With Cogan Hall and our containers now at Tyseley we were able to hold a working party once more. The team started cleaning up Cogan Hall and meantime noticed that more pipe work has been completed on Betton Grange. Also work on the superheater header has started

The move of our assets to Tyseley started this week with the movement of Cogan Hall’s tender to Tyseley. Our team helped Andrew Goldman’s men load the tender at Llangollen. Our containers of parts and tools will follow and then Cogan Hall itself.

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The 6880 Betton Grange Society have reached an agreement in principle to relocate their assets, including new-build No. 6880 Betton Grange, to a new permanent home at Tyseley Locomotive Works.
The 6880 Betton Grange Society wish to put on record its appreciation to the Llangollen Railway for providing a home for the project during its earlier stages and wish the railway well for the future. We look forward to taking a fully operational Betton Grange to Llangollen to haul trains there in the future.
The Society’s assets also include unrestored No. 5952 Cogan Hall and arrangements are being made for this to join No. 6880 at Tyseley. The 6880 Betton Grange Society are grateful to Tyseley Locomotive Works for providing home for existing and future projects.
The priority for the Society is the final assembly of Betton Grange which Tyseley Locomotive Works has been commissioned to complete, with a target steaming date in the autumn. It will then focus its resources on building a new tender for the ‘Grange’, with the objective of building a replica Collett 3,500-gallon version, a chassis for which is already in its ownership.
The opportunity is being taken to cosmetically prepare Cogan Hall for display at Tyseley and the Society invites expressions of interest in helping start the restoration of this former Barry scrapyard locomotive

During the latest visit to Tyseley we saw progress on the pipe work underneath the locomotive and progress in painting the LH cylinder covers

With volunteer work at Tyseley still not possible the focus has turned to TLW finishing the locomotive. Various parts have been made at Tyseley in preparation for the day they are needed and fitted to the locomotive.

With our tender appeal well under way, the Society has bought a tender frame assembly as the base for our new Collett 3500 gallon tender No. 2268

The team plan to contract the work restoring the frames and using the wheel sets from Cogan Hall’s tender to Tyseley Locomotive Works.

Whilst volunteer’s working parties are still not possible at Tyseley, work has continued by Tyseley Locomotive Works. The smoke box is now connected to the boiler and bolted to the saddle. Also some of the back head fittings are now in place As can be seen from the following photos. Work will continue through the autumn and winter.

Tyseley Locomotive Works have re-commenced work on 6880. The boiler is now in its’ final position and the smokebox is in the process of being fitted.
Also locally, the fabricator has progressed well with the backplate corner cladding. Photo to follow soon.
Working Parties are not expected to commence for at least 4 weeks from now. Any proposed dates are yet to be confirmed.
Unfortunately 6880 will not be Steaming this year as first anticipated. The CV-19 pandemic has greatly increased our timescale with decreased frequency of working parties and numbers. Fortunately the Final Boiler test is yet to be carried out which will be when the Boiler ticket commences.

At this time we have no clearer picture as to when we can resume working on The locomotive. The engine is still at Tyseley locomotive works which is shut down during the Covid 19 pandemic. Tyseley hope to re-open by the end of June with work re-commencing again on the Grange by mid July .It is then hoped that they will be able to accept Volunteers around 4 weeks later If so we can arrange working parties to suit. We do not yet know how CV-19 working restrictions will impact on our timescale, or frequency of allowed working parties. 
More news will be posted when we have it

Tuesday 17th March was the day that our boiler was lifted into the frames at Tyseley. Now the boiler can be fixed in place and the smoke box secured meaning that the final fixing can take place. Once this is done we can start on the final piping up and the fitting of the cladding.