Saturday, October 19, 2013

Roof Roof Roof

No, that's not the sound of your neighbor's barking dog.  But I'm afraid this 319 roof project is likely to get rather monotonous for a while.  Today I was able to insert all the screws in the lower tack molding on one side of the car, using my nice pilot drill set and a screwdriver bit with a brace to pull the screws tight.  And there are lots of miscellaneous tasks to perform, pulling up more tacks from the flashing, adding dutchmen to the carlines, installing pipe brackets to hold up the conduit, etc., etc.  Climbing up and down the scaffold is good exercise, at least.

They say brevity is the soul of wit.  That's my best hope of being witty.

7 comments:

David Wilkins said...

Do you do anything to seal the joint where the tack strip buts into the next section of tack moulding?

Anonymous said...

Comments on any projects are never boring. It is great to see and hear about the excellent work going on. Helps reinforce out donations too.

David Church

Randall Hicks said...

Each end should be painted. Then if the butt joint is close enough, a finish coat or two of paint will generally be sufficient to seal the joint, I think. Otherwise some caulk can be added.

Anonymous said...

Randall,
I believe in the woodworking and maritime world the term "Dutchman" for adding a piece of wood to existing work means some poor attempt at a repair.

However a well placed piece or repair such as you are doing is called a graving piece. You should give yourself credit where credit is due and call it a graving piece!

Ted Miles
IRM Member

Randall Hicks said...

Thanks, Ted. I wasn't familiar with the term "graving piece", but I'll withdraw the word "dutchman". What I'm doing might be more properly called sistering, I think, so these new pieces are sisters rather than dutchmen. Hope that helps.

Anonymous said...

Dutchman is a term in working with canvas for a strip that fills a gap, sometimes at a flexible or hinged location. It's used both in the language of scenery for the stage and for boating. Makes sense it would spill over from one of those into canvas for rail cars. I just checked two reference books, one theatrical, one nautical, and it's in both with more or less the same definition. I can't speak for woodworking, but I've heard it used it for decades without a pejorative intent against anyone from the Benelux countries. I thought sistering was adding a new piece attached alongside an existing piece. Graving piece does appear be the right term for a replacement, especially for planking, Ted is spot on. But we all know what you mean now and hesitate to use whatever words you think are best. Thanks for all your work to update us on progress. I always enjoy checking and learning something new.

James

Chris said...

I've heard the term 'dutchman' used for slices of rail used to fill gaps in a rail joint, which is not generally a good repair.