Maybe your IRM calendar doesn't show anything scheduled for the month of November, but don't let that fool you. We're busy as ever, especially on weekends. When I arrived at about 8:30, the Steam Team were already busy with the 1630, testing various parts of the complicated mechanism. I can report that the whistle still works just great. As for the rest, you'll have to read the department blog, as usual.
On the 319, a lot of woodworking got done, as well as painting. I started by installing some new pieces of roof board, and the final piece of support molding for the upper tack molding, followed by primer. I then went to the wood shop, and with the help of Eddie Pszczolkowski (I hope), one of our new members, we ran off all of the upper tack molding. When installed, it looks like this. 
And then it too was painted with primer.
The last piece on the west end wasn't installed because I still needed to make the curved backing piece at that end, as seen here. I later cut out the stock for it, and took it home for further processing.
The wood shop crew have been busy, of course. They've finished work on all four third rail beams for the 36, as seen here. The next step will be to extract the hardware from the trailer, so we can start drilling holes and complete the assembly. And this will be good practice for everybody, because the steel cars will need another 12 beams like these.
And Bob received the rebuilt bearings for the big bandsaw in the mail today. After it was put back together, he cut out the end tack moldings for me. These need to be completed before any canvas can be installed. So I'm thankful for all the help and cooperation this project is getting.
2 comments:
Randall,
not that you do not have a lot ot do keeping the C, A & E car up to snuff; but some day you might consider building a section of replica third rail with a sing explaining to the visitors what it was.
To the best of my knowledge no traction museum has done that. Do you ?
And there were third rail systems from one end of the countru to the other. In my neck of the woods, the Northern Electric was third rail for many years. And I grew up with the Long Island railroad which has third rail to this day.
Thanks for the good work!
Ted Miles
IRM Member
Ted: We do indeed have plans to install a non-electrified third rail alongside the 50th Avenue platform at some point. It just hasn't gotten done yet due to higher priorities by our hard-working track gang. And we have a fairly good-sized collection of third rail hardware from the CTA and CA&E for this project.
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