For all the action in areas around Bathurst, though, the city's weather station at the airport recorded just 0.6 millimetres of rain.

The storm front at Orange that produced the hail hit at about 2.30pm and lasted for around five minutes.

Much of the hail remained on the ground well after the storm had left.

NSW SES Orange City unit commander Rob Stevens said his team responded to about 40 incidents as soon as the storm hit.

Since then, he's had four teams continuously going from job to job to help clear up the mess.

He said there have been trees on houses, trees blocking roads and plenty of smashed roof tiles to repair following the storm.

"Certainly some of the larger hailstones were golf ball-sized or larger. I'd say most were about a large marble to ping pong ball-size. But generally we've probably seen the largest hailstones to fall in Orange in around a decade," Mr Stevens said.

He said the main areas of Orange affected were in the city's southern areas.

No-one was seriously injured by the storm, Mr Stevens said.

"Certainly the damage we saw on vehicles ... had that have had hit people, it might have sent them to hospital or worse," he said.

Mr Stevens said the weather had been very volatile and unpredictable this Christmas and he urged people to remain indoors should more storms hit during summer.

Residents at Grenfell, meanwhile, were treated to a white Christmas as hail blanketed the town shortly after midday.

NSW SES Assistant Commissioner Sean Kearns said 41 incidents were reported in the town.

"There was damage to properties including broken skylights, parts of roofs, broken windows, and damaged vehicles," he said.

"This kept local SES crews and two teams from Forbes busy throughout the day."

The Bureau of Meteorology said Mount David, near Oberon, recorded 38 millimetres of rain in the 24 hours to 9am on Boxing Day and the Campbells River upstream of Chifley Dam recorded 35mm.

That led to a rise in the Campbells upstream of Chifley to 1.44 metres in the early hours of Boxing Day - just under the 1.47m that it hit after big rain in the lead-up to Christmas (which included 75mm in 24 hours in the Oberon area).

The Macquarie River at the low level bridge at Bathurst was 0.53m as of 1.20pm on Boxing Day.