Railway Blogs

We reached a new milestone with our Black 5 locomotive this week. After an initial issue with one of the two safety valves and a quick bit of filing, the loco passed with flying colours. She only has one or two minor bits of work to be completed in the workshop and then she is ready for the park. 

Two injectors , one electric pump (instead of hand pump) were all tested.  The loco also has an axle pump but this cannot be tested during the stationary test.

We also received the two name plates for the running boards, see pictures below. ‘Covenanter’ will have these plates fitted in the next week or so, Mike has them home to paint and prepare them. The smoke box door number also arrived and you can also see the number on the cab side. 

5 for the month of May and 2026 for the year (52026), similar to Margaret’s 1949 on her cab.

Running in will take place over the summer before she can pull any passengers. All steam drivers will need  to be trained on this locomotive, more complex than both Margaret or Eva. 

Thank you ALL.

What a wonderful day was had at Strathaven Park yesterday . We celebrated the 77th anniversary and birthday of Margaret, our 2-6-0 locomotive.  A big thank you to all our visitors to the park who helped to make it a very special day.  We had several visiting locos which is always a great treat for all, along with our own locomotives running in the park. 

Thank you to the Tudor for providing the food on the day which was, as always, appreciated. Thanks to all the members who made it a great day for our visitors and thank you to Angus who was busy in the kitchen early on providing us with hot rolls to keep us going. 

We appreciated the Heron farm shop and kitchen (Emma ) for providing us with  a cake to celebrate the day.

Attached are just some of the many photographs from the day. 

Thank you all from The Wee Train now 77 years young. 🚂

On the 14th of May the Miniature Railway celebrates 77 years in the park.

We have invited friends from all the Scottish and North of England societies to join us in the celebration. We are expecting several visiting locomotives, along with our own trains.

Margaret our 2-6-0 loco will also celebrate her birthday tomorrow 🎂 (shhh! 77 years young). She will take pride of place in the cavalcade at 13.00hrs replicating the first day of running in 1949.

We are NOT OPEN to the public on this day but please come along and view our engines and visiting engines, which will be running throughout the day.

From the Birthday Girl (The Wee Train) 🚂

Thank you to all who visited the railway over the last three days. Saturday and Sunday were both very cold with unexpected heavy rain showers. In between the showers we had several families and groups come along to support the railway.

On Monday we had our best day so far this year with large numbers of new visitors along with many regulars out enjoying some spring sunshine. On two of the days we managed to run a steam locomotive – most of the afternoon on Saturday and Monday.

A BIG thank you to all the volunteers who manned the railway over these three days.

From all of us at the Wee Train

P.S. thank you to our visitor who shared the photo below.

Work continues in the workshop, with one of our steam locomotives, Cairnhill, passing both Hydraulic and steam testing.
A new fire grate was also fitted at this time. 

We also took delivery of a new Hydraulic table pictured below with Cairnhill sitting on the it.
This device will be used in the park to unload locomotives from members and visitors cars or trailers, making it easier 💪🏻 to access our track 🛤️

From all of us at the Wee Train 🚂

Our up and coming 77th anniversary will be held in the park, as we always do, on Thursday 14th May.
We will have several visiting locomotives visiting the park on the day.
We were also very fortunate to have an article published in Heritage Steam Magazine publicising the event.
Please see the article below. 

Note we won’t be open for public rides on that day but spectators can watch from outside the fence and see the wide variety of locos speeding around 👍🏻

From all of us at the Wee Train 🚂
77 this year and still going strong 💪🏻😁🎉

This Sat 18th & Sun 19th.
We are scheduled to open 11-4.30 both days and the weather forecast is not looking too bad 🫨
If we close early we will post on FaceBook 🚂🚂🚂

Our new Black 5 in the final round of painting, with final reassembly planned for, hopefully, mid April. The loco’s nameplate, numbers and LMS logo on tender, will all be in place soon. 

Then the loco will be taken around to the park, where the commissioning process will start and after several weeks of works she should be ready for passenger hauling. 

Our Holmside has also been reassembled, for the first time in many years 🎉
The boiler has been hydraulically tested, next will be steam and running testing to ensure her fitness for purpose 👍🏻 

A big thank you 🙏🙏 to all who have worked long and hard 💪🏻 on these locos to bring them to this stage, almost ready to head to the park and pull their weight 🏋🏻 

It’s only four days to go before our first running day of the new season – Saturday 28th April 🎉

Last minute maintenance and preparation work is almost completed and should be all ship shape after this Thursday’s final testing 🛤️💪🏻 

Thank you 🙏 to all the volunteers who have helped with the full range tasks on the winter work list to get the railway ready for another season.

Carriages were washed and cleaned, brakes tested, locomotives given their final servicing and a test run.
Another team has been busy levelling and ballasting the track to get it ready for the start of the year.
There is work that will be ongoing during the summer as we could not do everything in the cold 🥶 and wet ☔conditions. 

Looking forward to seeing regular and new customers alike during the year. 

From all of us at The Wee Train 🚂

We will be back soon and this will be our 77th anniversary of the railway running in the park.

We are very busy 💪🏻 with maintenance and repairs of the track🛤️ and our rolling stock🚞, together with building a new loco which should appear at the park this summer.

If all goes to plan we will open for the last weekend in March, if we cannot get the all our work completed it will be the following week (Easter Sat, Sun and Mon). lease see below some pictures of maintenance and work on both new and old locomotives.

Looking forward to welcoming everyone back for a new season.

From all of us at the Wee Train