Windcutter Project - 16T Mineral Wagon Restoration

Windcutter Project - 16T Mineral Wagon Restoration Volunteer group dedicated to the preservation and running of a rake of 16T mineral wagons on the GCR

The Windcutter Project is a group of volunteers who work with the Great Central Railway to restore to running order a set of 16T mineral wagons obtained 30 years ago through a fund raising appeal in Steam Railway magazine.

Now the steel for B570676 has mostly arrived and the brake cylinder has been re-installed and tested the team could set ...
11/06/2026

Now the steel for B570676 has mostly arrived and the brake cylinder has been re-installed and tested the team could set about welding in the floor sheets.
Tim set to on the north east side floor and Gary did a bit of careful welding of the pre-bent lower sides (in 1m(?) lengths) to form a section long enough to do one side quarter.

When Julian arrived he started working on the pillar bottom repairs on the north west side.

Testing of the Deltic Preservation Society´s “Tulyar” interrupted work as we all watched and listened to the big beast rumble past.
A gorgeous distinctive sound from the 2-stroke Diesel Napier Deltic engine.

Phil provided some lovely homemade cake for lunch and touched up the gloss paint on B589204, hopefully this dried enough before the rain downpours appeared.

The team then had a conflab around the end of #676 and discussed the build options on the new fixed end.
The consensus was that welding the new stanchions (yet to be delivered) on to the skin before then lifting it up into position with the A-frame crane on No.3 road was the best option.

Outside B573403 had been shunted on to No.1 road behind our other wagons and newcomer B279702 has arrived on an easy shunt after being used at Quorn in the 40´s event fire brigade demonstration (think extra big waste paper bin fire!).

Clearly #403 will require a new floor and pillar base repairs, so plenty to keep us busy for the next few months……

A good turn out again this week with five of the team busy on both wagons.The weld repairs to the underframe of #676 we...
04/06/2026

A good turn out again this week with five of the team busy on both wagons.
The weld repairs to the underframe of #676 were completed by Gary and then the under seal finished off by Phil.
The old W-iron was bolted back into place by Rob so that the wagon can be moved by the shed staff in a planned shunt next week.
Whilst it was out of the shed the refurbished brake cylinder was refitted to the underframe, Ian & Julian using the sheds hydraulic lifting platform to get it to floor level safely.

The poor areas of paint on #204 were rubbed down by Rob but a shower of rain prevented repainting.

A third wagon #403 has been started as well with a good clear out of debris, that has revealed several large holes!

Plenty of varied activity for the team to get their teeth into next week.

And here are some bonus photos from Phil’s visit.Paint sag on the west side will definitely need rubbing down and repain...
30/05/2026

And here are some bonus photos from Phil’s visit.

Paint sag on the west side will definitely need rubbing down and repainting.
With the amount of dents and dings on the east side its not so easy to see if there is further work needed there!

Most of the team were unavailable this week for a variety of reasons and so not much progress to report.Phil did pop in ...
28/05/2026

Most of the team were unavailable this week for a variety of reasons and so not much progress to report.

Phil did pop in and undercoated the end door and North East side of #676.

The gloss paint on #204 had run in places before going off so some rubbing down and re coating will be necessary once the heat has gone and everything has hardened off.

It was also birthday week for Tim this week and one of the pressies was a pair of Lego Windcutter 16T mineral wagons and a workshop building to put them in! Not quite scale replicas but great fun making them.
(JG Locomotive Works - follow them on https://rebrickable.com ) for details of what parts are needed and how to build them.

Hopefully we will be back to normal next week and not so hot.
The steel for #676 may even have arrived by then!

21/05/2026

Heat and hammering to make a new hook out of scrap steel bar.

An almost dry start to the day but not enough to start painting outside until after lunch.Whilst Rob & Gary cleaned down...
21/05/2026

An almost dry start to the day but not enough to start painting outside until after lunch.
Whilst Rob & Gary cleaned down the underframe on B589204 Tim took it easy (nursing a lower back strain) and went in search of the shed cat and a new arrival (a local shunter ex Albert Looms scrap yard - used to be just off the A52 near Spondon).

Gary noticed that the coupling stowage hook on the north end of #204 was missing/broken off and so aided by Julian they set about forging a new one from a piece of scrap bar.
Lots of oxy-propane heat and a nice big anvil helped a lot.

Phil arrived with doughnuts and set about the inside of B570676 with the bitumen brush on the chassis rails & panels that were not going to need any welding.

Gary then moved the oxy-propane bottles to wagon #676 and heated up the bolts to aid removal of the door spring brake protector device that hangs down below the door and stops the open door banging into the brake rigging.
This was so that we can send it off as a pattern to get some new ones made to fit to the double skin ex-ICI soda ash wagons (where they had been removed as un-necessary) and to fix the broken missing ones on the other wagons.

Julian braved the underneath of #204 to weld the new stowage hook into place after Rob had cleaned off the remains of the old one. Julian did a great job of laying down and welding from underneath as you can see from the photos of the finished result.

Finally by 13:30 and the end of lunch the weather had brightened up enough to risk gloss painting on #204.
Ian, Rob, Gary & Tim all pitched in and finished off the whole wagon within a couple of hours.

So #204 is going well and just needs the solebars touching up, boxes and numbers applying.
Plenty more welding to do on #676 and we are expecting the new steel sheets to have arrived by next week.
If it isn’t too hot……..!

Another damp workday session again this week and so B589204 had to remain in undercoat outside in the rain.With help fro...
14/05/2026

Another damp workday session again this week and so B589204 had to remain in undercoat outside in the rain.

With help from the shed staff the RVP coach was hand shunted forward in the shed and this allowed B279742 (aka B570676) to be moved undercover.
Gary took the rest of the paint off the east side whilst Tim needle gunned the west side solebar and finished off cleaning up of the bit where the door had been open.
Rob had worked on the end door before the wagon had been moved inside and then switched to helping Tim on the solebar.

Since last week the brake cylinder has been rebuilt by the shed staff as they were using the space to rebuild their own cylinders and took the opportunity to do ours for us.

Tim started working on repairs to the bottoms of the west side stanchions and welding the skin back in place where the end had been removed.

Phil arrived back from his holidays and cleaned up some of the chassis rails and bitumen painted them before taking an early finish.

Rob set up the jack in the south east corner and then started removing the rivet heads to allow the W-iron to be removed.
By the end of the day all the heads had been removed and the broken part of the W-iron removed.

More work next week to remove the rest of the remains.
Plus loads of welding even if we haveńt got the new steel delivered. And painting if the weather is kinder to us……

A quiet week this week with the team down to just Rob & Tim due to a variety of holidays,injuries and over-running build...
08/05/2026

A quiet week this week with the team down to just Rob & Tim due to a variety of holidays,injuries and over-running building work.

A very brief sprinkle of rain around 9:30am gave way to a dry day. Rob concentrated on finishing the clean up on the end door of B589204 whilst Tim needle gunned the side doors on B279742. As the side doors are often open and down it is easy to forget about them and find a last minute clean up is required.
By lunch time #204 was fully primered and baking in the May sunshine and the two side doors soon followed.

A hand shunt of #742 gave more space around #204 and allowed Rob & Tim to double team the undercoat painting on #204. By 4pm all four sides were complete allowing a gloss coat application next week or solebar cleaning and pad exams, whatever takes our fancy.

Meanwhile this Friday & Saturday Rob is off on a info/data gathering tour of South Wales / Forest of Dean to look at two 16T mineral wagons on the Forest of Dean railway and six(?) more (part of the DCRT Windcutter fleet on loan) at the Blaenafon Heritage Railway at the Big Pit museum Blaenafon.

Hopefully photos from his tour will be posted before next week.

Clear blue skies and a cooling easterly breeze made for a perfect work day this week.The team split between working on t...
30/04/2026

Clear blue skies and a cooling easterly breeze made for a perfect work day this week.

The team split between working on the repaint of B589204 and the major restoration of B279742.

Julian worked on #742 on the repair of the bottom of the west side door stanchions and supporting webs. Cleaning out the old cracked weld and re-welding with some fine multi-pass welding. The crack in the supporting web has been left for now until the new fixed end has been installed.
Rob moved from paint stripping on #204 to prep work for the W-iron removal on #742 by removing the east side tie bar.

Tim moved from stanchion repair prep on #742 to painting the floor on #204 then paint stripping on #204 end door using the needle gun. Gary helped with paint stripping and primer painting on #204 before moving on to paint stripping on #742 and helping Rob with the reluctant tie-bar.

Ian arrived late morning and started working his way round the split pins on #742, checking and replacing as necessary.

Gary and Julian then made sure the weld repair to the stanchion on the north end of #204 was completed before we tried to paint it!

When the team numbers are up having two wagons to work on is very useful, giving us the opportunity for team members to work on one whilst welding or grinding is taking place on another.

During all this activity we also had time to break for lunch and enjoy watching the busy shunting activity as the C&W staff organised a move of coaches from the dining set that had been through the works (Resident shunter D4067 forming up the train for Class 37 Cardiff Canton to take them back to Loughborough.

The repaint on #204 is progressing well, albeit a little bit more in depth than we originally planned. Next week should see an undercoat on the east, west and north sides.
Plus plenty of prep work on #742 whilst we await the delivery of the new steel.

This week the team concentrated on working B589204, Rob flatted off the west side and primered the bits that had gone ba...
17/04/2026

This week the team concentrated on working B589204, Rob flatted off the west side and primered the bits that had gone back to bare metal, leaving it with an attack of measles.
On the East side Gary & Tim took the paint back to bare metal as it was cracked and flaking all over (the new red primer is VERY red!).

Gary also gave the north end buffers and headstock a good wash and they came up a treat, showing how little work will be needed to get this one back in service even after 16 years since its last major overhaul.

Ian surveyed the split pins on #204 and #742 and then started work on the south end door with the needle gun in the areas where water often collects.
Gary touched up the gloss black on B64020 so this is now complete and ready to be delivered back into service.

Finally at the end of the day as the rain was approaching Gary liberated the top corners from #742 and the team surveyed the wagon to measure up for the new floor plates, side skin, end panel and stanchions.
Just in time we headed inside and let the rain chuck it down.

When we have the new W iron the team will help remove the old one and then LMS will hot rivet the new one into position.
Another first for the Windcutter team I believe.

Next week will see us doing more paint removal on #204 and more cleaning and prep work on #742.

Address

GCR Carriage & Wagon Works
Rothley
LE77LD

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