Steve Coulson

Steve Coulson - aka Stefco, 1941 - 2014.

Steve Coulson was born in 1941 in Rhyl where his mother had gone temporarily to escape the wartime bombing in Liverpool. He took his Christmas present toys apart to discover how they worked and his sister's presents sometimes suffered a similar fate as when he removed the voice box from her doll. After starting work at age fifteen in his uncle's business on Liverpool Fish Market he discovered he did not enjoy that and began an apprenticeship with a firm of ship repairers and engineers. He then moved on to a firm that made steel and plastic drums. He designed and built tooling and handling equipment. He began volunteering on the FR in 1957 or 1958 doing the variety of jobs dished out at the time - car park attendant, buffet car steward on No. 12 and track work with Will Jones and Paul Dukes of the permanent way gang. He also fired Prince for driver Bill Hoole.

Steve Coulson at the controls of the Stefcomatic Photo: FR Archives

In 1968 he took a job in the maintenance department at Trawsfynydd Nuclear Power Station and moved permanently to Porthmadog. At Trawsfynydd he worked with David Bascomb. They received awards for inventing ingenious equipment to assist in nuclear power station maintenance some of which was thought to still be in use in 2014.

He spent all his spare time working on the FR where he became one of the most inventive engineers the railway has been blessed with. He worked with Ron Garraway to modify the pit track in the Long Shed to accommodate Kelbus locomotive weighing gear. He designed and rebuilt the standard gauge Matisa tamper to operate on the FR. He rebuilt a Funkey diesel locomotive from South Africa to be "Vale of Ffestiniog". It has Programmable Logic Control (PLC) gear which he designed and programmed using experience gained at Trwasfynydd. He owned a share of Britomart from the 1960s and was closely involved with her maintenance and operation for the rest of his life. He tended to hoard potentially useful things and not long before his death had fitted a spare firebox to Britomart which Bob Harris had bought for £15 from the Port Dinorwic Dry Dock Company in 1966. He built carriage 122 which incorporated some of the very latest engineering techniques at the time.

He had a reputation for being a kind person, thinking of the feelings of new volunteers to make them feel welcome. Almost 300 people attended his funeral in Bangor.

See also

• Personalities

External link

http://www.ffestiniograilway.org.uk/full_article?a=tribute-to-steve-coulson