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Monday, November 12. 2012Wood Shop Update - November 10, 2012The weather was not with us today with spotty rain and periods of sun. So the work in the wood shop provided us with satisfying work.  Third Rail Beams John Faulhaber set up and constructed a jig for the new third rail beams for Chicago Aurora & Elgin car 36. The objective was to rout out dado recesses in each half beam which will be laminated to the finished thickness. Each of these slots will provide a rectangular hole for mounting a sleet scraper. John is steering the router here.  More Third Rail Beams The wood chips were really flying. Victor Humprheys took a turn at the router. The half inch deep slots required two passes with the router. All eight pieces are now ready to be glued together.  Wagon Top Boxcar Victor Humphreys had removed the badly rusted steel from two more panels on thsi boxcar, and in the shop he was fabricating new steel sheet to be ready to weld them in. Sunday, November 11. 2012Steam Department Update 11-10-2012Steady progress over the last two weekends in the steam shop. As ever with the winter approaching there are the jobs needed to prepare for the cold. Last weekend a lot of time was spent draining the boxcar water supply and removing the softener head to the safety of the shop. Not much to show for the effort but it would be a real bust if we have the locomotive ready to run and the water supply was not operational. Piping for the new air system arrived along with some more that we need for 1630. Unfortunately it looks like the supplier had a bad day!. Only one of the 3 types ordered was delivered correctly!. So now we have to arrange return and get the correct material. One of the joys of a volunteer shop working at weekend. You are not there to spot errors when material is delivered. On 1630 we pushed ahead with the key tasks: · Ed and Richard found a good process to anneal the copper ferrules. Sometimes simple is best. We had discussed using the electric furnace in the car shop but, on further discussion, that is not really designed to be opened and closed while hot as we would have needed to do to batch heat the ferrules. So, in the end, the method was to slide them along a rod and heat them with the acetylene torch to a red heat. At the end of the rod they dropped into a bucket of water. Eventually the process was so quick that I did not even get a photograph and all 130 that we needed were done in a couple of hours. · Jeff, Jerry and Alex worked thru the hydro-testing. The work ran well into the evening but, by end of day, they had successfully tested all 16 super heater flues and the new air tank. This was a good if muddy days work. For flues the rig is secured by a long rod running the length of the flue. At one end is secured a blanking plate.
While at the other is attached the plate thru which the water is pumped and pressurized
At least we got it done before the weather broke. The air tank tested fine at 240 psi so we can run the air compressor output at 150 psi. This will be a big improvement over the existing reservoir that runs at the system pressure of 90 psi. If we are regulating the system down from a higher reservoir pressure we should get a steady 90 psi at the output. · Meanwhile Mike continued with the patch. The two additional rivets have been successfully removed and focus is now upon final bending of the patch to achieve a tight fit all along the mud ring while aligning with the front and side sheets of the firebox to allow an accurate weld to be made. · On the main activity of tubing, the production line described a couple of weeks ago is now starting to show results. · Cutting to length is now established. Cutting with the chop saw is a spectacular operation. However it is now done quickly. The required master tube is laid alongside the tube to be cut, the distance set and the tube is cut in less than a minute.
· From this operation we have a satisfying stack of nearly 50 tubes cut to length, rough edges removed, painted and ready to load into the boiler. The stack on the fireman's side now shows that we need to get tubes off the stands and into the boiler before we run out of space.
· On the engineer's side we have a further supply fully swaged and annealed ready to cut.
· Meanwhile in the swaging area we brought in another bale of 37 tubes and have about 50 ready for another heavy session in the furnace. Below is a progress log. We are moving forward but there is a lot to do. Follow our progress !
Hopefully I can be a bit more productive next Saturday. After a 10 day business trip to the UK, I was not good for much by 6:30 so it was a short day for me!! Nigel Sunday, November 11. 2012Barn Fodder ?As you all have read by now we are actively pursuing funding and hopefully construction of a new Barn in the near future. There are many worthy candidates. I have had some inquiries on these two fragile wood bodied cabooses. Are they BARN FODDER?  CNSM 1002 Many almost swoon at the mention of the North Shore Line. If I said we had just discovered a hidden car that was almost unknown for 49 years, I suspect we would be getting calls from the post office to pick up our mail twice per day, the response would be so great. Well, it is true!! We have had this 1926 Chicago North Shore & Milwaukee wood bodied caboose since 1963, shortly after the line abandoned service. As you might imagine, another half century (almost) of outdoor storage has not been kind to it. Platforms rotted, steps fallen off, a tarpaper roof to help keep water at bay. It is unique, historic, and its future is in question. Fund R1002  CNW 10494 This one is a 1915 wood bodied Chicago & North Western caboose acquired by IRM in 1958, and it has lived outdoors ever since. Some basic level of patching and repairs continue to be done, but you can clearly see that it is CLOSE to the end of the line. The roof leaks and water gets into and behind the siding, and even the structural framing is being affected. As long as equipment like this does not get under roof it is an uphill battle, a losing one at that! Fund R10494 Yes IRM is only the second owner of these cars, and has owned them for more time than they spent with either of the original owners. Railway preservation is at a crossroads in many areas of the country, and we have to face the issue of whether equipment saved for so long should continue to be saved. Only today I read where the Kentucky Railroad Museum sold ELEVEN pieces of their collection for SCRAP, including four locomotives. These wood cabooses would not bring much as scrap value but their future is by no means certain. Many ask, why do these continue to see little attention and remain outdoors? The answer is YOU! Plans are underway for Barn 14 and it is not yet fully funded nor the space fully committed. Most volunteers spend freely of their time and money to make IRM and the COLLECTION a better place; I cannot ask them to do more. We cannot do this alone. Substantial donations to either of these could assure them a space in the next building. If not - well - look closely at the images. Please vote with your dollars and help us decide if they can be saved. Illinois Railway Museum Box 427 Union IL 60180
Thursday, November 8. 2012Wood Shop Update - November 7, 2012In addition to the work previously reported and targeted to progress on our CGW X 38 plow, here are some examples of the wide diversity of projects in the shop yesterday.  How It Stacks Up Certainly not a glamorous job but Simon Harrison helped to stack and move the pile of new lumber to make a new door for the station. It is useless to merely buy the lumber, it must be carefully stacked and stickered to preserve it as true as possible.  Third Rail Beams Speaking of new lumber basically only a week old at IRM, John Faulhaber and Randy Hicks were processing some of the heavy white oak timbers through our jointer. That is used to surface rough cut lumber to a smooth and true face and edge. From there they moved through the planer and then the tablesaw to rip it to correct width. Finally through the radial arm saw to cut all to length.  Windows Jon Fenlaciki was working on restoration of a large window for our first car, Indiana Railroad 65. In addition to meticulous removal of old finishes, the detective in him revealed the true color of the first layer of old paint, buried well below more recent layers.  Grid Shop Pete Galyda was visited by Dick Cubbage as here they discuss how to solve all the problems. I wonder if John Nelligan (at work on the sandblaster in the next room) knows it is break time? And many other tasks and projects saw work. We almost expect Tim Peters to be on hand at 120% of what any mere mortal can do and this was no exception as he sped on a time line to break all records for a new canvas roof on one of our 4000 series steel elevated cars. Victor Humphreys was outside with acetylene torch and managed to remove another badly rusted out panel on our B&O wagon top boxcar. Henry Vincent continued work on the new table saw and was assisted in some metal machine shop work by Rod Turner. Thursday, November 8. 2012CGW X 38 Update - Novenber 7, 2012Due to some new health problems I expect that BLOG entries may be spotty at best, and their content less than usual. Probably between now and year end. That said, here is some news from midweek. And of course an open invitation to any cub reporter that might be interested in hanging out, watching the work, taking digital pics, and reporting.  Door Weatherstripping Rich Witt and Dave Rogan worked to restore old metal strips used to cover over the door rubber weatherstripping. We are able to save four of the old ones, and have two new ones made to order. That chunk of wood on the bench is the new window sill for the south side of the plow, finally trimmed and fitted, cut areas about to receive some paint.  Holes Dave Rogan constructed a jig and proceeded to drill mounting holes in the new metal weatherstrips. One hole every SIX INCHES - that is a lot of holes.  Windows Those that remember these entries from last winter noted that almost every week there were one or more pics of work on WINDOWS. Yesterday must have been the first real sign of winter. John Faulhaber is checking the work so far on stock for three new plow windows. Yesterday the rough boards were jointed, ripped, crosscut, trimmed, profile routed, squared, and rabbeted. That was in our spare time. Others worked on the plow outside. Jim Leonard and Simon Harrison completed the work on the south plow body window opening. The sill was installed and all three shoe moldings fitted and installed, plywood blank done and in. Then they moved on to the south doorway tacking in new rubber weatherstripping, fitting the temporary door and hanging it on hinges.
Friday, November 2. 2012Wood Shop Update - October 31, 2012Just as the seasons change and winter is coming on, so does much of the work change, in this case cycling back to the Barn 4 areas.  Priming A lot of the work you will see in this report is for making more parts for our CGW X 38 Russell snowplow. Dave Rogan started the day by priming several pieces of wood lining and trim, in the hope they would be dry enough to install later in the day.  Chisel Work Cheryl Lint beat most of into the shop and continued her fine work in hand chopping mortises for new window timber framing.  Tenons For every mortise there must be a matching tenon. Dave Rogan is on the table saw and carefully cutting away at the stock to be removed on the uprights.  The Result Here is what we are talking about. Dave is holding the dry fitted timber assembly. This is fit to the opening and mounting holes marked. Then after a session on the drill press the pieces will be taken apart for priming and painting.  New Wood Dave Rogan is checking out new hardwood lumber for the X 38. Behind him is a pile of new stock to construct a new door for our station. Out of view are two more piles, one for CA&E 36, and one for LSE 810. On Tuesday the IRM crew descended upon a hardwood lumber dealer, as many as four of us were prowling the aisles at one time. The tab came to just under $1000, but that lumber should keep us busy in the shop for most of the winter months. If you appreciate the efforts and want to see the work continue, we would really appreciate donations to any of the restricted funds for those cars. Those are set up by a capital R followed by the car number. In this case funding is needed for RX38, R36, R810, and to the Buildings & Grounds Department. Which one is your favorite?  Metal Cleaning and Straightening Rich Witt was cleaning metal strips that are applied over the new rubber weatherstripping on the X 38 doors. But first they must be cleaned of old paint and rust, and straightened.  The Old Saw Not an adage or old saying, Henry Vincent has been restoring a very old Greenlee double arbor table saw we hope to get running in the wood shop.  Fuse Box Tim Peters is working on his current Chicago Elevated car project, to put a new roof on one of our 4000 series cars. The fuse box sits on the roof and the old one - - well hardly enough left of it to use for a pattern. But the car ran - - -  On the Roof Out in the barn, the new canvas has been lifted and unfolded over the roof. This after several weeks of work by Tim to repair the wood and apply new tack molding all around. Where is Waldo - I mean Tim? Can you see him on this pic?  Grid Shop Pete Galayda is by his workbench area which serves as a GRID SHOP, to repair and ultimately reassemble grid boxes for the Charles City Western 300 steeple cab locomotive. If you think you have seen this before, Pete is on number three of seven. He is helped every week on the project by John Nelligan who happens to be at the sandblaster right now.
Friday, November 2. 2012Fringe Benefit Motoring in Style Working as a volunteer at IRM often has unexpected fringe benefits. Pictured here is Frank Carraro operating a two car North Shore train last weekend. Frank has worked a long and productive career for real railroads and recently found time to come out and join the volunteers at IRM. Sort of a busman's holiday, he has joined the Signal Department, mirroring the bulk of his professional work. I have known Frank and of his railroad interests for longer than we both probably care to admit. Suffice to say I rode with him chasing the North Shore when it was still in operation, as we hoped to take and record photo images of the cars and line. Frank has always had a hope of someday operating a North Shore car, and it came to pass, as a two car train no less! When you are a volunteer at IRM you often join up with a likeable bunch of fellows (and some gals) as much for the social aspect, as for contributing to railroad preservation, and also learning in the process. In Frank's case he may be taking on some of the teacher role since I bet he has forgotten more about railroads than I will ever learn. But the crew learned of his 'bucket list' wishes and when the opportunity presented itself, all of the crews worked around scheduled operations and got him a complete mainline round trip in the cab. There are other satisfactions to volunteering at IRM, and believe it or not, positions are OPEN. We do a lot of work throughout the winter, in the wood shop for instance. Give us a try. |
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Comments
Sun, 05-19-2013 22:13
Hello again. I had an idea that was (somewhat rudely, mid-sentence) dismissed in talking to a museum volunteer a few years back, but here it goes [...]
Thu, 05-16-2013 21:52
Looking good Bob! I hope to come out soon once I'm done with school.
Wed, 05-15-2013 21:28
I was not around at the time. General discussion suggests that it was "pretty marginal" in a number of areas. Nigel
Mon, 05-13-2013 11:08
"THUMBS UP!"
Fri, 05-10-2013 02:15
No, it will not be necessary to hold any of the work waiting for the plow to be turned, end for end. Weather will be the major factor, but there will [...]
Thu, 05-09-2013 19:54
The CGW X-38 plow is really coming to life. Bob Kutella and Vic and crew need to be very proud of your collective efforts. I am very appreciative of [...]
Thu, 05-09-2013 15:20
The snowplow looks great! Are you going to apply the door and upper windows befor it is turned to continue work?
Thu, 05-09-2013 09:09
Max, Is there any progress to report yet, in regards to the installation of the poles and overhead wires? Have a good day, sir.
Wed, 05-08-2013 18:40
Thanks for the update! I still don't understand why Commonwealth #5 was removed from service. Do you know why?
Tue, 05-07-2013 09:28
Mr. Kolanowski.....I was just wondering if the Spaulding webcam will be up and running soon for us stay-at-homes. Thanks!2FP
Mon, 05-06-2013 23:04
Max, Has work begun yet on the construction phase of erecting the poles and putting up the wire? Wish I could be there to watch it happen.
Mon, 05-06-2013 23:02
Keep up the good work, Bob. Wish I could be there to help!!!!!!!