Entries by Roger Kramer

This late fall the Buildings and Grounds Manager, Dave Diamond, focused on the the major upgrading of the Barn 3 structure. The barn was built in the late 1970's or early 1980's and certainly needed attention. The structure was beginning to fail in spots and so the decision was made to invest a rather large amount of money into the structure. This will preserve the life of the barn for many more years. Dave Diamond and his crew inspected the supporting posts this summer and discovered a number of them were in a fragile state. A contractor was selected and work began this late November to repair and replace any supporting posts and to also reside the entire barn. The large eastern four barn doors will be replaced this coming Spring. Your donations to the General Fund have made this and many other projects a reality. Please remember it when you consider this years donations to your museum.

What a beautiful upgrade to your museum campus. There will be other projects like this one happening in the near future. Remember the General Fund this year! Have a safe and healthy 2019 New Year!      Thanks    Roger  

The matching grant provided by the Milwaukee Road Historical society has made it possible to begin this phase of the Mt. Harvard restoration. Paul Cronin and I formulated a plan of action before the exterior work was even started. We decide to repair all the damaged and rusted sections all in one time frame. By removing all the "problems" we could then purchase enough steel and supplies at one time helping to reduce the costs of materials. Paul contacted Gregg Wolfersheim and a work schedule was formulated to remove the old damaged steel sections. This is what you will see with these photos.

This is the area where the new stars will be secured and installed.

Remember there is still time to contribute to the match! Act by December 31 to double your impact! Your support will help accomplish our goal for the Mt. Harvard!      Thanks  Roger

I am happy to be announcing a new matching grant! This time for the Mt. Harvard. A commitment from the membership of the Milwaukee Road Historical Society for a matching grant places our Mt. Harvard in a good position to operate in a limited time frame for next year. This is a one to one matching grant up to $1,500.00! It is an important step towards bring the Mt. Harvard back to operational status. Please consider a donation. You can be confident that every dollar matched will be wisely used in this restoration.

In the mean time, and not to be out done, Bob Olsen is continuing the removal of the old paint layer in the women's bathroom.

               Thanks     Roger 

A lot of effort has gone into the interior since my last blog post about our restoration efforts on Mt. Harvard. We have finished painting the kitchen and installed all of the shelving and parts that we could find in the sleeper. Our three or four person team has now switch its focus to the hallway leading to the vestibule stair area.  Bob Olsen has now moved into the women's bathroom and is beginning to remove all the old wall and ceiling paint. ]    Thanks    Roger

The long awaited exterior restoration of the crane finally began in earnest this last August. Under the direction of Jeff Calendine from the steam dept this project is now near completion.  When completed the Bay City Crane will provide a mobile 15 ton lift capacity tool to serve the museums many future projects.  The plan was to remove all the steel panels surrounding the mechanicals; then sandblast each using museum tools and personnel, prime and paint and finally reinstall each. The first scheduled project for the crane is the lifting and re-installation of the Union Pacific steam locomotive UP 428 rebuilt cab.

After each exterior panel was blasted they were then primed and later painted with a beautiful coat of yellow.

As you can see this entire cab assemble was completed inside the steam shop. There was given a two week window to reassemble the cab and that goal was met. The road engine was then fired up and the entire crane was  moved outside for the winter. A tarp was then wrapped around he crane cab set outside for the winter season. The Spring project will be to install the newly rebuilt boom, string new cable and test the various systems before certifying the machine for service. Thanks go to Jeff and his large crew for all their hard work. Please  consider a donation the to Steam Department to keep all current projects advancing.                    Thanks    Roger.

  

About a month and a half ago I took a big step towards finishing the exterior of the IC 3345 coach. The end buffers were not installed when we painted the coach last year.  Wanting to finally  finish that part of the project I went into the storage field and found both of them.  With the help from Jeff, from the steam department and operating the large fork lift,  we moved them from the storage field to an area next to barn 10.  This happened in the early spring of this year. This September I personally hired a contractor to abrade the exterior of both buffers.  Kane DeKalb Dustless Blasting is the name of the contractor. The process  involves using water as the medium mixed with in this case with fine particles of ground up glass to remove the old paint and rust. I would highly recommend its use on other projects around the museum for it worked very well.   Anyway, they were prepped, blasted and primed on a Saturday and then top coated with two coats, of Sherwin Williams urethane paint on Sunday, September 22 of this year. 

What a difference sandblasting and painting will do for any piece. Painting makes anything look  good.  The next step is to finally install each buffer onto the coach and then finally move it into barn 3 for display. If you would like to help defray the cost of the removal please send your donation and mark it for the IC3345 fund.              Thanks, Roger!