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Monday, April 8. 2013Wood Shop Update - April 6, 2013 Door Panels Rich Witt is working on the new solid panel inserts for a new station door. We did a pretty good job machining them but go the extra mile to sand them out and get them ready for prime painting.  More Panels Victor Humphreys is working on one of the long panels for the doors as in total some time had to be spent. He is doing that in this image after glazing three more windows (new) for the Chicago Great Western X 38.  Jointing Rich Witt is running some fresh mahogany stock through the jointer for the new round top windows for Boston & Maine 1094.  Routing Then Rich and Paul Cronin passed the stock through the router and followed that up on the table saw to set the quarter round pieces 'free'. We hope to try steam bending them on Wednesday and if successful, that will be the last of the parts needed for these two windows.  Puzzle Solved A few more days of head scratching and it appears the puzzle is solved. These are the ad card panels that will get cleaned and repainted to go inside Cleveland Transit System 4223. As the arrangement grew one panel by one panel we were very optimistic until it seemed we were one short panel missing. Where could it be, in storage, forgotten in some work area? As luck would have it fate was on our side. As we had given up and started to gather up the above display to return to shelving, we FOUND the missing panel sitting in an area separate from all the others. Paul Cronin is in the background marking reference data so we will not have to solve this puzzle again.  Wiring While the above drama was playing out on the shop floor, Eric Lorenz continued to make up harnesses and string cable through the ceiling ribs. Later it would be very difficult to do this after more of the interior panels go in place. Unintentional, but I really like the halo effect surrounding Eric's head here.  A Roof We have all watched the work being done on Michigan Electric 28. But it seems like all the preparation is paying off as Norm Krentel, Jeff Brady, and Bill Peterson were installing panels at seemingly warp speed. There was little to show and presto they were almost to the end of the car!  In Stile Meanwhile back in the shop, Tim Peters continues on the Chicago Rapid Transit 1024 project. Here is a repair in style, of a stile, for one of the doors. Lots of tricky angles and fitting.  Where it Goes And here Tim is checking for the exact fit that a perfectionist like him insists upon. I guess it gets easier after you have done this twenty times or so.
Sunday, April 7. 2013Steam Department Update 04-06-2013A much more successful day yesterday at the steam shop. On 1630: · We continued with loading the super heater flues. Suitable homes were found for the shorter flues and we should not need to do further welding. All but one are now in place. This one was fitted but removed to allow access to the adjacent (top right) hole for fitting the ring.
· For reasons that are not clear, the top right hole is over size and needs a steel ring to reduce the size to fit a flue. Tom had turned the ring on the lathe a couple of weeks ago and today we fitted it. This was not easy as the tube had to be passed thru and beyond the sheet and then the ring expanded into the hole. The expanders are designed to work on the end of a long tube rather than a narrow ring, so positioning this while expanding was tricky. However, this was achieved successfully and the tube is now seated into the hole with the new ring around it.
· Ferrules were fitted into the front tube sheet around all but 3 of the flues that will require them. So this is largely complete, although some of the ferrules still need to be ground flush before we can roll the tubes into place. The ferrule can be seen, around the tube, in the hole immediately below the empty hole in the picture above and compared to the one to its right which is still to be ferruled. · Set up is now well under way for rolling the super heater flues into place. As compared to the rollers used for the small tubes, those used for the large tubes require a BIG air motor weighing about 60 pounds. This cannot be hand held in use. For the rear tube sheet a staging is now in place on which the air motor will be set to drive the roller expanding the flues into the sheet.
· On the front of the smokebox mounts are being set up to hold the large gearbox thru which the air motor will drive the roller expanding this end of the flues by means of a long shaft with universal joints.
The gearbox was earlier set up directly on the smokebox ring to assist in rolling the ring. However, for the tube rolling it will need to be mounted further forward on the brackets.
· Most of the smaller pieces of cladding that have been primed were moved back on top of the machine shop and large sections that must now be cleaned and primed were brought down. These will be cleaned outside, now that the weather has improved, as there is a great deal of rust and remnants of insulation material that must be removed. · Unfortunately the contractor repairing the riveting hammers has had trouble obtaining materials for the seals so these are still not back and the riveting is on hold. · The patch screw is now in place in the firebox corner. (Despite the name this does not actually secure the patch in our case). This is a special screw threaded into the mud ring to secure the outer sheet to the mud ring at the corner. Once in place its head looks like another rivet. The need arises because of the sharp bend at the corner. The inner surface is much shorter than the outer so rivets tightly spaced on the inside would be widely spaced in the outer sheet. These blind ended patch screws are set between rivets on the outside. Once in place, they look like rivets. This one was damaged and is now replaced. Elsewhere: · Big progress thanks to the diesel guys. They switched the tender out into yard 13. It made an interesting combination with #9255. This was quite a long switch movement as it had to be pulled out with chains to the trolley loop, where #9255 could then run round the loop to get to the end that has a coupler. It then had to be run out thru the depot to reverse direction on the "Y" before it could be brought back around the loop to be propelled into yard 13. After all this the box cars could then be spotted where we could get to them. Thanks guys !
· With the box cars accessible again, Jeff and the team were able to move material around in the all-door car and get to the tubes for the Shay. These are now in the shop ready for swaging. This is half the total tubes for the Shay. The rest are on stands on the other side of the area, so all the tubes are now in the swaging area.
It is startling to compare the Shay tubes with those for 1630. This is one of the half dozen additional tubes we need to swage for 1630. amazing., I knew the Shay tubes were smaller but had not visualized the difference being this extreme !. Not only are they shorter, but there are far fewer of them.
· Bob has now wired a good deal of the control panel for the planer. During the week, Kevin had largely completed needle chipping it ready for painting. So, good progress this week although the delay in being able to rivet the patch is becoming a serious concern. Nigel Friday, April 5. 2013Wood Shop Update - April 3, 2013I am very late to post this entry and was wondering if I owe you an apology. It just seems that there is a lot going on in my IRM life and I have been really busy. The other lame excuse is that I can blame the weather. This weekend will be the first scheduled day of railroad operations at IRM for 2013. The connection there is that this will be a short report. There were six (or more) of our regular Wednesday volunteers working on a large 'switch move'. The name is just like what it sounds. One car at a time, one track at a time cars were being moved from several barns to be rearranged from their winter storage locations to be operator friendly. That is so the deck of cards will not have to be shuffled by the regular operators, often needing a small diesel and towbars, to get the scheduled car out and ready to run in the morning. That meant fewer folks working in the relative comfort of our shop areas.  Raising Panels Work continued on the new door we are building for our station. Victor Humphreys, Dave Rogan, and Jim Leonard have a tricky set of jigs in position to do an operation to produce 'raised panels'. There are four solid panel inserts in this new door and first we planed, ripped, and crosscut them to size. One of the long ones is being passed through the table saw to thin that panel around the edges, on both sides. All done and now for cleanup and hand sanding.  The Grid Shop Pete Galayda continues to work to reassemble the many resistance grids boxes for the Charles City Western 300 steeple cab locomotive. He and John Nelligan have worked many weeks on this phase of the restoration, it must seem like forever to them.  Pulley Jim Foraker is working to restore a drive pulley for the new (old) table saw restoration. It is a paper pulley that was beginning to show wear and was de-laminating. Here, new epoxy is being poured into a mold to consolidate and repair it. That is right I said PAPER PULLEY. They were fairly common a hundred or more years ago on wood working machines driven by flat leather belts. On this one many, many layers of paper were stacked up (maybe 1500 or so) and then compressed and riveted into a sandwich. Seems to have been very workable, but nothing lasts forever.  Steel Jim is moving a new steel delivery into the shop, having been helped by Victor Humphreys. These pieces will be cut to our design, welded into a frame and painted to be ready to mount that beast of a cast iron table saw upon. Other work included more puzzle solving for parts for the interior of Cleveland Transit System 4223, and a two man crew - Jeff Brady and Norman Krentel - working on the roof for Michigan Electric 28. |
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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 [...]