Special Charter

 On Friday, IRM hosted a charter group of children from the Boys and Girls Club of Chicago, sponsored by the Union League, I was told.  Community outreach is an important part of our mission, so some special equipment was brought out that you don't ordinarily see on a weekday.

Such as the Shay, pulling the heavyweight coach train.

And our oldest Chicago L car, the 24.

A large number of volunteers showed up to make all this possible, including in particular the Steam Dept., Operations, and the Car Dept.  (not just us old retired guys!)

Everything went smoothly, and I believe a good time was had by all.

The 4410 and 4412 provided service for our regular visitors.

Meanwhile, back in the car shop, it was more of the usual activities.  As reported before, some of the headlight resistors on the 319 were blown out.  And since we would like to be able to run the wood cars after dark later this year, it's time to try to fix it.  

I soon decided that it was far better and easier to remove the individual tubes rather than try removing the entire box, with its wiring and so on.

So the three that were obviously bad were left on the bench in the shop for the electrical experts to ponder.  I don't remember what the cold resistance for the coils should be, but that can easily be measured next time.

I did some more wire-wheeling in the smoker of the 453, and after Joel provided me with a supply of leather straps, I started attaching one of the roof cables to the trolley boards.

Tim continues work on the platform of the 2872.

John spent much of the day on woodwork for the 306, but here he is painting the little latches for the window guards.  He also reports he now has a good formula for the orange paint, so the 306 will soon start looking much better!