Illinois Railway Museum Blog

Roll Siogn Box

Big news coming up for Chicago Rapid Transit 1797.  Tim Peters is in the home stretch on this massive restoration and here is working on a roll sign box.

Interior

The interior of the 1797 really looks magnificent, clean, fresh.  From my perspective, restoring one seat from the ground up, so to speak, represents hours of work.  Yet in a relatively short time, the entire interior of the 1797 has been re-done!

Lettering

The interior is complete with vintage lettering and information.  Sharp eyed viewers here will be able to look through the window of this motorman's cab door and see the words applied to the end door on the inside, by the always friendly Chicago Rapid Transit.  HANDS OFF

Museum Showcase Weekend is now upon us and those able to attend will see a sight not experienced in 64 years.  There will be an operating two car train of wood cars, in the classic brown paint scheme, as it is planned to pair up and operate the 1268 and 1797.  Don't miss it!

Upholstery

John McKelvey continues to prove invaluable with his upholstery skills.  Here, a passenger car lounge chair is going through the shop.

Roof Stuff

That is the highly technical term for the work being done for Cleveland Transit System 4223.  Lorne Tweed is assembling the many parts to be mounted on the roof, - trolley boards, stand off insulators, inductance coil, lightning arrestor, fuse box and trolley pole base.

Seat Work

Meanwhile, Mike Stauber and Frank Sirinek continue work on Shaker Heights Rapid Transit 63.  Piece by piece this car is getting closer to being able to try out as a running PCC car.

Electroliner

There will be many special displays and events for the upcoming Showcase Weekend.  The North Shore Electroliner is making a rare appearance.  It is spotted at our high level 50th Avenue platform, here seen through the picnic area near Central Pavilion.

And do not forget to check the restoration work on our latest Freight Department acquisition, Chicago Great Western X 38 snow plow.  We have largely cleaned and repainted the north side - the unit now sports its first coat of finish paint.  AND - at 1:30 PM Saturday there will be an operating demonstration of the plow wings, with a chance for YOU to participate!  See you on Track 40, at the east end of Barn 4.

As we set to work in the morning it was raining so we moved into the wood shop.  Dave Rogan, Rich Witt, and I manufactured about 50 feet of special profile molding (two different shapes) to act as stop jambs for the window and door openings.  The rain stopped so everyone shifted gears and went to our 'outdoors' shop space.

Floored

Buzz Morrisette was fastest on duty and he continues to cut out damaged flooring and to replace the heavy boards.

Visitor

Mr. Hans Bolt was visiting IRM from Switzerland and we showed him the plow work in progress.  Dave Rogan is explaining the mechanism for moving the plow wings.

Priming

Victor Humphreys set up ladders to work in tight places once we opened the plow wing.  He wirebrushed all the areas needlechipped of many layers of old paint, and then set about applying primer.

The Edge

It is pretty easy to see large flat areas of the side that are cleaned and ready for paint.  But there are a lot of odd details still needing attention.  Dave steadies the ladder while Victor gets to the upper rear edge of the wing.

Working not Watching

There is always some task ready for attention.  When Victor did not need a ground man for the high painting, Dave Rogan set up a needle chipper and began to attack the steps under the rear door.  Dave also did some work chipping the cast steel door threshholds during 'intermissions'.

QUIZ

Here is your quiz for the day.  The rear truck has casting marks indicating it was originally for the New York Central.  Interesting, but not unheard of for rail equipment to have had their trucks swapped for any number of reasons or maintenance.  But look at this image.  To the right of the bolster pocket there is a raised part of the casting, with a hole in it, and a slot behind that hole with a sheet metal retainer of some sort.  There is one on each side of the bolster pocket.  Does anyone have an idea what their purpose was??

We considered that these are freight car trucks.  Parts of the NYC ran from third rail but no reason to attach any kind of device to pick up current for a freight car, and unlikely there could have been any need for an inductance box or other device to be hung there, to trigger signal indications.

This will be a relatively short update.  We did not have a lot of volunteers, and many probably chose to spend the unofficial end of summer, Labor Day Weekend, with family or other pursuits.  But we did get a lot done.

Rear Wall

This is the rear wall, now nearly done.  Saturday we did some blacksmith work and straightened the metal above the rear window.  It had bowed inward about a half inch and there were sledgehammers swinging and some new words invented.  With the wall straight, we fabricated remaining window framing, primed it, and installed it, as seen here.  You can also see some of the bodywork and filler that has been applied to smooth out weld areas, where the missing metal panel was welded in below the window.

North Side

On the north side the goal is to have some finish paint applied very soon.  But needlechipping remained to be done in some fairly inaccessible areas.  Maybe that is why it was saved until last.  Look up under the small roof overhang behind the plow wing, half is cleaned up.  By days end, all had been chipped as well as the short notch wall behind the plow.  Of course that meant we got to charge up the air system and move the wing out, and then back in.  Obviously a railfan effort of fun, but we 'needed' to do it.

Front Anchor

On the front nose of the plow is a massive anchor casting and that is used to mount a front coupler when needed for ferry moves.  There really is no springing or draft gear in the traditional sense, merely a very stout pin to hold the coupler in place.  What you see could interfere with good snow removal and the air pipe and hangers often got damaged or bent in severe situations.  So it was made largely removable for winter operations.  There is also a train air pipe down to the coupler mounts, and when the coupler was removed, that pipe has a universal joint and the drop leg is swung back and over the plow roof, to rest upon it, in front of the cab cupola.  In the background, note the passenger department roof repairs underway on DM&IR 84.

Surely you modelers will want to include this detail on your masterpiece.  Walthers made a model of the Russell Plow in HO scale and while out of stock, they can be found on E bay.  This detail is not included on the model.  A little kitbashing and adding details and you will have a very credible model of the real thing, only found at IRM in Union IL.

Rare Visitor

I will digress strictly from the snow plow report, here, to show a rare visitor to Barn 4.  The Nebraska Zephyr is receiving a detailed inspection and some repairs in preparation for the upcoming excursion trip.

And in the Freight Car Department we completed a two and one half week blitz to repaint our Borden's Milk Car, BFIX 520.  We sanded, primed, and applied two coats of finish enamel to the top half of the car, as well a some washing and cleaning, and a repaint of the black handrails and grab irons.