The Society Plans and Visions for the future Following on from our AGM on Saturday 12th October, we are happy to bring our followers our plans and visions for the future years to come. Firstly, we held a very[…]

The 2857 Society 2024 Annual Report – now available for shareholders Ahead of the 2024 Annual General Meeting (AGM), Shareholders can now download the 2024 Annual Report. Copies of previous annual reports can be found on the Shareholders page.[…]

2857 Current Status Current Status of 2857 Update Part 1 Over the last few months 2 working parties have occurred on the loco, with various jobs being completed. These include – Stripping the smokebox of its contents, cleaning and[…]

The 2nd January 2023 saw GWR 2-8-0 No.2857 operate for the final time before withdrawal for overhaul. Crewed by Society Trustees Simon Brooks (Driver) and Harry Bradley (Fireman), the locomotive took a 325 ton train, formed of 10 Chocolate[…]

The SVR remained closed until August which meant that 2857 covered a very small fraction of its normal mileage in 2020. That said, the loco has worked virtually daily throughout August without putting a foot (a wheel?) wrong. In[…]

Over the winter the opportunity was taken to straighten up and tidy the injector steam pipes running down the back head so that they meet with the valves vertically, rather than in the cranked positions erroneously set at the[…]

In June some cracks in the copper firebox, which looked like old repairs, were welded and several rivets were replaced with patch screws. On the carriage heating it was decided to dispense with the ‘Sarco’ unit and to pursue[…]

By February, numerous complaints had come in on the vacuum brake. It was overhauled, resulting in it maintaining 25” vacuum at 5mph. A driving spring broke on a Saturday at the beginning of April but it was replaced and[…]

2857’s 100th birthday was celebrated on 2nd and 3rd June 2018. This involved 2857 running with all the operable wagons from the ‘813 Fund’ collection showing freight trains as they were, while a GB Railfreight class 66 diesel electric[…]

The intermediate overhaul was quite extensive in the end and included casting, machining and fitting new cylinder liners, a corresponding set of new pistons, overhauled piston rods, new valve spindles, new valve assemblies, all valve and piston rings replaced,[…]