Sandstone receives its Railway Safety Regulator operating permit for 2018.
The Railway Safety Regulator has issued Sandstone with its operating permit for 2018.
It has been issued without any exceptions. Click here to view
Welcome to the Sandstone Estates website! Click on “About Us” to learn more about Sandstone and the Heritage collection.
Please note we do not accept cash payments at Sandstone, only Debit Cards, Credit Cards, EFT payments & mobile application payments.
A LIMITED SPECIAL OFFER ON SEB’S HEART OF AFRICA RAILWAY!
For a limited period only, we can offer a steam hauled trip on Seb’s Heart of Africa Railway for 20 people for just R8500 including VAT! That is a huge saving, so book now while the offer lasts! As an added attraction we can offer a Walking Tour at a special price of just R275 including VAT per head if you take the Seb’s train offer! - Contact us for more information
Featured
Featured
Lukas Nel and his team have now begun the descaling process on the boiler and outer firebox of 113. This is a massive task with both tubeplates requiring normal repairs. This will keep the team busy for some time to come. Our pictures show the guys hard at work deep inside the boiler.
Featured
Work has begun on grinding the tube plate at the firebox end of the boiler on 113. This needs to be ground to be totally clean and smooth to allow the crack testing chemicals to work and also to check if the tube plate may have any bulging or be bent in any spot.
Featured
Steam Railway magazine has published an obituary from Sandstone Heritage Trust on this great man who sadly passed away in late 2017. Click here to read the article.
Featured
Our final Steam Report for 2017. Click on the link to see the latest Sandstone Railway news.
From all of us at Sandstone we wish all our readers Seasons Greetings and a Happy New Year for 2018.
Click here to read
Featured
This is our last report for 2017 before the workshop in Bloemfontein closes for the holiday break on Friday the 15th. All the tubes have now been removed from the boiler as our pictures show and the boiler will now be descaled. The tube plates will also be tested and inspected before the retubing commences. This will be during the early part of 2018.
Featured
Lukas Nel and the Bloemfontein team have begun removing the tubes from NGG16 113. Our pictures show the superheater header at the start of the operation at the smokebox end and then the process to the remove the old tubes by grinding off the ends at the firebox end. Our last picture shows the section of the small tube which caused the failure in April 2017.
Featured
The transport of live cattle by rail has long faded into history on the South African rail system and particularly on the narrow gauge. The South African 2ft narrow gauge system itself met its demise long ago but thanks to the efforts of Sandstone a large number of rolling stock types have been saved for preservation. A comprehensive survey by Sandstone in May 2016 identified every remaining wagon along the line from Port Elizabeth docks to Avontuur. Each wagon was photographed and the images are now in the Sandstone archives. Two G type cattle wagons were identified, namely G 210 at Assegaaibos in the Langkloof and G 246 at Saint Albans on the outskirts of Port Elizabeth. Both are of the type G-3. 210 was built in 1940 and 246 in 1937. Number 210 was still stabled at the old cattle loading dock at Assegaaibos waiting for a cargo that would never come again whilst 246, as the photograph shows, was basically reduced to a frame on wheels in a lonely siding. Both units have now been collected by Sandstone and transported to the Eastern Free State for preservation.
