As reported earlier, the 453 has been switched out of Barn 4 and the North Shore 714 is now in the roof booth for new roof mats, popularly known as "lobster traps". Wait till you sea this -- why, the jokes just write themselves. You've been warned.
But since the 453 left on short notice, the baggage racks we removed from the car were left behind. That's really not a problem. The two that were sandblasted I need to wire-wheel and paint, because they quickly develop surface rust. I started by wire-wheeling one of them to bare metal and painting it with rattle cans. First an automotive primer, then a light finish color.
This, of course, is not nearly the correct final color, but it's what they have on the shelf. We certainly don't want to leave it in primer, and when we're ready to repaint the interior, this will just be a part of the process.
Then I ran out of paint. It turns out that one can is enough for one coat on one baggage rack. Armed with this knowledge, I'll do the other sandblasted rack next time.
By the way, we noticed that on the baggage racks that haven't been sandblasted, under what's left of the tan paint is a light green - apparently a finish coat, not primer. I'm not sure I can explain that.
But now it's time to look at the714. This is the "before" picture: no lobster traps. At each end there were small rope guards, of course, to protect the canvas. They're not the real thing, so I removed them to check if there were any hidden problems with the canvas.
Sure enough, at the east (#2) end, there's a rip in the canvas where the rope guard was:
Later, I cut out a small patch and installed it...
then started painting it. This will be mostly hidden by the mat. And of course I was careful to have a plastic shield. Roof paint is very runny and I can't risk dripping anything on the car.
We had a large pile of parts from old roof mats in the barn, not far away, so I started sorting through them. Some of them are "new" pieces that were cut out many years ago but never used, others were original parts of the car, which I probably don't want to reuse. Some were not even close to the correct shape, and may have been made for one of the other North Shore cars. But some are very close, and can at least be used as patterns.
The rope guards were in the pile, so I pulled them out and stored them on top, so they don't get lost or damaged.
We also have a good supply of the transverse slats. I thought this was funny -- some of the old ones are carefully numbered with Roman numerals. I don't want to reuse them either.
This project is going to be a challenge, but we've done it before and we can do it again.
Meanwhile, Pete and Fritz continued their work on the interior of the 160.
And John was mostly working on the curved molding strips for the 306.
It's going along well.
Here he is fitting the molding into one of the arched window frames. Everything is nice and peaceful as long as he doesn't step over the fatal red line into the DMZ.
So that's our news for today. I really can't predict how long the roof mats are going to take. Among other things, we're going to need quite a lot of new wood.
5 comments:
The roman numbers are mine. These parts are from the 250 B end. The A end I used Arabic numbers. I planned to re-install them on the 250.
I planned on using them also as a pattern for the CNS&M 411 but the Jewett parts do not fit the Cincinnati cars and certainly don't fit the standard cars.
Randy Stahl
Thanks for the information, that certainly helps! I hadn't thought of the 250 and wondered why none of them seemed to fit very well. Want some souvenirs?
I was 16 and had a friend from high school helping on the 250. We had no support, no tools, no materials. I don't know what we were thinking.
I used roman numbers because I didn't have a paint brush small enough to paint on Arabic numbers. The only liquid paint I had was government surplus red lead in five gallon pails that weighed 150 lbs. I do lament the end of the 250 as I do the 318, if only I had the knowledge and ability that I have now the two cars could have been saved.
As far as souvenirs, I don't usually collect such things but thanks for the trip down memory lane !!!
Randy Stahl
Randy Stahl
According to CERA Bulletin 64 which covered the new CA&E Curved Side Cars -August 1946- (page 10) "Interior color scheme: Three cars, coral; three cars, blue; four cars, grey, with upholstering in harmonizing red, blue or brown." Perhaps the 453 was one of the "blue interior cars".
The bulletin doesn't make it clear, but the most obvious interpretation is that the 451-453 were coral with red upholstery, the 454-456 were blue, and the 457-460 were grey with brown. The word "coral" is sort of vague, I think, but the 451 and 453 have the same interior tan color with red seats, and the 460 is grey. And as it happens, the 451-453 were delivered first, then another group of three, 454-456, followed by the final four.
In any case, I'm thinking now that if I look more closely at the paint on the walls in better light, it will be the same base coat. And the top coat is what counts. But thanks for the input, Bill, suggestions are always welcome.
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