Entries by Nigel Bennett

A good day with continuing progress on a number of fronts but one major bust from the blog perspective.

Note to self - the camera may appear to work but actually works a whole lot better if you remember to put the memory card back in after downloading the previous week's pictures - So not many pictures this week although I thought I had pictures of the firebox tube end removal in progress!!

On 1630:

• Collin continued the removal of tube ends.  He is now down to a handful of small tubes and the super heater flues.  Barring unexpected problems this should be done next Saturday.

• Mike, Brian and others started to cut out the defective piece of the firebox corner.  First the section over the mud ring will be cut with a grinder then Dennis will make the rest of the cut with his specialized cutting gear.  The work with the grinder in now well under way.

Cutting out the corner Step 1

The hoses crossing the picture supply the parallel activity of cutting and driving out the tube ends.

• The super heater flues were loaded on the flat bed truck to go to a specialist sand blasting company for cleaning.  Once this is done they will come into the shop to be safe ended ready for re-installation.

Superheater flues going off site

• The swager was mounted ready for use. This sounds simple but I can assure you that getting several hundred pounds of metal with eight precisely drilled holes to fit on to 8 rods in a stand is a challenge that had some of us in the shop until 10 last night!!

Swager in place

• A good deal more material was moved out to the boxcar or onto racking to free up the space where we will work on the super heater flues when they return from cleaning.

Dennis started work on the smokebox of the Shay.  First job was to caulk the new section of the tube plate into the barrel.  This required air hammering the join between the tubeplate and the barrel with a specially shaped tool to completely close any tiny gaps between the two plates.  That is now done and he will start fitting up the new sections of plate for the smokebox floor.

Tubesheet caulked into place

The bright line between 5 and 7 o'clock between the new tube sheet section and the boiler barrel shows where the plates have been caulked.

Bruce and Stu worked on the measurement and machining patterns for the shoes and wedges for 428.  This is a critical piece of preparation for machining these parts.  Wooden patterns have to be made and fitted to the locomotive frames to prove that, if everything is machined to these dimensions, the three dimensional jigsaw will all fit together with the required tolerances.  The trouble with these beautiful old locomotives is that, after years of repair and modification, you can never be sure that the drawings you have are all consistent so that everything will be correct if you work simply from the drawings.

Glen continued the reassembly of the Bay City crane.  We hit a few problems with the cold temperature and a drain plug with suspect threads but believe the running of the motor in the crane for the first time in 20 years is imminent.

Nigel

Another good day of progress. 

Walking thru the shop, you would not see much change in 1630 but internally progress was good. 

Eric and Collin cut and hammered another 40+ tube ends from the firebox tube sheet.  Hopefully this can be completed in another couple of weeks and then we can progress to cleaning, by wire brush and sand blasting, of all the internal surfaces.  This will enable the inspection, which is the key objective of the whole exercise.  

Mike and Bob continued with the firebox patch by starting the removal of one of the patch screws securing the outside wrapper in this area.  It is hoped that this is the only one damaged to the point at which it will have to be replaced.  Other tasks on 1630 itself are largely on hold until the tube ends are out.  It is pretty difficult to work on the locomotive when someone is using an air hammer in the boiler which acts as a big sounding board!

Away from the locomotive, a lot of progress was made on clearing material out of the shop to the boxcar.  Two large air tanks and other parts of #26 were successfully transfered to the boxcar and we now have a work space on the East side where we can work on large parts during the winter.

Space to work

We now have the area for the swaging operation clear and can hopefully start the set up next week. 

Ready to set up swaging

On the Shay Dennis, with help from the "removals crew", made good progress on setting up stands to ensure that the locomotive is completely stable so that he can start welding the new smoke box plates into place.  Funny, he seems to have a strong desire to see the thing completely supported.  It may be to do with the fact that he will be working under there for days on end!!.

Preparing for smokebox rebuild

Good progress was made on cleaning the bolster from the truck.  It makes an interesting comparison with the "before" picture of the bolster last week when first removed from the truck. 

Result of a lot of hard work

However, a great deal more remains to be done when you look at the area where the springs sit in the truck.  The steam shop is never short of big cleaning opportunities!!.

But lots more to do

On 428 several jobs were progressed:

We got input from an external advisor on the repair of the riveting furnace that we need to complete the cab riveting.  When this repair is done, we can rivet the cab which will have a double benefit.  428 will look a great deal better with its cab back on and a large area at the South end will become available for fabrication when the cab is off the floor.

Another group worked on the air compressor.  A lot of carefully measurement was required to identify exactly what size of piston rings we need.  With this done, we can now order them and move forward to reassembly once we have them.

Air pump core

Air pump piston

Cameron was working with Tom on machining bushes for 428.

Machining a bush

In other areas, Rick continued the covering of the lathe and Glenn worked on the radiator fitting on the Bay City crane.  We are holding our breath on this one!.  Weather permitting, it may be that next weekend the cooling will be in place and crane will have a working traction motor for the first time in 20+ years.

So another productive day.

Nigel

This Saturday we had a surprisingly good turnout.  Steam Department volunteers must have felt the need to work off the turkey.

On 1630 work continued steadily. 

Collin and Phil worked on the firebox end tube plugs.  Another 40 are out.  The technique is now well developed but there is a limit to how long you can you can work at this.  Since you have first to gas cut the tube end to a suitable length for removal the atmosphere in the confined space of the boiler when you use an acetylene cutting torch does become "a little warm".  Still, the fireman's side is now largely clear.

Mike and Bob removed the stays from the firebox corner.  All the rivets and stays are now out so they are now working on cutting out the damaged corner plate.  Not simple as the replacement tube sheet fitted in the 1930's was welded into place.

A great deal of reorganization of the shop was achieved that will provide Dennis with a better area for welding, under lifting gear that can move and position heavy parts, as well as free the space in which we can both swage the fire tubes for 1630 and set up the rig to pressure test the super heater elements.

Space to work

The new fork lift enabled us to move the large timbers being seasoned for the Shay up onto racking so freeing a lot of floor space.

Timber for the Shay

The Shay saw considerable progress.  A "A" frame outside the shop was broken down and reassembled over the truck - one of those jobs that sounds easy until you are trying to align bolt holes in the legs and beam, both of which are heavy enough to need 2 people to move!!. 

Preparing to lift

Anyway, we achieved it and then it was possible to lift the bolster off the truck.

Lift in progress

So now the springs that are to be replaced are free and clear.

Target of the operation

Small snag - the truck must also be examined for damage or cracks which means removing 50 years of hardened grease and muck.

Cleaning project

Meanwhile Rick was completing the cover over the vertical lathe to protect this during the winter.

Protection for the lathe

We were also able to progress a number of machining tasks.

Thanks everyone for a very productive day's work

Nigel