The straight rail is placed with the head in the crow. A piece of point rodding has been placed on top to use as a straight edge to measure the offset of the bend. Now comes the hard bit. It has to be physically wound around to bend the rail. Rail is flexible to a degree, and doesn’t come in curves for the track, as for the normal curvature on a running line, will easily flex to the curve being laid. But producing a physical bend over a short distance is hard work, and requires effort. Photo: Graham Peacock