Peckett 1690 'Lady Angela'

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Peckett 1690 'Lady Angela'

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Peckett R2 1690 'Lady Angela' was built in 1926 for the Kingston Gypsum Mine in Nottinghamshire.

After a few years in preservation at Shackerstone, the locomotive was moved in 1976 to the South Devon Railway at Buckfastleigh, where she remains to this day

28/09/2026

We had a productive few hours this morning, achieving all we set out to do, which is very rare! First job was to burn the bolts off from the rear smokebox floor support bracket. A bit of heat and a lump hammer, and they eventually came out, so we can make some new angle brackets up soon, and get them fitted ready for Keith to paint. Next job was to work out how the eccentric sheaves were attached to the driving axle, as we need to swap these over to the original R2 Lady A axle that we plan to refit to the loco. Fortunately the cotter pins knocked out easily, allowing us to split both sheaves and remove them. And finally we measured the journals on the R2 axles, and found they are approximately 0.2" larger than the journals on the axles we've removed, which is good news - eventually we'll get these back on the lathe and machine them down to a nice smooth surface finish. Overall, a pretty good day!

22/09/2026

Spot the difference (apart from the missing crank pin, and tyre thickness!)
OK, the answer to this question - the grey wheels are from a Peckett R1, and the red wheels are Peckett R2 wheels, and are the original wheels Lady A was built with (stamped 1690)! As you can see the tyres on the original wheels are well past their best, hence the wheel swap many years ago. Our plan is to purchase a set of new tyres, and fit them to the correct wheels, so Lady Angela looks like a proper R2 again. More pictures and updates to follow soon 👍🏻

08/07/2026

A bit of a warm one today, but we achieved quite a lot before the sun got round to our side of the workshop. The backhead cut lines were agreed and marked up - basically we're only removing a flat plate section that includes most of the stay holes, and keeping the curved edges as they're still in excellent condition, and would be difficult to replicate without a die (a former for them to be pressed on). The foundation ring has been loosely refitted to provide some support for the remaining plates as we remove sections of it, and also act as a guide for the new pieces. Hopefully next week we can get cutting 😁. PS.... Keith has also been busy with the paintbrush, but I forgot to take a picture so you'll have to wait until next week to see the frame progress!

10/06/2026

Quick progress update.....

As you can see, Keith's been busy with the red paint inside the frames, which is really looking good in there now. We thought he'd have enough paint to last him a couple of weeks, but it was all used in 1 day!

On the boiler, all the rivets that need removing from the outer firebox are now out, so we can get on with removal of the wasted plate sections and start manufacturing the new ones. As seen in a previous post, some of the steel has already been received so we hope to get on with this job very soon.

15/05/2026

With the boiler now back outside after the NDT, today's job was to remove the rivets on the right-hand side of the backhead. The plan is to replace the steel outer firebox on the sides and back to a line just above the top row of stays, so these rivets need to come out to allow us to cut off each plate separately. These were relatively simple to remove - a quick blast with the oxy-acetylene to remove the head, followed by a few punches of the gut buster, and they're out 😁👍🏼. We'll do the other side next week, then look at removing the lower back head. We're also looking forward to the boiler inspector's visit on Monday to discuss the overall repair plan, based on the NDT results. Have a good weekend all 👍🏼

20/04/2026

Boiler NDT today. Fingers crossed 🤞🏼!

17/04/2026

Another day of prepping the boiler for NDT, which is booked for next week. And we're very happy to be back inside the SDR boiler shop, with thanks to the SDR Engineering staff as ever.

27/03/2026

More work on the boiler today, in preparation for the Non Destructive Testing (NDT) in 3 weeks time. We met with the boiler inspector last week, and he pointed out the areas that need cleaning up for the NDT contractor to do their tests, the results of which allow us to agree the work needed to be able to fully repair the boiler. We've already decided to remove most of the outer firebox below the dashed yellow lines, and as mentioned previously we're replacing the inner firebox with a steel version. The NDT will help us decide what else can be saved, or needs replacing/ repairing.

Address

South Devon Railway
Buckfastleigh
TQ110DZ

Website

https://www.southdevonrailway.co.uk/, https://www.facebook.com/groups/191205964705951/

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