Steam Department

There was a relatively small turnout this week but some key progress was achieved despite the fact that several people had to leave early for the Soiree and other commitments.

On 1630 much of the day was spent on woodwork.  It was clear from the dust production last weekend that much more effective sealing was required to allow cleaning of the tube sheets themselves.  (To do this the gun must be aimed directly at the sheet and therefore the tube holes).  Thru Rick's efforts we now have ply sheathing in place on both tube sheets.  This allows Collin to blast directly on the tube sheet without too much escape of debris into the shop.

Front tubesheet sheathed for cleaning

This shows the sheathing at the front end.  Hidden progress is that the rear tube sheet is similarly sheathed in the firebox and the front tube sheet was actually blast cleaned behind this sheathing yesterday.  With this in place we should now be able to complete the cleaning fairly quickly.

Another job that we started to progress was the inspection and preparation of the super heater flues.

These were sandblasted by an external contractor and are now thoroughly clean.  However, you can clearly see the rough cut ends resulting from cutting by the torch or rotating tube cutter.

Flues cleaned by sandblasting

Each must be inspected for excessive pitting and then painted with the Apexior boiler coating.

Flues coated with Apexior

Then the rough ends must be removed using the large band saw.  The method and set up was established yesterday and the first tube cut. 

Clean cut and ready for safe ending

This will now be a continuing task to do the same to the remaining 15 tubes.  Once all are done we will bring in a specialist to weld on new material to bring them back to the required length ready for refitting.

In other areas, Tom continued machining parts for the piston valves on  428 while Stu, Bob and Ed were cleaning the hydraulic pump for the planer.  Refurbishing this machine will significantly simplify the machining of large components such as axle boxes.

Hydraulic pump for the planer

Nigel Bennett

Two weeks of steady progress in the Steam shop.

Whilst I was on my travels last week Collin and Glenn brought the super heater flues back from Astro Blast.  Apparently the cold had some pretty disastrous effects on the air brakes of the flat bed but Glenn thankfully has a lifetime  of experience in plant maintenance so the brakes were released and the trip was accomplished while the flat bed may now be more reliable in cold weather.

Jason and others did a great job in sheeting over 1630 to protect against the dust coming from the sand blasting while Dennis started on rebuilding the smoke box of the Shay.

This week the main activity was sandblasting the boiler interior on 1630.  Progress was very good.  Collin managed to clean nearly half of the boiler interior.  While the sealing and ducting is reasonably effective there is still far too much dust for other work to be done around the locomotive while this is in progress.  Below a small team feeds material to the sandblaster in center under cover of a haze of dust

Sand blasting in progress

So it was late afternoon before Mike could start further work in the firebox where he is preparing the rivet holes for the firebox patch.

There was a possibility of the specialist who will do the thickness testing on the boiler starting next weekend.  However, this cannot be done at the same time as sandblasting so we decided to hold off on this for a couple of weeks.  If we can maintain the rate of progress achieved yesterday, it should be possible to complete the sand blasting in another one or two working days.  The equipment has now been moved to the smoke box end and next weekend we will aim to seal the tube plate and target to clean that and the front boiler section (the rear barrel section was done yesterday).

The unease growing in the sand blasting team as we happily feed 50lb bags of material into the machine is that all this material has to be removed when we are finished !!.  We used about 400lbs of material yesterday alone so it is becoming apparent that we face another substantial task to clean it all out before the process is really complete.  The progress made can be seen in the picture below as large areas now show bare metal rather than the rusty covering.  But all the black "sand" must be removed.

The rear section clean but with a lot of sand to remove

After a few hours inside, Collin extracts himself from the boiler.  Not much chance of me getting in there!!.

Collin emerges from a good days work

Bob made good progress on "painting" (actually it is a specialized interior boiler coating called Apexior) the super heater flues that were brought back last week.  The ends of these were rough cut when being removed from the boiler and now need to be cleanly cut in preparation for a specialist to weld additional material at one end to bring them back to the required length (a process called "safe ending").

Phil and others made a lot of progress in cleaning out and needle chipping the spring carrier of the Shay's truck.  This now looks a great deal better than the same area as it appeared in the 12/3 update. 

Spring Tray after a deal of work

The brake linkage was also removed and cleaned.  We do however have a big decision on how to proceed with this truck.  The best way to thoroughly clean and inspect it would undoubtedly be steam cleaning.  However, that cannot be done in the shop so would require a major shunt to pull 428 out over the wheel drop to allow the truck out of the South door.

A good deal of machining work continued, primarily on the axle boxes and other parts for 428 but also on the super heater flue expanders that we will need to install the tubes back into 1630.  I really look forward to being able to report that those are in use!.

Ralph machining bushes for 428

As an aside, during my trip to the UK I was able to spend a day at the Severn Valley Railway  It is amazing the level of interest in steam railways in the UK and therefore the level of business.  Even in mid February they were running 4 trains of about 7 cars each way over a 15 mile line and seemed to have at around 50% loadings.  3 locomotives were in operation with several others usable. 

At Kidderminster GWR prairie tank 5164 comes on to the train that it will take to Bridgenorth.

Severn Valley GWR Prairie 5164

At the Bridgenorth depot 5164 shunts LMS mogul 43106, which is being steamed for a later train, before taking its own train back to Kidderminster.  Notice the genuine antique heating system for the water crane!!.  It was well below freezing that weekend.

SVR Steam shunting

A couple of hours later and the Ivatt mogul is not only steamed but has brought a train the 15 miles to Kidderminster.

Severn Valley Ivatt Mogul 43106

Nigel Bennett

Progress in the Steam shop continued steadily over the last two weekends.

Jeff has continued the shop reorganization to the point that many of the large parts are now arranged on the East side while still allowing plenty of space to work on the super heater flues when they return. He is now moving on to the machine shop which, when complete, will free up a lot more space around the wheel lathe.

Bob and others made use of the space around the wheel lathe to work on getting this operational.

The McCabe was refitted to its modified timbers, which allow it to be lifted on the pallet jack.  Thanks to Bob Kutela for his help and use of tools for this.  The modified timbers will allow us to move this machine, although moving what we estimate at about 6 tons will never be easy.

Moveable - with difficulty !

The trouble with this machine is that it needs a lot of space around it when it operates but is used only infrequently.  However, what it does, in smoothly bending heavy boiler plates, is critical  It was used last weekend in a first test for bending the new corner patch for 1630's firebox.  This successfully demonstrated that we have the dies of the machine correctly set up to make the critical curve.

First test bend for the patch

On 1630 substantial progress was made on the boiler cleaning. 

·         Having successfully tested the breathing system and sand blasting equipment, the next major job was to minimize the flow of dust into the shop.  The last time this was done the locomotive was pulled outside but we certainly do not want to wait for Spring to do this !!

·         Collin and I closed up the boiler with tarpaulins and set up ducted extraction from the chimney.  With fans on the footplate we can establish a flow from back to front and "most" of the dust is pumped out of the door.

Rigged for sand blasting

·         The first blasting was very successful.  We largely cleaned the critical firebox top and side seam areas in about 20 minutes.  Glad to say it all looks good and free of any sign of cracks so far.

The critical seam now clean and looks good

·         From this exercise we learned that the blast medium we were using works well, so we can order in a large quantity for next weekend.  We also learned that, while the ducting works pretty well, the missing firebox corner creates a significant leak that will need to be plugged next weekend.  Collin was very comfortable in the boiler with the new breathing system ..... the rest of the team, outside in the shop, were less comfortable than he was!!.

·         Cleaning of the boiler interior can now be moved forward quickly.

Getting the super heater flues back from sand blasting is proving problematic.  They have been ready since New Year.  Snag is that they must not get wet and need to be collected weekdays or early on a Saturday morning.  Each time we have set up a crew to take the truck on a Saturday, the weather has turned cold ...... and the truck does not operate reliably is really cold weather.

In other areas a good deal of machining was progressed for 428.

I am now away on business for two weeks so no update next week.  However, as the trip is to the UK, I may actually see some working steam next weekend.

Nigel Bennett