Friday, October 13, 2017

Western Railway Museum

One of the highlights of our trip to California was a visit to the Western Railway Museum at Rio Vista Junction.  The first thing you see is the visitor's center, which is very impressive.  The building houses displays, offices, a theater, and the huge library section, which we'll see later.


Outside the three-car train was outside for a charter of some sort, and was about to be put back in the barn.




We'll see the interiors of these cars in a later installment.



And here's one of the Key System bridge units.


Interior of the 182:


The infamously cramped cab.  


But we'll cover the collection in future posts.   For now, we'll look at the facilities.  First, the guys wanted to show me the shop.


That's Jim Ward, who spent quite a bit of time showing us around.



This is the museum's first car; its ends are being rebuilt.






And a Sacramento Northern steeple cab, in the shop for maintenance.


This is a Birney truck, which is largely being rebuilt with many new castings.


Here's the pattern for one of the many parts of the built-up wheels.


And they proudly showed us the aluminum castings used for making the patterns.


This pallet has several new truck parts on it.


Here we're having lunch with Jim Ward and Ted Miles, both IRM members.


Then Ted took us on a tour of the library facilities.  Here he is with Alan Fisher, the chief archivist.


Everything is well-organized and very professional looking.




In the distance is Ted's wife Arlene, who also works on archiving.


Now we'll step outside and see the picnic grove area.



A flag stop at the north end of the property, with a train order signal.


The substation is actually an old portable sub, now inside its own little shed.  The car itself is being resided.


And here are some of the visitor displays.





There will be lots more coming up!

5 comments:

  1. Glad you had fun, I did too!

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  2. That's nice. It would be even nicer if you identified yourself. :)

    Meanwhile, an astute reader asks about the bridge units, "Did you notice the control/brake layout?" Sure, usually the controller is on the left and the brake valve is on the right, for almost any configuration on an electric car. Unless you're in England. I have no idea why the Key System arranged the controls this way, but I doubt this poses much of a problem for the motorman. This isn't quite like driving a car. But with luck maybe someday I'll get a chance to test that theory.

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  3. Randy, if you want to try operating a car with the controls in reverse position, take a trip on Northwestern Elevated #24. Initially, it's a little unnerving; but, in short order, you'll get accustomed to it.

    Dan Buck

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  4. Great post and nice to finally to see a picture of Ted to put a face to the name!

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  5. Dan: Of course! I actually have operated it once or twice, but I'd forgotten about the reversed positions. What I DO remember is how hard it is to keep the spring-loaded C36 controller in the right position. What an annoying design.

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