Them's the Brakes

Frank writes...

Earlier this year, we took delivery of some new brake shoes for Shaker Heights 18. One of the shoes that came with the car was unusable for regular service and needed to be replaced, and as luck would have it, the car uses a design that seems to have been practically unique to Cleveland Railway. Fortunately, we were able to have a handful of new shoes cast, and on Sunday we were finally able to install one on the car.

Voila! The nice brand-new shoe is shown here during test fitting, with the cotter pin attachment method clearly visible. A huge thank you goes out to Jimmy and Bill, who worked with me on this at times three-man job, and to Joel, Mikey, Nathan, and the other guys who brought the car over to the inspection pit on Saturday evening. Joel pointed out that the 18 was the first car inside the newly built section of Barn 4, though of course it was only passing through on its way to the pit and was being pushed by a diesel, to boot. But hey, I'll take it.

After some work on brake adjustment and other pit tasks like checking pole piece clearance, we took the car around the car line once to make sure the brakes weren't binding. We concluded that they were pretty good, though the various pivot points on the truck rigging could use some oil. Here, the car shows off its nice red roof at Central Avenue, though of course I forgot to bring my line pole filter.

Another nice view of the car's newly painted roof is this shot, taken Saturday evening by Mikey M. Don't get too used to that section of old paint on the side of the car at the front of the drop section.

Following a successful test trip we put the 18 back in Barn 7 and headed to dinner. After dinner, I put some white primer on the bare metal (and bare Bondo) spots on the last unpainted section of the left side of the car below the belt rail.

The last unpainted section of the right side of the car below the belt rail, the panel in between the doors, also got white primer. Before heading home, I was also able to create a temporary bell cord hanger using a strip of leather. The 18 has been missing the hanger located over the conductor's station since we got the car; the loop that the bell cord passes through came with the car but not the fixture that attaches to the ceiling, so we'll need to find a replacement for that. In the meantime, I rigged up a temporary hanger, so now the conductor can signal the motorman. Thanks to Jimmy and Bill for removing the loop casting and to Matthew for helping install the new hanger.

So what else was happening? A few of the regulars were out of town (and, in some cases, out of the country) but when I first arrived the loop at Electric Park was veritably strewn with buses.

It turns out that this week, the Hoffman Bus Garage will be getting lights for the first time since it was built about two decades ago. So that's exciting. Here, you can see a demonstration of how you "switch" buses, with Richard in the backhoe and Steven at the wheel of our North Shore ACF bus.

Here's another view of the ACF bus. This is a neat piece, I'll admit, and a good candidate for turn-key off-site restoration (hint, hint to you North Shore fans). The bus guys recently sent out most, or maybe all, of the windows from this bus for re-glazing.

Hey, you like breakfast, right? Of course you do! It's the most important meal of the day. And what better way to enjoy your breakfast than in the historic dining car Ceres as you rocket down the IRM main line at speeds approaching 30mph? This has never before been possible, but it is now. Click here to find out more.