As is usual on a Saturday, there was lots of activity on various projects today, most of which I won't be able to cover. Suffice it to say that a hermit wouldn't fit in.
Under Rod's direction, work has started on fixing up the 518 in preparation for the IT festival on April 30th. Here we see Danielle and her friend Kiki painting windows.
I removed several inner windows on the south side of the car for them to repaint over the next couple of days, and Danielle will also sand down the north side of the car so it can be repainted. It doesn't usually show up in pictures, but one side of the car is in badly faded primer, and the car fund has enough to pay for this work, thanks to generous donations from IT fans. Like you, perhaps.
Later in the day, we see Danielle sanding down some of the outer (storm) windows for eventual repainting in place.
I also took several pictures of the interior of the 518, which will be added to the IT folder.
Nature note: I needed lights in the 518 to remove the windows, and it has been at least a year since I stopped working on this car. I put up the pole, but nothing happened, and it felt like the trolley shoe was clogged with some big clump of sh---, uh, stuff. Who would do such a thing? Joel came along, climbed up a ladder, and found it was yellowjackets. They had decided the shoe was a good place to build a nest. They're dead now, so we'll clean it out one of these days, but that was good for a laugh!
After that, it was time to retreat to the 319. I did some more sanding on the filler on the corner moldings on each side of the ceiling, then a final coat of primer. The first finish coat will be next.
And then I did some more paint removal, and sanding in the vestibule. I put a first coat of primer on part of the ceiling, as seen here. I will probably want to sand it some more and put a second coat on, but there should be more noticeable progress from here on out.
6 comments:
Put up the pole on the 518? My old noggin does not work that well but I thought that was a TRAILER and lights only worked from a bus jumper strung to an adjacent power car. Did we put a pole on that car, which probably never had one?
Bob Kutella
Bob:
The 518 has always had a pole while it was at IRM, which we need for backing up, since the 277 only has one pole. The car did indeed have a pole while it was on the IT, to supply extra power for lights and AC. On the IT it would have been arranged with the pole to the rear, so we're running the 518 backwards, I suppose. But otherwise it's completely authentic.
Our history of the 518 has several pictures here:
http://hickscarworks.blogspot.com/2008/09/history-of-illinois-terminal-518.html
It is interesting to note that while the IT may have had a particular direction to normally run the 518, it was wired in such a way that it could be run in either direction in train. The knife switch on the electrical panel selects which bus jumper is the signal, and which is the 600 volt bus. The 277 does not have this option, its bus jumpers are permanently connected.
I have an in-service picture of the 518 with the trolley pole on one end.
Every time I look at the interior of the 518, I wonder why we just had to get a combine with a modernized interior, instead of one that still had its original interior. (There were a few in the 280 series still like that at the end.)
An old story about the 277...when we got the car, it had some major frame rot in the front end that needed replacing. To get it fixed, Howard Odinius talked to the head carpenter at Highwood Shop, Matty Dalbo. He said yeah, he'd be willing to come out on a weekend and do the work. Howard told him that it needed some curved pieces, and that all they had for power tools was a contractors' benchtop table saw. Not a problem, Dalbo said.
They had the replacement lumber ready, and the table saw set up outside, when Dalbo got there. Much to the members' amazement, the Highwood veteran proceeded to cut all the replacement pieces to form--curves, recesses and all--with the table saw.
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