It was snowing last time I sat down to write some news, today has what passes for summer happening outside our workshop door, so I thought I'd better write some (brief) notes, just so you know we're still here.
The main goings on in the workshop the last few months (indeed pretty much the only thing going on in my life at the moment, as Mrs P has texted me on one or two occasions recently) is Stafford production. I fondly imagined that the batch we were working on in February would last us for this year, so that we could get on with one or two other ideas we have in development. As it is, all those engines are now all sold, the workshop is now busy making parts for the next batch.
Whilst we manufacture components in batches of 12, there isn't really enough room in the current workshop to assemble that many at a time.
Six is a good number, however the way the orders and painting ran out, we assembled seven engines in June (the five you see here - the engine low down on a hydraulic bench is our demonstrator, recently returned from loan to a club in exchange for the new red one they'd ordered and a blue one which I delivered a couple of weeks ago).
We got these test-steamed, cleaned and packed ready for despatch to release some floor space so that the remaining five could go together in July - these are the chassis you see in the pictures, assembly started in the second week of July, all due for steam test by the boiler inspector at the end of the month, with shipping shortly after.
