Entries by Pauline Trabert

From Buzz Morisette

A tale of two sides.

Sorry but I have been very busy this summer and have not had time to report on the projects underway in the IRM freight department.

Victor and company have finished both ends and platforms of the PRR Bobber caboose. One side remains and just after the old car siding was off the bad side, it was moved outside Wednesday to have a good look. More bad frame work on this side than on the finished side will need to be addressed. But the finished side looks great. (Less the cupola of course).

PRR Bobber caboose before

PRR Bobber caboose side painted

Also outside in a barn shuffle the same day was the URTX insulated box painted Milwaukee Road. We have finished painting the new car siding but need to wait to next year to strip the bad side and install it. Until then we have been working on touch up and clear coat on the good side. Really looks great. But I missed the outdoor shot as usual.

URTX insulated box painted Milwaukee Road before

URTX insulated box painted Milwaukee Road refurbished

This project funded by the Milwaukee Road Historical society. Thanks for the support. Should be completed by next summer.

From Buzz Morisette, acting "Electric-Freight" Person:

As promised, this is a follow-up post on the North Shore 1003 caboose display. It is now open for inspection. And although there is still more work to do it makes a nice addition to the central campus for visitors to walk through.

Work remaining includes repainting the West interior, replacing the north car siding, and many detail improvements. As always your generous donations are greatly appreciated. Thanks to all involved in the project volunteering their time to enhance visiting the IRM.

Visitors on June 19, 2018.

Looking up at the cupola.

View inside the caboose.

Another look inside the caboose.

Photos courtesy of Buzz Morisette

From Buzz Morisette, acting "Electric-Freight" Person:

We are getting close to opening the North Shore 1003 caboose to the public.

For the last few months Henry V, John F, and I have been scraping, sanding and cleaning the caboose out getting it ready to paint this spring. The windows were repaired over winter and now we are in the final stages of painting.

Another big improvement was lighting tied to the barn lights. Dave D. instrumental in getting that hooked up. So stayed tuned we should have it open soon.

Pictured here are the volunteers of the “Electric-Freight” department spending Saturday 6/2 completing the ceiling and walls of the cab section.

L to R Victor, Bill, Greg and Buzz. Love that 1950 pastel green.

Greg with our reserve call up Bob B. of DeKalb.

Three new exhibit cases were under construction on Saturday, January 6, 2018 by Michael McCraren, Kevin Krebs, and Mashell Gellman. They are similar to the Pullman china case already on display but will hold memorabilia from CNW, LaSalle Station and Union Station.

Display case under construction in Display Car, photo courtesy of Mashell Gellman

One display case has been glued and clamped, photo courtesy of Mashell Gellman

Here's a Wood Shop update from Buzz Morisette:

In early October the Illinois Railway Museum was host to the annual convention of The Vintage Machinery group, Arnfest. Besides this being a chance for us to clean out a years worth of shop project leftovers, the Arnfest group generously repairs some of our old shop equipment.

This year besides replacing the bearings on our small band saw, they took on our big Fay and Eagan Jointer. The babbit bearings on this 100 plus year old machine were worn almost to the point of failure. Thanks to Tim, Victor, John and other shop regulars we were able to move it to a point to be worked on during the convention. The photos tell the rest of the story. (All photos from Buzz Morisette). 

Interesting to anyone that walked past, the old tool Whatsit table was a place for interesting conversation.

Job one was to remove the jointer’s old babbit metal.

Torches were used to heat the bearing pockets for the lower pour.

Another shot showing how torches were used to heat the bearing pockets for the lower pour.

A melt pot was set up near the south door close to the work.

Lower bearings being poured.

After that the top half of the bearings were poured.

End result, new bearings that should last another 100 years.

The band saw team replacing and tuning up the saw.

Yours truly running replacement Depot Door panels through the jointer after blade replacement.

Thanks again to the shop helpers I had as well as the great people at Arnfest for making this happen.

Warren Newhauser wrote the following summary of the recent work done on the X-5000:

Chuck Trabert moves a cable out of the way before the test begins - Photo by Warren Newhauser

On the morning of Wed. Oct 7, Chuck Trabert, Chuck Pomazal and Warren Newhauser set out to begin the long awaited exterior restoration of the the Milw Rd Dynamometer car. We planned to spend the day doing a small but complete test of sandblasting and painting on the roof in order to work out any issues/problems before tackling the entire roof. Under the supervision of Coach Dept Curator Paul Cronin, we used his Clemco industrial sandblaster to blast a part of the roof using 40/80 and 10/20 grit crushed glass media in Yard 3. The sandblaster air was supplied by the Track Dept’s tow behind diesel compressor. Full safety gear was used including a positive pressure respirator safety helmet.

Warren went first to test the sandblasting before 10am - Photo courtesy of Warren Newhauser

The team gathered on the scaffold to examine the early sandblasting results - Photo by Jane Pomazal

Chuck Pomazal helped Chuck Trabert into the respirator - Photo by Jane Pomazal

Chuct Trabert began sandblasting before noon - Photo by Jane Pomazal

Another shot of Chuck T sandblasting - Photo by Jane Pomazal

Warren sandblasting again at half past noon - Photo by Chuck Trabert

The sandblaster worked very well on areas with paint, taking it down to the bare metal very quickly. Where the roof had rusted, it took longer - much longer - to clean up the rust. Each roof panel, about 30”x40”, took about 5 minutes to blast.

After blasting 5 panels and the A/C duct above them, our next step was to power wash the bare metal with water and a metal wash solution called Hold Tight (not the Justin Bieber song!!), recommended by AGSCO who supplies the blast media to IRM. Hold Tight cleans contaminants/debris from the freshly blasted metal and prevents flash rust for up to 5 days. This is necessary if blasting and painting can not be done in the same day. To do this we borrowed B&G Dept’s pressure washer/tank on a trailer arrangement and filled the tank with about 100 gals of softened water from the Diner per Dave Diamond’s recommendation. We pressured washed the blasted steel roof panels, but we could not get the pressure washer to draw the Hold Tight solution so it ended up flash rusting a bit. The pressure washing did, however, remove a LOT of debris from the freshly blasted metal though. We later found we didn’t have the required “chemical” tip for the wand that would draw the metal wash in.

To deal with the flash rust, we applied, by brush, a metal prep solution to dissolve the flash rust and provide paint adhesion.

Around 3pm Chuck T was applying metal prep - Photo by Warren Newhauser

Lastly, by late afternoon, we then sprayed the Master Series primer on the panels and duct with Paul’s HVLP paint gun. This paint requires 2 coats of primer and one topcoat, thus one more primer coat will be needed before topcoat.

It was near 5pm when Chuck Pomazal started applying primer - Photo by Warren Newhauser

Chuck P applying primer - Photo by Chuck Trabert

Another shot of Chuck P applying primer - Photo by Chuck Trabert

Quarter to 6pm the first section of the roof has one coat of primer - Photo by Chuck Trabert

Close-up of the primed section of Dynamometer roof - Photo by Warren Newhauser

Unexpected Issues/Problems/Lessons Learned:

1. During the day the blasted metal roof was so hot you couldn’t even put your hand on it even with gloves on. This caused us to wait until the sun went down a bit late afternoon before starting painting. Painting outside needs to be done early in the morning or later in the day if it’s exposed to the sun.
2. The 10/20 media pits the metal roof more than the 40/80 media does, but removes the rust faster.
3. In the past, we applied a roof sealants Permaflex and Vulkem (urethane rubber sealants which have lasted years) that are very difficult to remove with the sandblaster.
4. Rusted metal takes a lot more effort to blast clean than painted metal.
5. Pressure washing blasted metal removes a lot of debris in the metal. 

Now that we have done a test, we know what needs to be done to take on the rest of the roof. Based on the current sandblasting rates it will likely require 8-12 hours more sandblasting, 2-3 hours power washing, 4 hours to apply primer coat #1, wait 4-24 hours to dry, 4 hours to apply primer coat #2, wait 4-24 hours to dry, then topcoat (4 hours).

Thanks to Paul Cronin and Dave Diamond for all your help.

We have lots of opportunities for volunteers to learning the restoration processes. Please reply in a comment to the blog if you are interested in helping.