Illinois Railway Museum Blog

Thanks to Pete Pedersen for supplying and sharing some additional images.

Lettering

On good weather days we need to take advantage of working in the Freight Department Car Shop - outdoors that is.  In the morning we laid out the herald for the Milwaukee Road which is to be applied to this car.  Rich Witt is double checking the size and shape. 

Pete Pedersen Photo

Here is a rare shot of me working, starting to apply the first white paint in the field for the herald.  By the end of the day we had applied two coats of white background paint here.  Meanwhile Victor Humphreys continued the herculean effort of cleaning and repainting the entire roof single handed! 

Last Sunday, the coupler on the east end was removed to repair the area.  Victor is also spearheading this with a lot of prep work, and grinding and fitting today.  The goal is to weld up the hanger frame where cracked, and to install a new wear plate.  All the tools and machines were dragged out to do the welding but hopes were dashed when it was determined that the electrical welding cables would not reach.  It seems someone last January or February removed the receptacles and plugs from two of these heavy cables, with the aim that they should be upgraded and replaced.  Then walked away with nothing done, (where are the old parts?) to be discovered now when we need them!

I joked that we could move the car closer to the electrical service to do the job, except that there is no coupler there - that is the point of the work!  Not so far fetched, as moving this car with no coupler may be one of the more attractive options left to us - not that it is easy at all.