June and July Update

Portwey

Over the last couple of months volunteers have been continuing their hard work on Portwey. This has primarily been focused on the much needed boiler tube replacements.

Most of the tubes have now been removed and cleaning and preparing of the holes ready for the new tubes is beginning. The hope is to have the tubes replaced and Portwey ready to steam around September or October.

Challenge

After her very busy trip to Dunkirk in May Challenge and many of the volunteers have been having a well deserved rest. This has not stopped continued work on her though.

One of the team has been continuing to sand down the bridge guard rails ready for new varnish. Meanwhile others have been hard at work cleaning up areas of Challenge that have a habit of getting rather dirty. These areas include the thrust block for the drive shaft and the oil tray for the old steam fuel heaters/pumps. After a weekend of work these areas are now once again clean.

We have also been working on clearing out and organising Challenge’s historical items, documents and more modern documents relating to her newer components. This is a job that has been a long time in coming and will, once finished, allow us to have easier access to the items and make more room by getting rid of many items that have been shoved in amongst it all over the years.

The Trust

In June we attended our first event with our new gazebo and stand. We attended Dene Rally in Hampshire and talked to plenty of people over the weekend about the tugs and what we want to do with them. We plan to attend multiple events next year in the hope of raising funds, sponsors and more volunteers.

We are working hard on our efforts to raise funds for Challenge and Portwey and as usual all donations are very welcome. Each pound donated helps that little bit with repairs and running costs.