Recent photo of her boiler back in Germany for some corrections. Does anyone know what problems they had? I wonder how much it costs for the Meiningen Locomotive Shop to build a Belpaire boiler for a 4-6-2?

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 8&nseq=106

My general understanding is that the overall fitup of the parts of the boiler wasn't very accurate, such that it did not fit onto the frame properly. There may have also been some difficulties with QC in terms of its worksmanship. It's a touchy subject as you may well imagine. Everybody's being pretty gentlemanly in public discourse.

3800's are the Oz version of our N&W J class.......and this one was a joy to ride behind. I was very honored to ride the last few miles on the footplate into Sydney Central at night - the dwarf signals and steam and moonlight combined to make it an unforgettable time machine experience. I'm sure it will all get resolved and she'll be back on the rails in due course.

dave

When the boiler was made presumably the client (NSW Government) did and signed off on regular progress and fabrication inspections (including welding & dimensional audits) during fabrication and before the boiler left the German shop.

Then magically it was found that the boiler is dimensionally out of shape when it arrives in Australia.

Mike

Apart from being slightly out of round.......
Dave, they're known as the 38 Class, not 3800.
Cheers, Bob

This page provides details on what was found wrong after the initial delivery of the boiler:

http://www.3801.com.au

Does anyone have any recent news regarding 3801's boiler?
Is DB Meiningen really undertaking rectification work on the boiler or for no explained reason is the boiler sitting in a corner of the Meiningen workshop gathering dust?

All the Australian "official" websites regarding 3801's restoration have been in complete lock-down for a considerable period of time.
You have to start wondering why the silence has been going on for so long considering the "news" posted to these websites were posted thick and fast (weekly updates) before the trouble began.

Normally the people and organisations managing these projects are falling over themselves to provide "news" if the project is going according to plan.

If this was a privately funded project, then I understand there is no obligation to release any news. However 3801's restoration is a 100% taxpayer funded project in conjunction with the NSWRTM and the longer the silence continues makes me think something stinks and people involved are trying to cover it up and keep it out the the Australian media.

In Australia - based on my limited experience as a visitor with friends in the business - the media doesn't have anywhere near the credibility or reach as the bush telegraph. I would not assume that Australian steam people don't know because it hasn't been published in the media so we don't know. It isn't really our business after all. It might make for a good case study once it is all worked out and the issue is settled if the people involved choose to share it.

dave

Hi

Here is a discussion from the past.

Robby


http://www.rypn.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=31861&p=162134#p162134

The front tubeplate was welded in about 1/8" oblique, and there were some areas where the shell was either not rolled correctly, or the seams were welded in such a way as to cause heat distortion and an out-of-round condition -- I have not seen exactly what this was. I believe John Rimmasch knows something about the welded stays. These problems were probably not the result of errors by the Australian mechanical crews, and it is my opinion that proper attention at Meiningen would have caught them if they had been.

What I have pieced together is the suspicion that the people actually doing the 'site engineer' function, and supervising the work, were "political restoration" people, not engineers or people familiar with new steam. Certainly there are firms in Australia, and experts in Australia, who could have supervised the work correctly, and probably at much lower cost and with less trouble. Apparently there has been some 'management shakeup' since this problem came up and was given the sort of response that happened.

I'm hearing its a combination of extremely poor project management and total lack of fabrication inspection on the Australian management side which has caused alot of the problems. Another issue was the requirement of the erroneous Australian Standard boiler code (which the Germans weren't familiar with) over a more widely respected and used ASME or a European code.

The only recent news rumor I heard is there is no new work being carried out on boiler repairs.

As for people say "we have no right to know", I feel as a publicly funded project some disclosure is required, especially as there has been NO news for at least 18-24 months.
--And before that time the people running the project were falling over themselves to provide news to the public.

The "political restoration" people and those at the top of the organisations connected with 3801 have done a extremely good job with the policy of limiting information.

The Australian railway media (enthusiast publications) seem complicit with this policy. These publications certainly don't a have a investigative journalist attitude. ................... I suppose these enthusiast publications have the attitude of don't bite the hand which feeds you.

I suppose the only real news revelations will come from the mainstream print media. I do hope this subject does reach the mainstream media. Only that way we can have a clean out of those "politically" appointed people and learn from mistakes to ensure these problems do not occur again.