Saturday Car Work

As mentioned in my father's post, all four Hicks Car Works contributors were out at the museum on Saturday.  I spent much of the day making more progress on the 205.  My biggest accomplishment was painting the west end of the car with a first coat of orange, as shown below.  This means that the side and both ends of the car, all sections being cosmetically restored, have a first coat of orange.  Only a few small pieces still need to be installed and/or painted orange.  Note that the bottom half of the anticlimber at this end is still in primer; I'm out of IRR green and need to get more mixed to remedy this.

I also did some less photogenic work on the car including spraying a quick-and-dirty coat of gloss black onto the east truck, a job which was done earlier to the west truck, and more cleaning up of parts inside the car. And I cut to length and primed a bit of wooden window beading that somehow had never been installed when the Portland-installed drop sash was removed, back when dinosaurs roamed the blog.

NEWS FLASH - I stopped by Chicago Rapid Transit 1797 over in Barn 4 and was treated to the above view of the interior, which is very close to finished.  Tim Peters and Frank Kehoe have done a spectacular job of returning this car to its 1938 appearance in a remarkably short period of time.  Tim informed me that the 1797 will be making its operating debut at IRM next Saturday, for the first day of Museum Showcase Weekend, running rain or shine with restored wooden trailer 1268.  This will be the first time the 1797 has carried any fare-paying passengers since retirement from the CTA in 1958, so don't miss it!

Definition: Nick [nik] - verb: to secure (a person, services, etc.) for some cause, enterprise, etc.; to dragoon: I got Nicked and spent an hour or so working on repairing metal display signs in Barn 7.

As I was finishing up with fixing some of the Barn 7 display signs that had gone askew David and Al showed up, bringing the 3142 back into the barn.  I snapped a couple of photos; they're certainly dressed for success!