KSE Signalling Project

To provide suitable support for the locking room floor and lead-out bench, our signalling engineers required three pairs of rails, suitably spaced across the width of the ‘box, to be cemented into sockets cut into the rear wall and to project forward across the locking room floor, through a prepared aperture in the front wall, to the trackside. These rails will provide a rigid base for the heavy floor timbers required to take the weight of the various rods, cranks etc.. emanating from the lever frame on the floor above. As the internal walls will be plastered, we have chosen to build the locking room using concrete blocks which will not be visible in the finished ‘box. These will be faced with stone externally using material which has been sourced locally and carefully matched to the original building. Additional solid block pillars either side will carry the steel beams that will, in turn, support the lever frame. With the floor supports described above in place, construction of the w...

After talking about rebuilding this structure for some 25 years +, with all the necessary paperwork now in place and signed off – Risk Assessments, Method Statements, Construction Phase Plan etc to conform with the Construction (Design & Management) Regulations 2015 – work on the reconstruction can now formally begin in earnest. The remaining rear wall of the 1860's S&DR box Our Team Leader, Bob Tyson, writes ‘The single remaining wall of the 1860’s S&DR signal box is outlined gauntly against the grey skies of Stainmore as we clear away the vegetation and detritus that has accumulated on the site since the structure was demolished by British Rail in the 1960’s. This enables us to examine the rear wall and its foundations more closely to determine how they have fared in the intervening 60 years. Surprisingly well is the answer – the wall has its core exposed at the tope edge and some loose pieces of stone but, on the whole, it is as straight and true as the day it wa...

Hello all! Today we're going to show how the unique North Eastern Railway Central Division level frame recovered from Pesspool Junction will be fitted into the S&DR signal box.  The 1861 box at the end of it's life. Note the additional window to the locking room, seen on the left hand wall in this picture. This is the operating floor plan showing aperture for frame and *indicative* joist locations to accommodate this. Dimensions: Apologies: all dimensions used here are imperial as the equipment and building itself looks to have been designed and built using these. They also work out very nicely! Front to back, the surviving box structure measures 10’ inside the walls. This has been used in this plan, and is assumed to be correct. The aperture for the frame to sit is drawn here as being 6” from the front wall. This is our datum, from which the other measurements are derived. This can be adjusted plus or minus 2”, but will then shuffle the rest of the aperture across. If it...