563LG Launches The T3NDER Club!

The restoration of LSWR T3 No 563 is rapidly moving forward. 563’s boiler could steam this year for the first time in over 70 years and the locomotive could be complete next year.  Her tender needs to catch up!

Will you help make it possible?

Join the T3NDER Club today!

Designed by Williams Adams in 1891 and built in 1893, London and South Western Railway T3 No.563 is the sole survivor of the twenty strong class. During their working lives the T3s worked from London Waterloo to Swanage, playing their part in the development of Swanage as a thriving seaside resort.

Donated to the Swanage Railway Trust by the National Railway Museum in March 2017, it has always been our intention to return No.563 to steam. Over the last two years, restoration of the locomotive has progressed at the Flour Mill. Tasks already complete include:

  • Complete disassembly to ‘kit of parts’ for full condition assessment
  • Fabrication of a new copper inner firebox
  • Fabrication of four new girder stays for the firebox
  • Fabrication of a new angle ring to join the boiler to the smokebox
  • Strip, clean and paint frames, splashers, cab sides
  • NDT, strip and paint driving and bogie wheels

We are now at the point at which we need to focus our attention on the tender, to ensure that it will be ready when 563 returns to the Swanage Railway. Our plan is to restore the tender in our workshops at Swanage, using our team of enthusiastic expert volunteers. The work required is not extensive, but includes:

  • Strip to bare frames for inspection and protection
  • Replacement of the tank floor
  • Replacement of wrought iron brake components
  • Assessment of existing springs
  • Minor frame repairs around front drag-box
  • Re-metaling & machining of axle-box crown bearings and horn way faces
  • NDT of wheelsets, spring hangers etc.
Photo copyright: S.Gardiner

With an estimated cost of just £50,000, we have decided to form the 563 T3NDER CLUB, with an invitation for 100 supporters to donate £500 each, with an option to do this over five or ten months. 

Special Benefits for members of the T3NDER Club

  1. Opportunity to ride on the first train behind 563 during its first official day in public service on the Swanage Railway, as a guest of the Swanage Railway Trust.
  2. The opportunity to visit the workshops at the Flour Mill and the Swanage Railway to view progress with restoration (Covid permitting, terms and conditions apply). 
  3. Opportunity to join the team working on the tender at the Swanage Railway. 
  4. A special T3NDER CLUB badge.

Please join the T3NDER Club and help us get 563’s tender ready for her return to steam. 

The T3 tender’s water and coal capacity will be slightly adjusted during restoration to better meet the requirements of heritage railway operations, but without altering external appearance.

Please download and complete the forms then post or email them back to us!