Simms Collection -- Interstate Public Service

 The Interstate collection is rather limited, and only a couple of the prints have any information.

#122

#150

"150 + 605
Locomotives sold to Winona RR
and still operating there"

#152

#155

#155

#156 in Columbus, Ind.

#157

#158

#158?

#300

Finished!

Frank writes...

There were a few different things happening on Sunday, but the most consequential for me - if not necessarily for anyone else - was that I completed painting work on Shaker Heights 63.

This involved climbing up on the roof and painting the whole center - anything that couldn't be reached from the top of a ladder - as well as the trolley base shroud grey. Now, there's an asterisk to this: although painting work is complete, I'd still like to apply a handful of decals or stickers at some point. These include the "Westbound Entrance" and "Eastbound Entrance" legends next to the doors and, more noticeably, the RTA emblems. I'd really love to get a copy of a vector file for that RTA emblem, which by the way, is still used by GCRTA. I've tried reaching out to them a couple of times with no success yet. Anyone know someone with that agency who could hook us up?

Joel ordered nice new blue flags for the barns, so the guys put this one up for me. Pretty slick! If you don't know what a blue flag means, then you'd better get back to studying that rulebook. Anyway, thanks to Dan and Greg for their help with the 63. After dinner, I picked up all the trash around the car - wadded-up masking tape, newspaper, used foam trim rollers, etc. - and threw it out. C'est fait.

Let's move to a more important project: the 36. It turns out we will want to chain the truck frame to the rail so we can freely jack up the spring plank, but where the truck was sitting on track 43, that's not possible because the pavement comes right up to the railhead. We're not complaining - we're glad it does - but we needed to move the truck over to track 42. Joel, shown here running the forklift, and Richard moved a pair of 4000 trailer trucks out of the way and then shifted the 36 truck over. The entire operation probably took 15 minutes. It's almost like they've done this before!

The other priority for the day was removing the two third rail beams from the R side of the 319 for replacement of the wooden beams. A huge thank you goes out to Mikey and two of his friends, who were all indispensable in getting the beams removed from the car and moved back to the shop. 

After dinner, Steven removed the thermostat from the 18. Above is a photo showing how the wires are connected; the wire with the tag goes on the "57/60" terminal and the other wire goes on the "R-881-C" (or something like that) side.

Unfortunately, I have absolutely no idea how this thing works and virtually no idea how to troubleshoot it, so I'm hoping better minds can lend a hand. Our goal here is to get the heat working correctly in case the opportunity arises to use the 18 during the colder months. Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion.

In other news, Nick and Greg were disconnecting the 600V connection to Barn 7 so that portion of the exterior sheathing could be replaced; Jimmy and Steven were in train service; Brian was working on air brake stuff; and Jerry - helped at times by Richard, JD, Steven, and others - was working on the CTA 6600s.

Simms Collection -- Iowa Miscellany

 CHARLES CITY WESTERN

Charles City Western #50

CLINTON DAVENPORT & MUSCATINE

CD&M  34

DES MOINES & CENTRAL IOWA

DM & CI RR
#1807 Elec. locomotive
At Des Moines, Ia.
Taken Sept. 1937
PRINT FROM Edward Frank, Jr.

DM&CI 1708
McGuire-Cummings
Spring 1935
x "Ohm" or "Ampere" from
Gary South Bend & Chicago RR

DM&CI 1705
Snow Storm
February 1938

DM&CI #1712
ex-LSE 179    (1917 Jewett)

DM&CI #1714    ex-LSE 180

DM&CI #1714

Des Moines & Central Iowa  #1714-10-12
June 30, 1940
[RH:  All three of the LSE Jewetts]

Des Moines & Central Iowa
No. 1719 at Des Moines, Iowa

FORT DODGE DES MOINES & SOUTHERN

FD&DM 72

Friday Factory Report

I wanted to continue making new third-rail beams for the 319 in our well-equipped factory.  So the first thing to do was to go over to 8 and get exact measurements of the two beams on the south side that we need to replace.  And on the way:

Contractors are continuing to work on Barn 7, and it looks like replacement of the south wall is almost complete.  I hope they don't scare the horses. 

I really think these beams need to be made before the car is used in service again.  I purchased the wood last time, and mortised out the slots and glued the four halves together.  Here's what they look like after removing the clamps.

I then used the measurements I'd taken to mark everything on the beams that needs to be done.  I cut them to length, cut out the diagonal notches, marked all the holes, and then drilled them.  After you do this often enough it's like clockwork, and mistakes are a thing of the past.

Tim was the only other person there today, and he was working out in the barn on the 268.  He's accomplishing a lot, but I didn't want to spend any time getting in his way.  But the vestibules of the car are lighted, and they look a lot better than when I saw them last, I think:

This is the west vestibule.  With nice mood lighting, it looks quite sophisticated.

And here's the east end.  In any case, this car is going to be the envy of the rest of us when it gets done.

Meanwhile, by early afternoon all of the woodwork on the two beams was finished, and I was able to put a first coat of primer on eight of the nine sides of each beam.  (Each beam is an irregular nonahedron with several holes.  Not up to Euclidean standards, but historically accurate.)

Once the beams currently mounted on the 319 are brought over to 4, I will be able to reassemble the parts on the new ones, and we'll be ready for service.

Simms Collection -- Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern

WATERLOO CEDAR FALLS & NORTHERN

The captions are usually taken verbatim from the prints.

Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern #32,
on Waterloo turn table, 1912

WCF&N #33

(RH: McGuire-Cummings builder's photo
WCF&N #80)

Waterloo Cedar Falls & Northern
#100 Heavy Int. on street at Cedar
Rapids, Iowa    7/22/39

Single end
Two Man
Color: Red & Yellow

WCF&N #101

WCF&N #101

WCF&N #102

WCF&N #142

Simms Collection -- Crandic

The Simms Iowa collection covers most of the Iowa interurbans.  We'll start with the Crandic.

All captions are taken from the prints unless otherwise noted.  Most of them are from a fan trip in 1939 using car 109.  

Iowa City    May 29 1939     WCJ

Regular Pass. meets the
109 we didn't have the face
scorching meets we had on the
Indiana RR.  These boys really do
a good job of railroading

[RH: Regular car is 117]

[Also, I am guessing that "face scorching meets" means that on the Indiana RR the extra would pull into the siding, and the regular car would fly by at full speed.  On the Crandic they evidently had time to stop and say hello!]

This was taken on our fan trip on
the Crandic.  I don't know the name
of the station.

[Coralville, Ia.  --  see first comment below]

We stopped at this substation
so that the M. M. could cut
it in.  A storm from the night
before had knocked it out.

extra 109 goes in the hole
for a freight.  The crandic has
some cabooses but they never use
them.  I don't blame them either they
sure are off the list.  They use
a three man crew, so they really
don't need 'em.

Crandic #51
Cedar Rapids    July 1939

Cedar Rapids   May '43   (GK)