Delving deeper into the carriage

This month was much more hard work than last month. We didn’t feel as though the foundations for the carriage were adequate, so, we decided to dig a further metre downward and, in doing so, we were able to remove a considerate amount of mud and tree roots that had mis-shapen her spine somewhat. After lowering the floor all the way round, we could now start to consider how uneven she was.

Spirit levels and laser levels in hand and acrows at the ready, we eagerly surveyed the carriage in the search for any unevenness that we could find. We were not surprised by how uneven she really was. Despite being suspended on an even floor and somewhat hovering over the ground, it was to our absolute horror that she wasn’t really holding up very well. In fact, her back right shoulder was a whole 6 inches lower than the rest of her body. She was either slouching or had a saggy bottom, we couldn’t quite decide, but she was at an angle that would seem almost too much to fix. So, being engineers, we fixed her. It was an almost comedic sketch as seen by that of Charlie Chaplin watching the two men at work.

Whilst one barked the direction, up or down, to the other as to what to do, spirit level and measurements in hand, the other had to raise or lower the 6 acrows accordingly. Sort of like a spinning plates act. The ‘up a little’ and ‘to me, to you’ sort of conversation made for a very amusing chuckle brothers like sketch to watch.   The passenger part of the carriage is now all level at the roof line, this will have to be replicated when the guards van is renovated.

Once orderly and even, we were able to lay and cement in the other sleepers and lay her onto them, keeping the acrows in so that she would have another source of mobility, like a set of walking sticks to comfort her in her old age. Next task will be to replace the uprights and attach them into the horizontal sleepers.

As a team we would like to thank the previous owners of the house for cladding the outside of the carriage. Earlier this month we were told that we were lucky to have a carriage in the condition that it is today, so thank you very much to whoever tried to maintain it for us, you have made it stay in such good condition and we really don’t know what state it would’ve been in if the cladding wasn’t there in the first place!

In continuation from the last blog, we also discovered that our village was having a historic day, a sort of celebration of the history of our village. Once there, we were pointed to a map of 1876, around the same sort of time as that of when the carriage came into our garden.  It is interesting how the area has changed, but it still leaves the question: how did the carriage get in to the back of the Garden?