Illinois Railway Museum Blog

Clean up work has continued through July in the Birmingham diner following the repair of the floor in the galley corridor area. On July 7th Mike Baksic and Shelly Vanderschaegen worked on an empty corner where a cabinet had been removed many years ago. A sander was used to get down to the bare surface of the walls prior to painting them.

Mike Baksic cleaning the corner walls 7/7/13

7/14/13 capture of the painted corner walls

On July 14th Mike and Ray Mormann replaced the threshold between the galley area and the dining room and Ray secured a piece of trim which wrapped around the rounded corner near the threshold.

Threshold reinstalled

A tricky piece of trim was put back in place around the curve into the dining room

Shelly and Pauline Trabert washed down the corridor walls and ceiling outside the galley area. Linoleum will be installed in the future over the plywood which covers the repaired floor.

Galley exterior corridor 7/14/13

Shelly and Pauline did a basic clean up in the close quarters of the galley with the shop vac.

Shelly vacuuming the galley floor 7/14/13

Pauline stops working for a minute to smile 7/14/13

On July 20th Mike, Ray, and Mark Gellman focused on windows. Several windows had been put in upside down at some point in time and these were corrected. Deterioration around a couple of windows in the galley corridor had allowed water to seep inside the car which had caused the floor damage repaired earlier in the month. A scaffold was rolled around to the side of the car so sealant could be applied to the reseated windows to help prevent future leaks.

Mark and Ray securing a righted window back into the frame

Meanwhile, Shelly and Pauline cleaned all surfaces in the galley from top to bottom and then scrubbed down the floor. Things are starting to look pretty good in the Birmingham once again.