Entries by Frank DeVries

Today's activity was to protect the Winter trains. Today's track department consisted of me, myself, and I.

Continuing the tradition, we have had snow for each and every IRM winter train season. The track department had prepared earlier in the fall for these trains, and in fact prepared a third switch for smudge pots to keep our switches clear of snow during these trains.  Adam prepared the East Wye switch, and I prepared the two switches used previously, South Wye, and 50th ave.

I arrived around 09:30 and it was still snowing. I loaded up a snow broom and shovel, and started work clearing switches. In about an hour and a half, I had the switches cleared of the 2 to 3 inches of snow, and the pots all lit. A quick trip to Karstens crossing to make sure the crossing wasn't iced in, and a quick lunch. Upon returning from lunch, I started to search for the clamps we use on the switch stand by Depot Street. I searched and searched without success. I figured I would do some creative engineering to get it through the day. When I arrived to hook up the battery, I pulled the end of the cable out from under the switch stand and found someone had already attached said clamps to the lamp. I hooked up the battery, then went to run an extension cord for the switch lamp at South Wye. I have no idea why one was wired for 12V and the other for 110VAC. We do need to take them down in spring and remove the wasp nests in both.

The rest of the day was tending to the East wye switch, and keeping the pots lit. We had a couple that just did not seem to want to keep going. I wound up changing out a couple wicks and they were off to the races. The last train ran at 4PM. I made one more round to fuel the smaller pots, and put them out for the night. With no more snow in the forecast, we probably won't need the pots tomorrow.

I will post some photos to the IRM Members page a little later.

Frank D.

Thanks to the CN, and a malfunctioning crossing, I was up and out of the house by 5AM arriving at IRM at 6AM.

First task was to inspect Volkmann's work on the East switch. As Pete P reported earlier in the week, Volkmann was out and changing most of the long timbers in the switch. Overall it looks much better than before. There are a couple ties in wrong order, but not too bad. This switch was in really rough shape before they changed the ties. This switch should give many more years of good safe service with this work complete.

Next I got started with a much needed oil change on the Model 50 burro crane. I had originally planned to alter the drain plug with a 90 degree angle to provide a more down angle oil flow, so I don't ruin any more clothes, but I was doing this task so early, Napa and Ace were not open yet. A project for another time... I did manage to get the oil changed without soaking myself again.

Next task was to fuel up and clean out the Santa Fe truck. Lots of scrap wood, old boxes, cups, and bottles, along with one dead battery, were cluttering up the bed of the truck. Time to clean up. Once the trash was dumped, and the battery in 24 with the other dead battery, I went to pick up the smudge pots from the Santa Train weekends.

Task number next was to pull the radiator off the tie crane. Seems we have a very generous donor to donate an engine for the tie crane. They are even going to put it in for us! That saves us two days worth of work for us volunteers!!! When the engine let loose and ventilated itself in November, it blew the starter off the block, the oil filters off teh block and threw a chunk of cylinder liner into the radiator, puncturing it. So... off it came. 8 bolts, a couple hose clamps, and she was out. Once we had it out, I was amazed this thing was cooling anything! The vent fins were full of dirt, a large section clearly came in contact with the fan at some point, plus the new hole. I will take this to a radiator shop in Joliet and get it re-cored.

About the time I was getting the radiator out, Adam showed up. He went to talk to Dave and found him back by yard 10. He then discovered the 10/11 switch (not the one off the carline!) was gapped by almost 1 inch! YIKES! Had to fix that. In order to fix that, we decided it was time to put the switch tamper to work and see what's what after it's long battle back to restored service. Tom showed up shortly after we made our discovery. We pulled the 6000 into yard 3, to clear up for the switch tamper. Tom ran the tamper back to yard 10, while Adam gathered tools, and set up our work zone. We had a minor altercation as we took the tamper through the carline S curve. A push cart pin fell off the cart and wedged itself between the stock rail and guard rail, derailing the welding cart and hydraulic cart. By the time Tom got the tamper stopped, both carts went across the frog and re railed themselves. Best kind of derailment is the one you don't have to
clean up! We did knock the welder out of it's seat on the cart, which would require the burro to fix, but it wasn't so bad that it could not wait. On to the job site......

Since I had to leave at 3PM, I will leave the rest of the day's festivities to Tom or Adam in Saturday Track Report - Part 2.

Photos will be posted later.....

Frank D.

...will keep the track department from completing their scheduled tasks.

So it was a typical spring day at Union today... Cloudy, with peeks of sun, occasional rain, and yes Virginia, Hail. For the most part it was simply cloudy and dry.

The day started around 8:30 with myself showing up and getting the Model 50 Burro fired up. Given the cool 40 degree weather, I needed to cut out one of the hydraulic pumps to get the engine to turn over and warm up. Tom showed up at 9AM and about the time the 50 was warmed up. We shut down, engaged the hydraulic pump and off to yard 13 for more work setting out track panels.

We had to work some strategy to the task today. We planned to set the last two panels already stacked near the broken rail for 13-4 track, set the remaining panels for 13-1 and 13-2. We needed to use lighter panels (read missing more ties) on 13-1 so as to not overload and tip the crane when setting those panels. We also had to stack the panels near the broken rail. The plan was to stack em, cross the broken rail light, and then lay them out.

We broke for lunch around 12:30 with only the panels across the broken rail to set. We came back and made short work of setting the panels, and adjusting a few more on the good side of the break. Some OTM was picked up, a few loose ties moved out of the way, and we headed back to the barn. Upon our arrival back on 11-2 track, we found the track cart from the dog pull last week. We set that off, and parked the crane. About that time, Steve showed up in time to help fuel and add hydraulic fluid to the machine, and get the rail tongs on the hook for tomorrow.

The panels for yard 13 are now all laid out, with one spare for filling in some gaps. Cropping and drilling are next. We will have to get the hydraulic cart moved over to yard 11, so it is close to the work. Adam and Marcus will be the Sunday gang.

New photos have been posted on the IRM members photos website at http://www.irm.org/gallery/album247

Frank D.