Wood Shop

It seems a lot of folks like to volunteer in the wood shop, another very good turnout with some rare visitors - first timers or members who  do not spend all their time in the shop.  The event that is becoming space limited is noon around the lunch table - shoulder to shoulder swapping tales, telling stories, and discussing the work.

The biggest job for the day involved making new tongue and groove boards to replace rotted stock inside the MILW X 5000 dynamometer car.  Buzz had jointed the new lumber last Wednesday.  The next step was to set up the table saw and rip all the wide planks down to about 2 1/8 inches wide That was a lot of ripping but by noon or so, Bill Peterson, Warren Neuhauser, and Dick Melzer are standing in front of a large pile of the slats.  We started that job earlier with John Faulhaber also helping, especially with the fences, jigs, and set up on the table saw and soon to be used shaper.

Next - the wood was marked for the 'best side' and each was run through the shaper to mill the groove and a small chamfer.  All in one pass using our power feeder.  The crew feeds, monitors and catches each piece.  Not heavy work but many hands to do that and inspect each piece coming off the machines.

The second pass through that machine puts the tongue and a chamfer on the other face edge of the boards.  We kept the crew busy throughout most of the afternoon.

The result was about 450 linear feet of new stock, here being stacked up ready for priming and painting.  We purposely kept the tongues shallow as this will be installed on the inside, (concave) side of the car, and each piece will have to be able to create that inside curve.

Tim Peters was stripping the many layers of old finish off of one of the doors for Chicago Rapid Transit 1024.  He put on quite a show acting as a stripper wearing hearing protection.  Those were needed since he was right next to the shaper milling operation which is quite loud.  He also ran quite a stack of new basswood planks through the table saw and the planer.  This was the first steps to making boards to curve over the roof ends on the 1024.

Victor Humphreys applied the first coat of maroon paint to two of the new windows for the Chicago Great Western X 38 and also did more painting on the small quarter round strips for installing the glazing.

Not a lot of work on the new doors for the X 38 since the tongue and groove work was a full time process for many hours.  But the door joint final fitting came out well under the direction of John Faulhaber, and we did the planing and finish work on the four solid panels which will fill the lower two spaces on each door.  It is sitting in the press, ready to be glued up on Wednesday.

Lorne Tweed and Eric Lorenz are going over all the details for the the window posts on Cleveland Transit System 4223. While many of these are nominally the same, there are also many for special mounting at the front, rear, or near the side doors.  All seem to be measurably different from one another.

Dave Fullarton stopped by with a small wood electrical box door, I think he said for the CTA 2000's.  Whatever, you can be sure it relates to our rapid transit cars.

John Faulhaber and Rich Witt helped and the new door was made in no time while the shaper crew labored on.  Dave moved on to painting it at once with GLYPTOL insulating varnish.

We will close with the WHAT IS IT quiz of the day.  Roger Kramer has a box like dispenser removed from the Ladies Room of one of our heavyweight Pullman Passenger cars.  We think it held flat folded paper cups for drinking water, if any of you are old enough to remember those. 

This was another busy Wednesday in the shops in Barn 4.  One of the volunteers said to me "Wow, there are 17 people here today!"  I counted 18, so another weekday record for attendance - and PROGRESS.

The lead photo today has to be Mike Alterio and Frank Sirinek alongside Chicago & West Towns 141.  Work has been ongoing to fabricate new parts and linkages and yesterday the brake rigging under the car was COMPLETE!  The trolley pole went to the wire, the air compressor charged the brake system, and the brakes were applied from the control stand inside the car.  THEY WORKED!  This was very much a team effort with many contributing to the success.  The tests pointed to some adjustments still needed but the brake cylinder, rods, bars, pins, bushings, new clevises, the many parts salvaged and made new performed as designed.

Dick Cubbage and Jim Leonard are trimming tenons on the bandsaw for a rail on the new doors for Chicago Great Western X 38.  It is a fitting job and quite fitting that volunteers new to the work are doing and learning the skill sets.

Each mortise and tenon joint is custom fitted one at a time.  As we go along it is too tempting to resist assembling what is ready so far.  Jim Leonard, John Faulhaber, and Dave Rogan seem pleased.

Jim is using the disc sander to take off just a 'whisker' to make the joint nearly perfect.  The smart folks do this carefully and only a little bit at a time.  Slower perhaps, but little risk of taking too much and ruining a piece.

Dave and John are using a tenon jig on the table saw to just shave a bit off the thickness on one side of the tenon.

Results are what count.  Near the end of the day Dave, Jim, and John have the entire door assembled for the first time.  They look very proud and OUGHT TO BE!

Henry Vincent has been working at repairing an end train door for Chicago Aurora & Elgin 36.  He has moved on to the fussy work of plunging mortises (seen here) and trimming tenons for the final fit before the gluing stage.

Buzz Morisette is already at work on new lumber for creating tongue and groove ceiling boards for the MILW X 5000 dynamometer car.  Our volunteers yesterday got what I estimate to be over $1000 of new hardwood lumber and hauled it to our site in our truck.  It barely had a chance to get warm, and the work was on.  Yes the raw materials alone can be costly (donate now to MILW X 5000, CRT 1024, or ME 28) but the value of the fabricated work we do is easily five times that.  And we have the opportunity to pass on the skill sets every week to the volunteers.

What would a BLOG entry be without mentioning windows?  Volunteer Dave Diaz has returned to the fold to help out, and he and Simon Harrison are working on the metal sash windows for Cleveland Transit System 4223.   This PCC car had a lot of window work done last winter in the shops, and now it is time to finish off remaining items to make them ready to install on the carbody.

The driving was certainly poor in the morning but many hardy souls came out to help.  It did not help that GATE 5 was inoperable when I showed up (the first one?) and I was not dressed to brave the snowy winds to unlock the secrets and get it reset.  But I did - I wonder what I did right?

Victor Humprheys is applying the first coat of finish grey interior paint to the cupola windows for Chicago Great Western X 38.  It is very satisfying to see this taking place, remembering the rough boards and resulting sawdust that got us this far.

John Faulhaber is starting the fussy work of fitting together the first pieces for the new doors for the X 38.  Earlier we did the trim work to prepare the rails and stiles at each mortise.

Bill Peterson is working his way into our graces every Saturday.  He is willing and seems quite able to take on additional tasks.  Here he is demonstrating how we fashion double tongue tenons to fit two matching mortises for the mid rails of these doors.  The OJT caption?  On the job training!

Victor also assisted in gluing and clamping 9 pieces of wood for the third panel to be made for the new X 38 doors.  It is a good thing the glue we are using has a good pot life and we can usually find the seven or so extra sets of hands to do the assembly and clamping.

Buzz Morisette is holding two small pieces of wood.  The old brown ragged one is from the head lining of MILW X 5000, our dynamometer car.  The new one is a test piece for cutting the profile and groove on new lumber.  The shaper is set up now with the proper tooling and ready to go once the new lumber is delivered.

Here, Buzz is routing a fancy profile on a curved piece of new molding that was created for his restoration work on the private car ELY.  I am sure the car builders did this mass production fashion, but when there is a will there is a way.  We have some very talented and creative volunteers willing to share some of the tricks of the trade.

Lorne Tweed is going over the many windows needed for the Cleveland Transit System 4223 PCC.  We are all eager to see enough of the interior panels and trim installed to allow windows in the car sides.  Glass is a GOOD thing!

Tim Peters is in the final stages of his window making marathon for Chicago Rapid Transit 1024, with some help here from Bill Wulfert.  The few left on this bench are all that are remaining to be able to say they are ALL glued and assembled.

It reminded me of the announcements often heard in supermarkets, but here Bill and Tim are cleaning up layers of old paint from the brass lamp bases and window lifts fro CRT 1024.  Someone should be taking time lapse photos of this project, it is moving along too fast to capture everything on these BLOGS.

And of course Rich Witt continues in the Engineering Department.  Sometimes we push him pretty hard and are set up and cutting stock as the lines go down on paper.  And of course Rich also does a lot of the shop work and finished up a very nice piece today.