Typical Wednesday

Today was another typical, busy day at the Museum, as we'll see.  Now last Wednesday I was on vacation; I would assume a lot of work got done, but if something seems to occur, yet doesn't get posted on the Internet, did it really happen?   The answer is still up in the air.

Be that as it may, there was more painting to be done on the 319's vestibules.  I finished the lettering over the side doors at both ends:

And then started painting the floors with the finish color.  A second coat at the #1 end:

This was painted at least four years ago; notice how much darker the first coat appears above.

You will notice that the 319's trap doors - on the motorman's side only - resemble the surface of the Moon: lots of circular craters.  In the absence of micrometeorite strikes, this can only be due to the use of a motorman's stool with tubular metal legs, but missing its rubber feet.

And in fact, here's the stool that came with the car.  I noticed this problem soon after we got the car and bought a couple dollar's worth of rubber tips to keep the problem from getting worse, but I think it's time to get rid of this thing.   It doesn't look at all like what motormen would actually use, I believe.

And for that matter, if anyone has an authentic CA&E motorman's stool in his collection, I'd love to get pictures and drawings so one or more replicas could be made for use in revenue service.   That would be an enjoyable home project.

And then, a first coat on the #2 vestibule:

So let's see what else is going on.   Lorne is giving parts for the Cleveland PCC a flawless paint job, as usual:

And John has painted the new door for the 213:

And Tim is rebuilding this end of the 1754.  Because of the way various parts overlap, the end has to be finished before he can install the tack molding and do more work on the roof.

This reminds me of the 308 from about 15 years ago.

And he is making lots of new wood pieces for this project.

Speaking of the 308, here Norm and Jeff are working on a metal plate for the end of the 28.  This looks a lot like the one I had to cut off the platform of the 308, although the dimensions are undoubtedly different.

 And finally, on the 308 itself a couple of light fixtures needed to be repainted.  Earlier this year it took some work to get all of the light circuits working again, and one of the fixtures had to be replaced.  I hope you can see that it now looks better.

This Saturday will be a special Chicago and North Western Day at IRM, including a special night-time photo session (at extra charge).  Whether or not you're primarily a North Western fan, you won't want to miss this!