Harvest time on the Sandstone Estates Farms means combining ahead of the clouds. Summer rains are still pouring down making harvesting complicated and sometimes frustrated. Combining started with 7 Combines and because of the rain it was needed to employ 11 Combines to catch up and to harvest at high speed in between the typical afternoon showers in the Eastern Free State to get the crop off the lands.
The first of the freight stock items (total 114 units) purchased by the Sandstone Heritage Trust has arrived at Sandstone Estates. The cost of transporting each item is greater than the actual cost of the items in question due to the long distance that needs to be covered. It is an 850 kms trip each way.
Due to height restrictions the wagons have to be removed from their bogies which will be transported separately. The first item to arrive is a relatively rare NGX tanker.
Our Heavy Haulage fleet has completed the extraction of all the tankers which were offered on the scrapping tender in Port Elizabeth which was awarded to the Sandstone Heritage Trust. There were a total of 5 tankers on the tender. They are as follows:
XC 2196 Liquid Fertilizer
This year the expected harvest will be so the best ever and the Railway will play a very important role to transport the wheat from the hungry Combines to our grain silo's at Hoekfontein Station. 15 B wagons will be prepared for the harvest and the Bagnal will be used as motive power. The two new NG OK wagons and AY wagons will be part of the Harvest consist.
The harvesting of the massive wheat crops have started and the huge John Deere Combines are running like hungry wheat Eaters through the lands. The Railway is on Standby with 19 wagons to assist if the Freightliners and Richard Westerns can't cope with the loads.
