We Have Liftoff

Frank writes...

Sunday was a day for a significant step forward toward getting the 36 back into service. Since we found a couple of broken leaf springs in the trailer truck two years ago, we've been planning to pull that truck so we could replace the springs. Various circumstances, almost all of them surrounding the construction work on Barn 4, pushed back this work.

But Sunday was the day! On Saturday, after inspection work on CTA 22 was completed, the guys brought the 36 over to the pit, pulled the kingpins, and removed the top rod from the trailer truck end. Above, shortly after I arrived, the guys pulled the car out of the barn and positioned the jacks. The main workers on this project, from start to finish, were Nick, Greg, and Brian.

The first thing was to jack up the car and remove the truck. That was the easy part. Above, Nick brings over some chains to lift the truck off the rails while Andy helpfully offers his usual mixture of folksy anecdotes, homespun wisdom, and unsolicited advice.

With assistance from Joel, Greg ran the forklift and, using the fork extenders, carried the 36's truck over to track 43. We didn't have time to start the work of removing the body bolster so we can extract the leaf springs, but that will happen soon.

In the meantime, Brian and Will brought the shop truck - a CTA 4000 motor truck - over to roll under the car. This is where things got a little complicated: it turned out that the center bearing on the shop truck was higher than we wanted, and that meant removing shims from under the shop truck's center bearing. But of course the bolts were rusted, so they needed to be heated (hence the torch set visible in the below photo). This job was done by Jimmy and Will, after which Joel used a large hammer to persuade the shims to detach from the center bearing casting. This all took a little time, but the work progressed steadily. A huge THANK YOU goes out to everyone who helped, including Nick, Greg, Brian, Joel, Jimmy, Will, and Andy.

Once the center bearing on the 4000 truck had been reinstalled minus its shims, the 36 was jacked up a bit to clear the truck's brake rigging. Above, Brian is over to the right "conducting the orchestra" consisting of Nick, running the jack at the left, and Greg, running the jack on the other side of the car. Then, we pushed the truck under the car, lowered the car, dropped in the king pins, and voila.

The car is still at an angle, but that's not a big problem for low-speed switch moves, and we hope it won't be like this for very long anyway. As soon as we have time, we'll remove the bolster keepers from atop the 36's truck, lift off the bolster, and remove the leaf spring packs so we can get the springs replaced. Fingers crossed that before long, we'll have all four of our "serviceable" wood cars cleared for service again.

I was busy with the 36 project the whole day, but in other news, Sunday marked 100 years to the day since the 714 first entered service on the North Shore. Zach and his crew marked the occasion by posting a nice sandwich board up at the depot and running the car along with the 251, which recently had some air compressor wiring work done to return it to revenue operation. It sounded like all went well.

In the evening, it was time to wrap up the winter's work on the 460. Nick, Steven, Brian, and I took the two rebuilt doors over to the car, hoisted them up, and screwed them into place. Thanks to Steven for taking the above photo, showing Nick and yours truly upstairs and Brian downstairs installing the side door. I'd like to do a little more futzing with the train door to get it to seat a bit more comfortably, but the car is now ready for service.

Sunday Progress Report

Frank writes...

Most of the department spent all of Saturday and most of Sunday switching, and we've got more on that below. For my part, I worked with various other volunteers to make progress on a few of our CA&E (and other) cars. Apologies in advance if I've forgotten anyone's name!

These aren't in chronological order, but the most notable step forward was probably the progress on the last third rail beam for the 460. Greg, Jimmy, and I went over to Barn 6, picked up the third rail beam, measured the correct end-to-end hole spacing, and brought the beam back to the car shop. Here it is after Greg set us up to drill new holes on the drill press. (I should also mention that this was made possible by Joel installing dowels in the old holes last week.) This project went smoothly, so we took the beam back over to Barn 6 just before dinnertime.

After dinner, Greg, Nick, and I installed the beam on the car. Voila, the 460 has a complete set of third rail beams, I believe for the first time since it left Wheaton in 1962.

Over on the CA&E wood car fleet, during the afternoon, Zach, Ashtin, Will, and I removed the pilot from the 36. We put the pilot along the barn wall and also moved the third rail beams from the trailer truck out of the way. We hope to pull the trailer truck within the next few weeks so that we can replace broken leaf spring packs; once that's done, the car should go back into revenue service for the first time since 2023.

I failed to get any photos, but Brian also got replacement studs and nuts - plus a new gasket - and reinstalled the feed valve on the 308. We still need to complete this car's annual inspection, but lacking motors at the moment simplifies that job.

There wasn't really any progress on the 451 this weekend, but it did get moved for the first time in a few months because the CTA 2200s that have been living at the northwest corner of Barn 4 left the barn via the pit lead and the 451 had to move out of the way. (The new denizens of Track 41 west of the curtain are Sand Springs 68 and Veracruz 19.) Here's the 451 being shoved back into its spot west of the pit. But wait, what's that in Yard 4?

That's right - like the swallows returning to San Juan Capistrano, the storage reefers have returned to Yard 4 East. Department switch crews brought them back over on Sunday morning and refilled track 42. While the reefers to the right, on track 43, are more or less immobile, the ones on track 42 are expected to move on an occasional basis to move cars in and out of the restoration bays at the east end of Barn 4 on the center track.

The other thing I worked on was Shaker Heights 63. I touched up the grey paint around the edges of the roof and the upper rear markers; although these areas were rolled with grey paint last fall, there were some spots that needed to be filled in. I still need to climb up on the roof one of these days and put a coat of grey on the center of the roof, but except for RA emblems and a bit of door-adjacent lettering, that will complete the paint job on this car.

50th Avenue

Before we get to the switching update, there's big news over at 50th Avenue! Ever since the 'L' station replaced Yard 1 back in the early 1980s, the plan has been to install a gantlet track on the west side that would allow us to operate either narrow (Chicago 'L' width) or wide (railroad width) equipment out of that track. But for the last 40 years or so, only the wide track has been in place, making it impractical to operate elevated-width equipment out of that track for the public due to the 1' or so gap. But this past week, our hardworking Track Department volunteers all took a week off their jobs and tackled the task of installing the "narrow track" on the west side of 50th. They also replaced ties and installed a switch. The result was that on Saturday, the 431 was brought over for clearance testing. After a bit of "platform shaving,” the test was a success! Thanks to Bill Wulfert for sending along these photos of the testing work on Saturday.

This is an exciting step forward. It will make it easy to operate two different shuttle trains out of 50th Avenue, meaning that if we want to, we can operate six mainline trains as part of a regular rotation instead of five - the usual four out of the depot plus two shuttle trains out of 50th. A huge THANK YOU goes out to our indefatigable Track Department for all their work to make this happen!

Switch-A-Palooza

There was quite a bit more switching on Saturday and Sunday, involving moving cars to different spots in various barns. Barns 4, 6, and 7 in particular have seen some changes. Barn 7 is now home to at least two cars that have been redeemed from exile in Barn 13. Thanks to Bill Wulfert for the following photos.

Detroit Department of Street Railways 3865 is our only "Peter Witt" and our only Detroit car. It was brought back to Barn 7 for display.

Here it is alongside CTA 2007, lettered 1892, which has been mostly stripped of parts and is due to be scrapped.

The 3865 was the subject of an uncompleted restoration by the Henry Ford Museum years before it came to IRM, so its exterior has a lot of new steel but the interior is still partially disassembled. But its exterior, though a bit worn, looks pretty nice. Another car that moved from Barn 13 to Barn 7 was Milwaukee snow sweeper B48, which is now parked between the two Shaker Heights cars I'm working on, the 63 and the 18.

The former occupant of that spot is Milwaukee 972, shown here running itself over to its new home at the west end of Barn 4 on the south track. The west end of the barn is going to be reopened to visitors, some 15 years or so after it was completely closed off, so we are moving some presentable cars into that end of the barn.

Moving off exhibit and down to Barn 13 is Milwaukee Electric 1129, our TM interurban coach.

This car was painted as Milwaukee Electric 1111 by Bill Nedden back in the 1970s, when things like that were less frowned upon than they would be now. In fact, the 1129 was sold to the London & Port Stanley before the TM ever adopted this "speed stripe" livery, so it never appeared anything like this.

You'll note that as a single-ended car, it only has doors on one side (and the ends). The left side of the car is completely "blind."

And some additional photos taken during the Saturday switch-a-thon were sent by Joel:

Here's IT 1702, looking smart with a demonstration wire spool prototypically mounted on its deck.

Milwaukee Electric L7 runs, but its air compressor needs an overhaul.

And here's the L10, which was also brought back from exile in Barn 13. It was the subject of on-again, off-again work in the early 2000s, and there's some interest in diving back into it to see if we can make it an operating locomotive for the first time in probably 50 years.

A lot more equipment has moved around that isn't pictured here; you'll just have to visit to see all the changes!

Opening Day

Frank writes...

Sunday was opening day of our 2026 regular operations season, though we were open starting at the end of March for the Bunny Trolley Hop event. But in either case, let's go back to Saturday, when I wasn't at the museum, for a quick prologue.

The car shop guys worked on Saturday to finish up the annual inspection of the 309, and we're happy to say that the car was cleared for revenue service without any major issues. Brian LaKemper submitted the above photo, showing the 309 leaving Barn 4 and the 319 heading toward Barn 4, stopped alongside to swap over the adapter coupler. 

Here's another view that was sent by Ted Kuhn. A huge thank you to everyone who worked on the 309 inspection and on starting the 319's inspection!

And that brings us to Sunday.

When I arrived, I briefly stopped over at the art exhibition opening, then snapped a photo of the season's first regular service car on my way back.

In Barn 4, the guys had started working on the 319 late Saturday. The first job tackled was the trap at the #1R corner, which had started to pull out of the body corner post. That's no good. Here we see the trap support bracket removed; thanks to Joel and Zach for drilling out and dowelling the holes so the bracket could be reattached securely.

Zach also noticed that the floor latch wasn't working right, so he and Richard removed it, as shown here. Thanks to Zach for replacing the spring in the latch! The traps on the CA&E Jewetts and all the steel cars are basically the same as on North Shore cars except that the latch is mounted to the floor next to the trap instead of to the trap itself, and consists of a pedal you step on to release the trap. When they work, it's great - you don't even have to bend over to raise the trap.

I didn't take any photos of the regular inspection work, but a huge thank you goes out to Ashtin and Will for inspecting the #2 truck and both controllers, along with some other things. Ashtin and I spent some time trying to get the feed valve working; since the 319 arrived, it's had the wrong type of feed valve, but it worked fine until last fall. We tried two different feed valves of that type before giving up on that avenue. Many thanks to Brian, who had a nicely rebuilt C6 feed valve (the correct type for the car!) on hand, and Richard, who cut a threaded stud to install it. The 319 now has the correct type of feed valve and, even more importantly, it works. We didn't get the car's inspection work completed, but we got most of it checked off, including truck inspection and brake adjustment on the #1 truck as well as inspection and some repair work in the contactor box.

On Saturday, the Diesel Department guys dropped off a gallon of red paint with a revised color match, and Good Nick wasted no time getting to work on the two doors off the 460. Here he is scuffing up the previous coat of red...

...and here are the doors after a mirror-smooth application of fresh red paint. Next weekend, we hope to take these out in the sunlight along with some older samples to confirm that we have the correct shade. If we do - fingers crossed - then these doors will get their outsides painted before reinstallation, and then the 460 will be ready for service.

For a CA&E fan, it's hard not to like this view! The 451 on the left is seen with its baggage racks, on which wire-wheeling is just about done; then the 319 is on the pit; and the 306 is on track 42. Joel surveys Wheaton West.

As always, there's plenty going on. Tim was hard at work installing floor slats in the (1)268 while Brian and Will were working on rebuilding a handful of M23 motorman's valves they pulled out of storage. Joel was cleaning stuff out of the west end of Barn 4 so it can be opened for public viewing. Speaking of which, Kansas City 755 has seen more attention from Tim, Mike, and Greg. Above, the battery compartment has been cleaned up and painted, and they've reinstalled one of the two smaller outboard markers on the back of the car. These were removed when the car went to Philadelphia. The rooftop markers, which were installed by Philadelphia, were also removed from the rear of the car.

The 755 has its share of rust, which was made more plain when the floor-level rub rail was removed. But this was anticipated; new steel will be welded in as necessary. Tim and Greg also removed the vertical rub rails, which were installed at Philadelphia, one of which was formerly located on the right side of this photo.

Finally, at the end of the evening, Greg and Nick helped me schlep the 460's fourth third rail beam - the one we didn't get installed two weeks ago - from Barn 8 over to Barn 6. We'd left the beam conveniently located next to the car, but then the car went and moved itself two barns over. The nerve. Anyway, it turns out the hole spacing is ever so slightly off, just barely enough that we couldn't get it bolted onto the truck. It won't be a difficult fix, but we ran out of time so this will have to wait.

Motion Everywhere

Frank writes...

Sunday wasn't just the second day of Bunny Trolley Hop, it was a day of movement, including after the event ended.

What I spent a good part of my afternoon moving was third rail beams. The quartet of beams built by my father over the winter were taken over to Barn 8 for installation on the 460. Above is the one at the current northwest corner of the car...

...and here's the one at the northeast corner. A huge THANK YOU goes out to Greg and Good Nick, who helped install the beams. We also got the beam at the southwest corner of the car installed, but the fourth had fouled bolt holes, so that was left for remedial drilling and later installation. I strongly suspect the 460 hasn't worn third rail beams since 1962, so it's really nice to see these on the car again.

Another thing that got moved was the 453's coupler! Dan F dropped the coupler off the west end of the car and hauled it away, as shown here surrounded by the blocking used to ease it down off the car. Yours truly helped. This coupler is missing a few parts, but we have a plan to address this so that the 453 can be run in train service in the future.

And I finally remembered to test fit that 3D-printed height-adjustment plate template by trying to bolt it both to a truck frame and to one of our newly made third rail beams. I'm happy to say that it fit both perfectly, though I'll need to swap the hole positions left to right. The next step will be to send the 3D file to a couple of area foundries and fabricators to get quotes. That's the easy part - the hard part will be paying for it! And in other news, I got some more needle-chipping done on the ceiling in the 451, though it wasn't especially photogenic.

So, what else was happening? When I arrived, Norm, Jon, Dan and Jimmy (the latter two pictured here) were working on Michigan Electric 28. The 28 sits atop the trucks from long-gone North Shore combine 250, but the North Shore set the side bearings on its trucks further out from the car's center-line than was typical. Norm speculates that this may have been to reduce swaying on the 'L.' Anyway, Norm moved the side bearings on the front truck inward many years go to match the bearing plates on the car itself, but the rear truck never had this done. Until now!

Dan headed up the work to use the mag drill to drill new holes in the center bearing support brackets, then he and Greg (shown here on the left) bolted the side bearings into place in the new, correct location. The truck was then moved back under the 28 and the car was set back down, this time with all four side bearings correctly aligned.

You'll see more about this below, but Kansas City PCC 755 has shown up in Barn 4, and here we see Steve lying down on the job as he examines the steel work that will be needed at the right rear corner of the car.

Brian was hard at work on air brake stuff, as usual. Above is a completely rebuilt air gauge for the 306 that he just completed.

As part of his project to rebuild several S governors at once, he's had to fabricate a missing retainer clip for the internal filter on one governor. Above is how they're supposed to look.

And here's the replacement on the left with the original on the right. Both of those photos were taken by Brian LaKemper. In other shop news, Joel and Jimmy completed the inspection of Veracruz 19 and Joel was up to various other things, including moving spare parts out of the west end of Barn 4 and distributing first aid kits to the operating fleet.

And now, it's time for our ever-popular series, Switching Roundup! With the vast amount of equipment that is being moved around as part of the Barn 15 project, IRM is really living up to its "Museum in Motion" tagline. We start with an update from Saturday. The below photos were taken and submitted by our redoubtable roving reporter, Bill Wulfert.

Kansas City PCC 755 is the subject of a long-running restoration project, but only now is it being brought over to Barn 4 so that the crew has readier access to tools. Above, the car is seen on the tail track.

And here it is on Station Track 1 as part of a wye move. I don't think it's been to the depot since I painted the car in KCPS colors about 25 years ago, and for all I know, it's never been through the depot. As for my corn-broom paint job, I'm pleased to say that its mediocrity has held up nicely, and the quality is just as middling now as it was when the paint was fresh.

The switch crew extracted the Cleveland PCC from track 42.

The lettering and striping on this car isn't 100% done, but it's close.

And back into Barn 4 it went, but this time on track 43 instead of 42.

That opened up a new spot for the 755. Here, the diesel has run around the car and is pushing it down the west leg of the wye.

Next stop, Central Avenue! One of these years, the 755 will hopefully be calling at this same spot, but under its own power and full of passengers.

And into the work barn it goes.

Here's a very happy Steve next to the car.

The front of Barn 4 is now far too modern for my tastes, between two PCCs and a pair of Budd 'L' cars, but what can you do?

With that, let us progress to Sunday. Although I was on the property, I was busy messing around with third rail beams and couplers and neglected to get any photos of the fun. The focus for the day was extracting the AEM7 from the west end of track 52. The AEM7 was the recipient of enough donations to purchase it indoor storage space, so it's going into Barn 15.

Here's an unusual sight, courtesy of Brian LaKemper: a train of lightweight passenger cars in Yard 6.

This photo by Jeron Glander shows track 52 completely emptied out.

And the final result, in a photo by Brian LaKemper, has a pair of IC Highliners at the west end of track 52 in the spot formerly occupied by the AEM7. All four Highliners are lined up on this track, in fact, with the two most recently operational ones to the east, where they can more easily be extracted.