Illinois Railway Museum Blog

A day of steady progress in the steam shop.

The main focus was on refitting the tubes into 1630.  At the moment it is all preparatory work to ensure that we can establish a "production line" process when we do the actual fitting.

·         The major step, with considerable assistance from Bob and Joel in the wood shop, was the production of a measuring beam.  This is based upon Tom's experience from the last overhaul.  The problem is that the distance between the front and rear tube sheets is about 17 feet and the sheets are not perfectly even.  Each tube needs to have a fairly accurate 1/4 inch projection beyond the tube sheet each end and the variation between the shortest and longest, due to the variation is the sheets, is around 1/2 inch.  So, to cut all to a standard length and grind down to the exact length would be a VERY slow process.  Also test fitting each tube into the boiler in order to mark where to cut is very hard work.

Tube measuring beam

So, based upon Tom's experience the beam provides a much simpler approach.  It was made with a hook at the rear end which, when passed thru the hole in the rear sheet, will hold the beam accurately to the face of that sheet.

Hook for rear sheet

(Don't worry, this was taken before the hook was finally tighted onto the beam!)

The other end is marked with colored bands at 1/8th inch spacing.  We simply note which band is visible at the front tube sheet, mark the hole with that color, and repeat for 180 holes.  We can then cut tubes to 4 lengths (1/2 inch longer than the measurement) and fit to the holes based upon the color codes.  It will take some time to mark up the whole tube sheet but will save a great deal of time overall.

Color code for front sheet

The other challenge that we confirmed in this exercise is a little anomaly with 1630.  Normally the pattern of holes in the front and rear tube sheets is the same, which means that you can simply count vertically and horizontally to match where to place a tube.  Snag !.  Somewhere along the line, probably when the rear sheet was replaced in the late 1930's, 1630 acquired sheets that do not match front to back in some areas.  This means that we have to be very careful in matching the holes when measuring and then number them at each so that we can place the tubes correctly later.  It will be a LOT easier to make sure we have everything matched using a timber beam than to try and match using heavy steel tubes !.

·         Production of ferrules continued steadily.  We produced about 40 so we should have the supply in hand by the time the length measurements are complete. 

Set up to cut ferrules

New ferrules await final clean up

The objective will be to place all the ferrules in the back sheet in a single exercise once we have done the measurements;

·         Glenn and Jerry cleaned up the ends of the tubes that we swaged last week.  This points up a learning.  The mill scale on the new tubes is a lot more difficult to remove once it has been heated and swaged.  So, in future, we need to wire brush the new tubes before we swage.

Jerry cleans up the swaged tubes

In other areas:

·         Work progressed on the set up of the "new" house air compressor.  New is a relative term as it is an EMD locomotive compressor of 1950's build acquired from a Milwaukee Road shop.  However it is an important pre-winter task as we will use a lot of air in tube fitting and riveting the patch.  The existing compressor is getting "tired" and past experience is that digging the Sullair out of a snow drift and starting that up makes for a slow start to work on a winter morning.  This is a major enhancement that is being funded from the annual Sanfilippo benefit. 

The compressor site has now been cleared and work is starting on set up. 

New air compressor WiP

The site is subject to review.  There are concerns that the compressor will be too noisy when running in the shop and it may be best to site it outside.  However that could not be done until Spring to coordinate with B&G work on the shop.  As very little change would be needed to piping or electrics between the two locations, we will set up inside now and decide, based upon experience over winter, if this is the permanent location.

·         Bob and Stu worked on the wiring for the water supply that we need to change to make it more readily usable next year.  (It was a little embarrassing that the Leviathan team ended up using a fire truck to get water as the water system was so tricky to start).

So a reasonable day of progress on several fronts.

Nigel