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Sunday, July 31. 2011TMS Project - July 30, 2011We got some publicity for the project this week, and for IRM. The Thursday issue of the Waukegan News Sun had a few pics and information on the CNS&M 354, which once plied the streets of Waukegan.  Interior This is the fine looking interior of the 354 with car lighting working again thanks to the Electric Car Department and some troubleshooting. This feature was worked on to show off the interior to best advantage for the photographer shooting the story.  Car Cards Victor Humphreys helped on this task, and here he is distracted, reading some of the very old car card advertising inside the car. This remains an active project and we really need your donations help to bring this back to operation, any amount large or small is still being accepted with our thanks. And we have challenge grant money that will match your contribution dollar for dollar at 100% parity. This is a great way for you to help IRM and stretch your dollars. Please specify fund RTMS on your check. Sunday, July 31. 2011News and Views - July 30, 2011 Windows Tim Peters has started making new windows for the CRT 1797, the next round of window work that seems never to be done. In this case I probably have the numbers wrong, but the wood Tim is running through the jointer, and the stack seen behind him and to the right in the picture, will produce 18 new upper sash windows, and for 4 combination window assemblies going outside the door pockets on the end of the car.  Drill It John Faulhaber has set up his drill fixtures and is busily engaged in drilling and countersinking holes in the rough seat handle castings for the Sand Springs 68.  Windows Windows? Did I say windows? Jon Fenlaciki was again on the workbenches, restoring brass sash and windows for the CA&E 451. I believe he said 13 have been completed and placed back into the carbody.  Windows Yes, more work on windows. Eric Lorenz has started installing glass in the door windows on our CTS 4223 PCC car. It is hard to try to capture an image of something that is transparent, but the first glass is in, working on the four door leafs at the front of the car.  A End I am going to sneak this image in here rather that make a separate ENTRY for just one photo. Work continues on our B&O wagon top boxcar. In the morning the A end is still in the shade, so Victor Humphreys is up on the scaffold, working to clean and prime more surfaces, before the sun comes around and it gets really hot. He was joined today by Ray Pollice, working around the corner on the north side. Thursday, July 28. 2011Wood Shop Update - July 27, 2011 Superheater Blocks We will start out this entry with a Steam Department report. Jim Opolony from Steamland joined the wood shop crew today to fabricate new wood blocks to protect the ends of superheaters being removed from the Frisco 1630. There were not enough previously on hand (from UP 428) to accommodate the number in the decapod. Jim and Rich Witt have prepared the blocks and are laying out the remaining work.  Drilling Jim, Rich and Victor Humphreys were boring the last of them by the end of the afternoon. They are complete and ready for the steam team to continuing pulling the superheaters Saturday.  Upholstery We have shown a few pics along the way of John McKelvey recovering seats for the North Shore 757. In case you do not understand the scope of what he has accomplished, working alone, all the seat cushions (bottoms) are done and only nine of the seat backs remain to be worked upon. This is very specialized work and John is willingly volunteering for this large task.  Seat Handles As a fill-in job when forces are available, we have been working on the brass trim for the Sand Springs 68. We are apparently in the monsoon season so many of us were chased indoors to the shop, and Pete Galayda joined in the fray. Here he has the rough castings to be drilled and countersunk.  Drilling John Faulhaber constructed a neat fixture to help the seat handle drilling and here, Pete and John are on the large drill press making brass chips.  Finishing Touches Victor Humphreys is doing the final touch up on primer paint for the new station door completed in recent months.  Hood Running Boards Earlier in the day Pete applied the first color coat of orange paint to the new running boards destined for the Charles City Western 300 locomotive.  MILW 01984 Here is a Buzz Morisette photo of the newly restored Milwaukee Road caboose. We all enjoy seeing spanking new clean equipment turned out by the volunteers. In this case, expenses for supplies and materials went beyond our estimates so we are asking for help to complete paying for them. (All labor and skilled work was done by our volunteers.) The fund is R01984 for all you generous supporters of IRM. Monday, July 25. 2011Steam Report - July 23, 2011Images and report are from Jim Opolony - THANKS JIM!  Scaffold Work started at 8:00 in the morning by shop members gathering the materials that would be needed for removal of the 1630's superheaters. Since there was a constant rain, placing of scaffolding in front of the 1630 did not start until 9:30. (Our Mamas told us to stay out of the rain when we were little, so we followed their advice.) Last week, steam team members made sure that the nuts holding the first row of superheater tubes in place, on their hangers, were heated and loosened so that the job of removing the tubes would be easier. The decision was made to use the boom on Glenn's truck to lower the superheaters to the ground. The tubes would be pulled out part way from the tubesheet, strapped and connected to the boom before being completely pulled out of the tubesheet. At the same time, they would have wooden blocks attached to their tapered ends to prevent damage.  Smoke Box At 10:00 the center superheater was removed from the tube sheet. To our surprise, the superheater was out of the locomotive and in the shop, on wooden horses, within seven minutes. The entire front row of superheater tubes were out of the locomotive, blocked, stacked, and tagged by 10:35. At this point the work slowed down. The nuts on the second row of superheater hangers had to be heated and loosened. In some cases, this took several attempts before the nuts moved. In addition, since the hanger bolts are cast iron, we had to make sure we did not break them. After the nuts were loose, it took until 2:30 to remove the second row of tubes. An additional problem was that the socket that fit the nuts in the first two rows would not fit into the space between the next row of tubes. Finally, Glenn found a socket that fit.  First Row Superheaters Once on the ground, they would be carried into the shop and tagged by row and their location in the tube sheet. The wooden blocks had been made by Bob Kutella and Victor Humphreys, of the Freight Car Department, for the superheater tubes now in the UP 428's boiler. They will make additional wooden blocks this coming week since the 1630 has more superheaters than the 428.  Second Row Superheaters Work ended on the 1630 with members of the steam team working to loosen the nuts on their threaded hangers on the third row of superheater tubes. Next Saturday, when these superheaters are removed, the nuts on the final row of superheaters will still have to be loosened so that the fourth row of superheaters may be removed. Then, the work to remove the other boiler tubes and flues will start. In addition we still need to find the time to remove the lagging and boiler insulation, and other accessories to allow full inspection of the boiler. Monday, July 25. 2011Barn 4 Work - July 24, 2011 Water Everywhere I mentioned in the previous post that I was forced to change plans, and that is why no report for Saturday. Here is the reason, a dim image that greeted me at the first crack of dawn, about three feet of water on our street.  Window Posts Tim Peters is now attacking the carbody posts on the north side of CRT 1797. This wooden L car originally was a semi-convertible design, and Tim has found evidence of that. It seems odd to me that the side windows could be raised up into and stored between the ceiling and roof, but that is the way it was. Imagine an 'open car' on the elevated!  Lifts Kirk Warner was able to join us for the weekend as part of an intermission on a business trip. We went into the Sand Springs 68 and started the installation of the hardware that the Wednesday shop guys have so perfectly buffed, polished and restored. Kirk is driving the four wood screws per lift on the first window.  One Done Then Kirk insisted I take a test drive, and they seemed to work perfectly. Monday, July 25. 2011ME 28 Update - July 24, 2011Due to a change in plans I was able to journey to IRM on Sunday and got these images of work on the ME 28. Progress continues.  Roof Panels Jeff Brady was installing the last two new roof panels. This has really been a lot of work and those guys are to be congratulated.  Front End Completing the curved roof sheathing on the front and rear ends cannot be far away. On the front end, Norm Krentel has installed a type J governor on the interior bulkhead and here he is fabricating and routing air piping for it. The governor is a device that senses the pressure in the air line and serves to start or to stop the compressor on the car as needed. Once the roof work is done access to this area will be severely limited, so the crew is doing some forward thinking to put this in now. Much of the wiring and other work in this area has also been repaired or in some cases installed new. Thursday, July 21. 2011News and Views - July 20, 2011Even though there is a wide diversity of subject matter in this post, I am lumping these together in my Wood Shop category since the extreme heat resulted in volunteers looking for work indoors and out of the sun. But to begin - -  A Baggage Car NICE! CB&Q 993 basks in the hot afternoon sun after reaching COMPLETION by the Wednesday Special Projects Group. This group of midweek warriors have completed restorations on six cars in the last dozen years!  CTA 30 Jerry Saunders continued to lead a team of volunteers preparing CTA 30 for re-painting. The car body has been scuffed and flaking paint removed and it is nearly ready for the priming. I do not know how Jerry, Eric Zabelny, and Fred Zimmerman worked in that heat outdoors, in the sun. But we encouraged them to take frequent breaks and drink a lot of water, which they did. Tough guys that they are, they claimed the heat did not bother them.  CCW 300 Those of us who are wiser (and older) took refuge in our shops. Pete Galayda is working on new hood running boards for the Charles City steeple cab locomotive.  Station Door Victor Humphreys has applied primer to both sides of the new wood door custom made in the shop, for our depot.  CAE 36 Rich Witt was quite content to continue on repairs to a window for CA&E 36, in our cooled shop. Sanding was completed and then the task of applying white primer began.  Brass Polishing Simon Harrison and John Faulhaber took some more turns at restoring brass hardware for the Sand Springs 68. Here they are seen working on the first two seat handles for the car. These are new castings which need to be smoothed and worked through the polishing and finishing steps. We ordered new felt 'bobs' and these were quite effective at getting to the interior surfaces.  Production Production at the end of the day included two seat handles and another four of the window lift assemblies. These were then cleaned and clear lacquer applied for protection. This is another example where volunteers can learn and master old crafts and techniques. Our shops have a collective experience not matched and which are not found in commerce today, in many cases. What would you like to learn? |
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Comments
Mon, 03-10-2014 08:43
Hello Josh. The building of both Barns will take much prep work but can be accomplished. Thank you for your interest in the Sil Pony. [...]
Mon, 03-10-2014 00:13
Roger, I saw on the Yahoo IRMList that indeed, both barns 13 & 14 will be started this year. This is great news! I'm interested in working on the [...]
Sun, 03-09-2014 23:02
Hello I have been interested in volunteering for quite some time. If you could email me with some information that would be greatly appreciated.
Sun, 03-02-2014 14:36
Thanks for your kind comments, Kirk! Yes, it's my hope that we can spray and hand brush, were possible, the interior when completed. Gary and I [...]
Sun, 03-02-2014 10:03
Thanks. Appreciate the effort. greg
Sun, 03-02-2014 08:37
Greg, I talked to Tom Schneider, the curator of the Steam Department yesterday. Rather as I suspected, he does have a good deal of information [...]
Sat, 03-01-2014 10:33
Congratulations on your great progress. Is your intent to spray the interior after repairs and priming are completed and the weather warms up? What [...]
Thu, 02-27-2014 13:59
Hello, I was wondering if you had a history of the Louisiana and Arkansas #99 from the time it was the LR&NCo until it was acquired by the [...]
Tue, 02-25-2014 09:05
Jamie can you give me any information on Milwaulkee Road 33C as i havent seen any information on it in a couple of years.
Mon, 02-24-2014 16:38
Yes, as Mark mentioned it made it into Barn 11 last year to dry out some after finally being unloaded from the flat car.
Mon, 02-24-2014 08:16
That car has been moved inside to keep the weather out as windows are repaired. I think it's in a barn that's not open to the public.
Sun, 02-23-2014 21:25
Is there any information regarding the status of the ex California Zephyr dome coach. When I was at the museum late last summer I did not see it.