Changes to the Neighborhood

Frank writes…

Sunday was the last day of steam operation at IRM for the year; there was also a “horn blow” over in Electric Park, with various people over there tooting their own horns thanks to the hardworking air compressors in ComEd 4. I’m not sure whether that was really a public event, as I hadn’t read anything about it in advance. But closer to home, right in the Barn 4 Electric Car Shop, a major reshuffling has been afoot.

Above, we're at the southeast corner of Barn 4, in the new addition, looking west-northwest. On Saturday, the guys moved Michigan Electric 28 (visible at left) and Cleveland 4223, which is behind it, one spot further east. Both cars will end up one more berth to the east - the 28's long-term home will be where the photographer is standing - but, as you can tell, more stuff needs to be moved out of the way first. But don't get used to this view, because it's about to change.

About an hour later, we're over at the northeast corner of the building looking at the 28, the 306, and CA&E 460, which is on the pit for its annual inspection. But something's missing...

You guessed it - Green Bay & Western 109, the occupant of the east berth on track 42 since May of last year, has moved on. It was switched over to its new home in Barn 3, where it will serve as a display piece and as classroom space. It does look pretty snazzy out in the sunlight. Many thanks to the folks on the switch crew who made this happen! Everyone is glad to see the car moved to public display where it can be enjoyed by our visitors. Stay tuned for news on what will take the 109's place.

One of my projects for the day was working on the two brackets for the 453 we received from ECTM, as noted last week. Here they are.

And here's the first bracket installed on the car. It's the vertical angle-iron piece running top-to-bottom down the middle of the step well; you can probably see the nice new hardware holding it in place at the top. Unfortunately, we ran out of the correct type of bolts, so we'll need to install the second bracket next time. A huge THANK YOU goes out to Mikey, Jimmy, and Drew, who were indispensable in this installation project.

On the other side of the car, here's an action shot of Mikey using a hand sledge to drive the remnants of the old bolts out of the holes. Those bolts had been torched off and had then rusted in place, so driving them out was quite a chore. Jimmy (who also took turns at the sledge) holds the light while Drew looks on.

Another task I had was cleaning up around the 451. The car will be moved over to Barn 8 for a little while to allow a high-priority project into Barn 4 (again, don't touch that dial - all will be revealed in time). Many, many thanks to Richard, who helped me load baggage racks from the car onto shelving in the "lean-three." And thanks to Zach and Drew, who helped me install two of the four newly built third rail beams for the car. Above is the first...

...and here's the second. Whew! The motorized forklift that my father picked up a few years ago was extremely helpful with this job. The last two beams will wait for next time.

And finally, I went over to the 18 after dinner and took down the signal bell cord. That allowed me to remove two of the leather straps that need replacing - one was essentially hanging by a thread and the other had parted entirely, and was held together by tape. You can see one of the straps that's still in good shape at the top left of this photo, for what it's worth.