Weekday Report

On Wednesday, among other things, I dropped off the items recently donated and shown in a previous post.

During the most recent operation of the 319, we noticed that a metal strip on the floor had come loose and was sticking up, like a miniature "snakehead" from the early days of railroading.  This wouldn't kill anybody, but people with open-toed shoes might get hurt.  Anyway, I fixed it.  And we'll have to keep an eye on it.

And on Thursday morning, the machinist finished reboring the final motor bearing for the 309.  I finally thought of taking a brief picture of the machine in operation.

All this work was done by Gabriel's Machine Shop in Oswego, not too far from where I live.  Gabriel is a good guy to work with, and an interesting person.  He's from Argentina, and an inventor.  He markets a machine he designed for making food packets for things like soy sauce.  I personally have no use for soy sauce, but more to the point, he also does a lot of work on engines for race cars and antique automobiles.  They're certainly interesting to look at.  And much more complex than the motor bearings we needed to have machined.

Back at the Museum, John and Gerry were working on parts for the 306, but I was busy putting the bearing into the oven and didn't get a picture of them at work.  Gerry was painting these parts, among other things.

Out in the barn, two guys I hadn't met before were working on installing windows in the 109. Their names are Ralph Durham and Ray Amash.  This car is really going to be a great addition to the collection when it's finished.

I put the newly-machined bearing into the big oven in order to break the epoxy holding the two halves together.  After a few hours it was up to 500F but still didn't come apart.  So I have left it in the oven and will try again when I get a chance.