Thursday, February 9, 2012

Stop the Leaks

While the tarp covering the 321 was generally in good shape, it appeared that one of the seams had opened up slightly on the top, and the car was taking some water. So I purchased a new canvas tarp, 10x12, to cover this up. Installing it from the ground by yourself is an interesting project, but it went well.

Here are a couple of views of the completed patch job. There was little wind and not a cloud in the sky.
So it was a good day for this work.

I was planning to wait a few days before strapping it down, but the wind picked up, so later in the day I walked out there again with some straps and fastened it down more securely. None of the other tarped cars get this level of attention, I think.

Most of the rest of the time I was removing paint from the 36 again. The window posts have a lot of small surfaces and require a lot of detailed work.

Ed Oslowski is still working on the 277. He needed two window latches, which disappeared somehow, so I picked out two from the 318 (which I believe are the same type) for him. And Rod supplied me with some more pins for the final MU socket on the 36.


But that's enough about me. Let's see what Tim is doing on the 1797. It's over the pit, so we can see some underbody equipment. (L) Behind the huge third-rail cables we can see the battery box. It's empty! The batteries are huge, and recharging them through the cigarette lighter in your car just seems to take forever!

(R) Looking up at the trailer truck.

Tim has been working on the plumbing. Many of the pipes coming up through the floor were rusted out. Here he is working on the connections to the feed valve, which is located under one of the seats. And as you'll notice from the department blog, they're always working on windows. So we're all trying to stop the leaks!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks guys for a great blog. This is my favorite destination on the net.
My question about the 321: what is the long term plan for this car? Further restoration? Operation as trailer? Inside static display?
I only wish I lived close enough to be able to help.
Thanks again for the updates, the pictures and the dedication to railway history.

Kirk Warner said...

The progress which you are making on the 36 is wonderful to watch. What are the plans to handle the paint which is in the grooves of the boards?

Randall Hicks said...

1) There are no definite plans for the 321 at this time, but it's under discussion. So don't go away.

2) Kirk: If you mean the paint in the chamfers, you can easily get that with the right type of scraper. I just haven't done it all yet. To the extent paint has worked into the grain, that's not a problem. You just sand it down and paint over it.