Well it turns out Veteran's Day is an Amtrak holiday... know knew? Well the weather cooperated today so I head out with a list of one man jobs to accomplish. To my surprise, JD Marzec and Greg Frech both showed up willing to do track work! Turns out they had the day off as well. So with three people the job quickly turned to Yard 11. The job was to get 11-4 track ready for another pass with the tamper so the first task was to regulate the stone that was dropped a few weeks ago. After getting the regulator fired up, Greg and JD made a few quick passes with the plow and broom. After they finished the 6000 tamper and regulator were moved to Yard 10 to clear 11-4 track. We made our way to Track 24 to fire up the tie crane and motorcar/ powerpack combo. We had to replace a ~12ft stick of rail on 11-4 track to close a 3" gap in the curve. So Greg and JD both got a walkthrough on the machines and ran them over to yard 11 while I acted as the U-man on the ground. The three of us made quick work of removing the old rail and cutting/ installing the new rail. After the last spike was through we headed for lunch at Joe's.
After lunch we spent a few hours cleaning up material and prepping other jobs. Greg ran the tie crane and dropped some old wood in our scrap pile in Yard 14 and cleaned up misc ties while JD and I moved the 100lb track panel from the connector track to Yard 13 for the next yard track. JD did a great job running the crane and we had the panel moved and the crane put away little before sundown. All of the machines were put away and our tools cleaned up at a good hour and called it quits. Not bad for a Wednesday I'd say. I'll be out this weekend but it sounds like we'll be short Tom and Frank for sure. I hope to do more misc work in Yard 11, load scrap and repair the loose switch stand. Given the weather holds up of course. We may also do some more tamping with the 6000 if there is someone willing to learn the machine...
Until next time,
Adam Robillard
IRM Track Dept
Comments
Fri, 03-29-2024 21:26
We're slackers and spend more time working on the equipment in the shop than keeping all you readers updated. We'll work on it, but I'm sure updates [...]
Thu, 03-14-2024 08:02
What happened to the Department Blog? It's been over 2 years and I still regularly check for updates, but nothing comes...
Mon, 12-27-2021 16:28
Happy New Year to all the Departments at the Illinois railway Museum! Thanks for all the good work you do in railroad preservation. Ted Miles, [...]
Wed, 10-13-2021 13:33
Was the CB&Q 1309 every transported to IRM?I’ve been reading old issues of Rail&Wire and the car was mentioned several times.
Mon, 06-07-2021 22:40
I was wondering if in the model layout display what scale would you guys be using and would you be displaying model train history as well? Just [...]
Wed, 06-02-2021 17:27
Nice to see 428's cab back on. Looking forward to when it is operable!
Tue, 06-01-2021 16:47
I hope the work will continue on the UP #428. Now that they are the museum's connection to the national railroad network; she would be very [...]
Sat, 04-17-2021 23:07
What is the status of 126, the Milwaukee Buffet car that is in S. Dakota? Any guess on when or if it will get to IRM?
Wed, 04-14-2021 21:09
Perhaps it is time to scrap the remains of the c, B & Q 7128 to make room for the Villa Real. Ted miles, IRM member
Wed, 04-14-2021 15:26
Hi IRM my name is Jason and I was wonder If you guys would be willing to save a CN Dash8-40cm they are currently being retired by CN and being [...]
Fri, 04-09-2021 19:56
Bear in mind that the Nebraska Zephyr is an articulated train set, so cars cannot be inserted at will. Although cars and/or a second engine could be [...]
Wed, 03-31-2021 11:37
I believe Silver Pony is currently on the back burner, and has been put into storage in one of the barns. The car needs a lot of work done to it's [...]