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Tuesday, February 28. 2012Wood Shop Update - February 25-26, 2011Despite the title of many of these entries, remember that while the Wood Shop DOES make a lot of sawdust, there are three distinct shop areas contiguous to the south wall of Barn 4. You will see a lot of activity and work not necessarily sawing wood!  Track Department We completed making new decking for the track department as Victor Humphreys is stacking and inspecting the finished pieces.  Windows Does that caption sound familiar? Tim Peters is somewhat hobbled, but he continues to work on the Chicago Rapid Transit 1797 project.  Light Socket Bases A man whose skills know no limits, Tim began modifying and reworking porcelain light sockets to be 'correct' for use in the 1797  Doors Here is a little side trip to show some work being done on our Kansas City PCC car. This is a regular effort, I just happened to catch some pics this weekend. Mike Stauber is working on one of the door leafs, removing paint and figuring a way to repair the rusted out sections.  Lights On the other side of the shop, Frank Sirinek was cleaning and inspecting the glass diffusers or covers for the ceiling lights on the Kansas City PCC.  Still More Lights There are a LOT of lights in the Kansas City PCC car and on Sunday, Frank was still at it. He has moved to a different work table. Did he wear out the one yesterday or just wanted better light?  Steam Victor Humphreys is making adjustments to a special clamping jig as we just assembled a new window for the fireman's side of Norfolk & Western 2050. This is an odd shape sash, and fabricating it was made somewhat tricky with the lack of right angles.  Glass OK, this is not exactly a new subject, it is WINDOW glass. Ray Schmidt has been cleaning this art glass panel for the Michigan Electric 28 for a lot of hours. There were an estimated three coats of paint on this, applied when the car was used as a cottage. And of course, that was applied to the textured side of this pressed glass.  Clear Sailing Here is better idea of the glass panel, destined to be in a paired window upper sash arrangement. By day's end it was either so sparkling clean, or Ray simply gave up on more cleaning. It was placed in the waiting restored window frame and glazing proceeded.  LSE 810 We cannot leave out George Clark and his work on the Lake Shore Electric 810. Recently reported was the work to prime and paint new siding, and here are two metal parts, a door track and side rub rail that will soon be finish painted and installed. Tuesday, February 28. 2012CTS 4223 Update - February 25-26, 2012 Electrical Eric Lorenz and Lorne Tweed are going over an electrical cabinet that lives below the front dash at the end of the car. The old one is in pretty sad shape and a lot of the framing and cabinet work will need new parts fabricated. This step is all part of the work needing to be done and getting wires pulled, before installing the new glass windshields and painting that area.  Innards Here is a better look at the switches and fuse blocks that live in the above cabinet. Sketchy schematics, lots of cut wires, missing elements and fuses. Did I mention it was dirty?  Windows Of course we need to mention windows in any such BLOG entry. Alex Randow works on these pretty regularly and he is checking the growing pile of completed sash. 17 large sash and 18 small sash are now complete.  Panels Alex also worked on cleaning up several old panels and trim work needed for the car interior. These represent items in good enough shape to re-use, and as explained previously, several items need to be re-installed before the side window areas can be completed. Note that these now shine like new metal, you would not have thought this possible if you examined them before his work. It did not happen by accident.  More Windows Keith Letsche walked in Sunday and volunteered to do more window sash. This project is mostly a Wednesday/Saturday crew and this unexpected work only adds to and advances the work. Thanks, Keith. Sunday, February 26. 2012Steam Department Update 2-25-2012There was a relatively small turnout this week but some key progress was achieved despite the fact that several people had to leave early for the Soiree and other commitments. On 1630 much of the day was spent on woodwork. It was clear from the dust production last weekend that much more effective sealing was required to allow cleaning of the tube sheets themselves. (To do this the gun must be aimed directly at the sheet and therefore the tube holes). Thru Rick's efforts we now have ply sheathing in place on both tube sheets. This allows Collin to blast directly on the tube sheet without too much escape of debris into the shop.
This shows the sheathing at the front end. Hidden progress is that the rear tube sheet is similarly sheathed in the firebox and the front tube sheet was actually blast cleaned behind this sheathing yesterday. With this in place we should now be able to complete the cleaning fairly quickly. Another job that we started to progress was the inspection and preparation of the super heater flues. These were sandblasted by an external contractor and are now thoroughly clean. However, you can clearly see the rough cut ends resulting from cutting by the torch or rotating tube cutter.
Each must be inspected for excessive pitting and then painted with the Apexior boiler coating.
Then the rough ends must be removed using the large band saw. The method and set up was established yesterday and the first tube cut.
This will now be a continuing task to do the same to the remaining 15 tubes. Once all are done we will bring in a specialist to weld on new material to bring them back to the required length ready for refitting. In other areas, Tom continued machining parts for the piston valves on 428 while Stu, Bob and Ed were cleaning the hydraulic pump for the planer. Refurbishing this machine will significantly simplify the machining of large components such as axle boxes.
Nigel Bennett Thursday, February 23. 2012Silver Pony Update Riding Piggyback Please earmark your donations to restricted fund R1108 Roger Thursday, February 23. 2012Wood Shop Update - February 22, 2011The sawdust and sparks were really flying yesterday and we would like to thank the many new volunteers helping on project work. As with anything it is important to establish hierarchy and assign meaningful (?) job titles right from the beginning. Do not take me too seriously, no one else does!  CTS 4223 The Cleveland PCC saw new volunteer Dave Rogan (APPRENTICE) return to help install interior panels with Simon Harrison ( newly promoted to APPRENTICE MANAGER). ASSISTANT INTERIM WEEKDAY PROJECT MANAGER Lorne Tweed oversaw the assignments  CTS 4223 Al Reinschmidt returned again and 'volunteered' to resume restoration of the window tracks. Lorne looks quite delighted to have a new volunt- - - (victim) while Al is seriously considering his prospects.  On Track For once not WINDOW tracks, but instead new decking for two of our four wheeled track carts. Dick Cubbage and Victor Humphreys are cutting long planks to size.  Stacked Victor surveys the planks stacked on one of our shop carts. A seemingly simple process but one that occupied two guys for a few hours. There are a LOT of pieces.  A Door Buzz Morisette was working on repairs to an interior door for what I was told is for Illinois Terminal 233. The bottom rail was mostly rotted away and a new piece of mahogany will be made.  LSE 810 George Clark continues to prepare, prime, and paint new siding for Lake Shore Electric 810. Weather just a little warmer will see a crew working in the barn to install these.  Resistance Pete Galayda met no resistance as he continued to ready a headlight resistance box to install in the Charles City Western 300 locomotive.  Truck Work Gerry Dettloff is fitting a keeper rod behind the head of a new hardened pin in this truck. The truck is from TM 972, part of the work for our TMS Project. Sadly, the next image in this sequence is not posted. The acetylene tank was empty and I migrated to other tasks, before the cylinder was replaced.
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Comments
Tue, 01-19-2021 20:11
Dear, IRM The N and W 611 is coming to the IRM 2021 NHS. OK IRM.
Fri, 01-15-2021 10:20
Hello Jason. Your comments are very much appreciated. Yes, there is much hard work that goes into all our restorations and maintenance here at the [...]
Fri, 01-15-2021 10:13
Hello Jack Yes, It will be one of our most impressive cars that we have at IRM when its completed. Thanks for the pat on the back! Roger.
Thu, 01-14-2021 21:05
Those cars look great so far guys! Man I wish I had the time to volunteer and become a member at IRM that looks like so much fun especially with how [...]
Tue, 01-12-2021 16:30
the pawnee is looking great a pat on the back to all involved
Wed, 01-06-2021 10:14
Good job on coach updates January 5, 2021. Sincerely, Ethan A.
Mon, 01-04-2021 12:31
Hello Jack Happy New Year from IRM. To my knowledge there was no damage from the minor ice storm that we had in late December, 2020. Some [...]
Sun, 01-03-2021 20:12
the museum area had lots of ice storms in area did the museum get a lot of damage
Thu, 12-24-2020 13:27
roger, Thank you to all of the Passenger car department volunteers. The #109 is going to be a great car when all done! Ted miles, [...]
Sun, 12-06-2020 08:46
Hello Ted We havenot finished lettering the 975 but we are well on the way. Look for a few blogs from me now that the wearther is colder and the [...]
Sat, 12-05-2020 18:36
i watched crew replace switch by diesel shop on dec 5. its good to see museum have equipment to do job and save money
Fri, 12-04-2020 14:56
It has been a long time with no news; have you finished lettering the Southern Pacific locomotive? Please post a picture. Ted Miles, IRM Member