thing for it was to get Adam in early on Saturday so that he could be unloaded and gone before the train service started and the Derby-lorry arrived. Thus the programme for Saturday started to develop. Both Matt H and Andy M would be available, but we would park in the station car park as at 10.00 Adam was due with T1. At 08.00 though Andrew was at Etches Park with a Hiab fitted wagon uplifting stacks of pallisade fencing panels. If it had all gone to schedule, he might have been finished by 09.00 and joined us before Adam got here, but it had not proved possible to get the panels out of the undergrowth and on to the car park on Friday as had been expected, so loading took him rather longer.

At about 10.20 Adam arrived with T1: we had removed our gatepost in advance but had waited to dismantle the fencing between us and Station House.The procedure is to back the end of the trailer tight in past the level crossing gate post, with full steering so as to turn without going on to Station House's lawn, then pulling back forward with opposite trailer steering to gain space and then back in again. I donned my headset, took up the steering control and between us, with Andy and Matt watching the closest pinch points, we steered the trailer through the gateway, then shuffling forward and backwards until I had gained enough space at my end and Adam had the tractor unit straightened up to propel it in and clear the road outside for the patiently waiting cars. The picture above is just before that last stage. I had earlier measured the space between the the front of T2 (now minus neck) and the cabinet containing the power outlets and guessed that T1 would fit but that the neck would overlap and so it proved: Adam detached and went on his way, and we put the fence and gate post back in before news came through that the second lorry was in transit.

This arrived just before Andrew (who had had some chores to complete before he could set off from Etches) but we had barely lined up when he reached Darley. Pallisade fencing panels are assembled so as to be as difficult as possible to break through, and means that when you do take it down you end up with panels that are not always ready for immediate re-use. But first off was to get the vehicle unloaded, by stacking the piles alongside the fence. Included in the haul were 5 concrete level crossing panels, each about 2metres long and 2 of which we are planning to put into 3A and 3B immediately outside the shed so as to provide a better surface for the fork lift on its expeditions into the big wide world.

For Saturday afternoon though, work began on installing the internal cameras and dismantling a Cummins engine, though in blazing sunshine Andrew and I jacked up the front of T1 and put it on blocks so that anyone minded to try stealing it would be thwarted. More particularly it was at an angle so obstructing the way past for any lorries we legitimately need to bring in, so we would have to slew it over. I thought that this would be a good test for the crane, but Andrew disagreed.

Sunday, and Andy M arrived witb news that his van had been broken into overnight while parked at a hotel. Fortunately it was only battery powertools that had been taken, though the damage to the side door was ugly and considerable and as his regular van was in for repairs, this was a hire vehicle. Thus his first job was to phone it all in, but Derbyshire Police's computer was down so they couldn't give him a crime number, his employers asset management company answered their phone but weren't interested as it wasn't their vehicle, and the hire company replied with a recorded message quoting their Monday to Friday business hours. He welcomed a cup of tea. While he continued with camera installations, Andrew and I drew the train back and extracted a 12 inch universal column which we planned to slot under T1 and after greasing, slide the trailer over to open the access and make it doubly hard for anyone to drive off with. And this we carried through, latterly with the trailer sat on the beam and using a pull lift between the two until it had slid over a good couple of feet. Then we turned our attention to the piles of pallisade, assessing exactly what state it was all in. Some will require stripping off their horzontals and re-bolting to new ones (where they have been cut through too short) and as the fixings are not re-usable there'll be a considerable quanity to buy new. On the other hand, the discovery of two pairs of double gates, although not big enough for our purposes, with luck should sell for enough to pay for the transport up from Derby.

Nevertheless we estimated we have upwards 70 metres worth, nearly all of it the 2.4m (8ft) high variety although a little is 2m only. That should permit us to produce a continuous fence from the rear boundary of Station House, along past the shed and 20 metres or more beyond, although before we can embark we do need to ascertain exactly where the PR boundary line is, as towards the Station House end there are two seperate parallel fences hiding in the dense undergrowth! By judicious re-arrangement with the forklift, we were able to recover enough space for parking our vehicles, tidy up some of the stuff around the back of the shed and several of the new internal cameras were powered up and started recording.

Just as we were winding down, a strange sight hove into view and 'Cathryn', the PLA 0-6-0T, arrived from Rowsley with a brake van full of excited volunteers as it made a test run to Matlock, returning just as we were about finished.

OK, not as exciting perbaps as some of my previous editions, and what we did was not as photogenic. This week includes some transport work and a few other things, and all being well I'll be back this time next week to tell you all about it. See ya then.