Illinois Railway Museum Blog

A rather subdued day at the steam shop.

The planned work on 1630 went very well.  Ralph's brother Tom, who is an inspection and testing specialist, spent the day working with Collin on ultrasonically testing the boiler with professional equipment.  This is a far cry from the simple manual tester we have used in the past, providing a clear indication that the signal and measurement is acceptable and an automated documentation trail.  By the end of the day they had measured thickness at more than 200 points covering front tube sheet, barrel, firebox wrapper and back head.  In a number of places the surface was too rough to get a clear measurement and minor grinding will be needed to make the measurement.  We also still need to do the inner firebox, siphons and dry pipe but probably 70% is done and so far all looks good.  A further day of preparation next week and then hopefully the testing can be completed in two weeks time.

Eric and Kurt did a solid day on the fireman's side firebox stays.  The tell tale holes on the majority of these have now been cleared and checked.  They also tackled the job we have all been dreading, moving the grate sections out into the tender to give clear access to the rest of the stays.

So major progress was made on the critical boiler inspection phase. 

I am not posting any photographs this week.  Major progress in this phase is measured by checked stays, circles on the boiler and computer files of thickness measurements, all of which take us steadily closer to a working locomotive ........... but do not provide much to be seen around the locomotive or shop!!.

A major offset to this good progress was that we heard our shop foreman, Tom Schneider is unwell and scheduled for a medical procedure on Monday.  Our thoughts are with him.  His presence and vast experience is sorely missed.

In other areas:

·         Glenn progressed the Bay City crane towards mobility;

·         Jeff completed repairs to the lubrication system of the Brownhoist.  This had been "red tagged" as far as crane operation is concerned for a while as the lubrication feed to the rotation mechanism had failed.  With this done it is now available again for lifting; and

·         Work progressed on the repair of the rivet furnace.

Nigel