Take a Step Back...

Frank writes...

...back in time, in this case. You've read about Monday's news, but what about Sunday's news? Those suspicious characters with day jobs who were alluded to in yesterday's post (ha ha) are guilty of taking too much time to get their photos posted, so you'll just have to make do with yesterday's news tomorrow. Or something.

Sunday was the last day of Day Out With Thomas 2024, and once again I found myself going in circles. Fortunately, it was aboard a streetcar, in this case the 3142. Above, our two operating CTA streetcars are ready to leave the barn in the morning.

And here's the 3142 in Yard 7. Everything went smoothly, the crowds were happy, the weather was beautiful - what more could you want? I ended up doing 30 trips around the car line, so I certainly kept busy.

Someone else keeping busy was Joel, who spent the day inspecting the 308! As with the past few years, we've scheduled the CA&E wood cars to operate for Vintage Transport Extravaganza. But we need three cars to handle the crowds, and with a broken leaf spring under the 36, we're short a car. Enter the 308, which of course still has its motors out for repair - but is serviceable as a trailer, or "coach" as the CA&E called them. A huge thank you to Joel and to our switch crews for bringing the 308 over to Barn 4 on Saturday night and extracting it Sunday evening. I helped couple it up to the 309 and 319 and run it back to Barn 8, but managed to forget to grab a photo - oops. You'll just have to join us on August 4th for the 308's first time carrying passengers in more than five years.

Thanks, too, to Bob Olson for sending along some additional news photos! First, this is the crew that brought the 213's door over to Barn 8 and hoisted it up into the 213. You saw "the rest of the story" in the Monday update. L-R that's Jimmy, Greg, Brian, Richard, and Zach.

Below, Marcus and a younger Track Department volunteer I'm afraid I don't know are in Barn 3. Our hardworking track volunteers have finished the complete rebuild of track 34! This was a marathon of a job that took a few months. Next comes some Buildings & Grounds work, so the freight train isn't coming back into this space quite yet, but this is a huge step forward.

That folks! Below, Bob on the left, Marcus, and ____ (help!).

Wednesday Report

The most noticeable activity nowadays when you come out on a weekday is all the activity by the contractors on the south yards, and now on the Main Street project.  They're still hard at work preparing this first section of the eventual car line.

Notice the dark, ominous clouds to the west.  I'm sure you don't want to read more whining about the weather, so let me say that not as much got done today as I would have liked, but the important tasks were accomplished.  I wanted to do some switching, but that was delayed by the approaching storm, so instead I helped Pete by fixing the one remaining problem with the control system.  We then tested it with the light box, and all is well.  Pete still has some air leaks in the brake system to address, and perhaps next week we can actually run the locomotive!

John and Ed were working on the Electroliner, and Jeff and Norm were working on the Michigan 28.  One of the few remaining tasks on the LSE freight trailer is to make new side bearings, as seen here, and Gerry and John F. are working on it.

We decided on a new consist for Member's Day, so switching was required.  Here's what it looks like as the couplers are being aligned for joining two cars together.

We want to limit the mileage we put on the 309 for a couple of reasons, mostly the motor bearings, so here's a consist we haven't run before: 36, 308, and 319.  It all seems to work fine.  We will probably drop off the 308 for night operations and run only the 36 and 319 (the "Brookins Limited"!)

One thing we had noticed is that one of the new third rail beams on the 36 was incomplete, and the old fuses were flapping in the breeze.   That looks pretty dumb.  I installed some parts to hold the fuses in place, since they could not be removed from the frozen bolts on the shoe assembly, and it looks much better.

Well, that's about it for productive work.   Let's take a walking tour of the sunny South.  The B-71 is indeed now on terra firma, and needs the cables removed that hold the trucks to the frame.

Here's the switch to the new car line extension, which is straight ahead.   Yard 15 branches off to the right.

The car line has had ballast dumped all along its length, and now needs to be raised and tamped.

Curving towards the west.

And looking straight west:

Ahead is the sharp curve to the north, where the tracks will parallel Olson Rd.

And we notice that tracks 151 and 152 now have been ballasted.

Looking north along Olson, this is where the car line extension will go next.

And we also have this nice access road alongside Barn 11.

Members' Day this year will, with luck, feature several pieces of equipment that have never run under their own power at Union before, or at least not for more than forty years.  We can't make promises, but you can be sure that you will miss a lot if you're not there.

Dig This

Our friend Jeron Glander sends us pictures of another busy day at the Museum.   Since I don't live out there, I would miss a lot if I didn't have trusty reporters helping out with the breaking news.

Jeron, Rich Schauer, Bob Olson, and Gerry Dettloff helped get our little blue friend on his way.

At the south end of the property, work is progressing rapidly on the car line extension.

But even more astounding:

Work has started on installing the double-track streetcar line, working west from the Central Avenue crossing.  The street has to be excavated down to a stable layer of soil, on which the gravel roadbed can be compacted, followed by ties, rail, and pavement.  As Jeron points out, the view of the current wye track gives a good idea of what it will look like in cross-section.

More Thomas

Thomas Weekend #2 was in full swing today.  The weather was variable, to say the least, but as usual everybody seemed to be having a good time.  I was the Wye Switch tender for the day, which is a strenuous and painful job, but somebody's got to do it.   Every half hour, I throw the switch, wait for the Thomas train to go by, and then throw it back.  And then I have 20 or 25 minutes to do something else.  Whew!  So I tested the recently repaired control jumper, did more sanding in the 36, cleaned up some other parts, and so on.

Meanwhile, we had a great crowd of visitors, as usual.  DOWT provides an excellent opportunity for us to present the Museum to people who might not visit otherwise.

And so typical Museum volunteers (R) try to impress visitors (L) with their skill, intelligence, knowledge, and seriousness of purpose.   Not always successfully.

And in the midst of the crowds of families with little children, we had some visitors from far away, Bill Fronczek and Walt Stafa, old friends of ours, seen here with Norm Krentel.  Unfortunately, this picture was the last straw.  My camera revolted and has refused to operate since.  Sorry.  So all I have left are a couple of cell-phone pictures.  (You will notice that I never take "selfies".  Otherwise my camera wouldn't have lasted a week.)

Our friend Ray Bellock wanted me to point out that his wife Roberta has been a constant helper at Thomas days for the last 17 years, doing face painting, hand stamping, and temporary tattoos every single day.  But this is probably her last year.   We can't thank her enough for all the joy she's given the younger visitors for all this time!

On the other hand, that sounds to me like a job opportunity for somebody out there!

And Volkmann has been hard at work; the switch to the south carline has been installed and track is extending towards the south and west.  I think this is really exciting.

If my calculations are correct, in one day, we ran 14 Thomas train trips, a smaller number for the Percy train, and the four streetcars must each have run about 30 round trips.  This is an impressive achievement which required the cooperation of a great many volunteers, something of which we can all be proud.

Wednesday Report

We'll start today by looking at the progress being made by Volkmann Railroad Contractors on the south yards and the new car line.

 New switches are being installed for the next two tracks in Yard 15.   Here we are looking east.

And this is looking west. 

And here is the right-of-way for the new streetcar line, which will pass south of Yard 15.  This is probably a much better roadbed than most interurbans ever had.   And it appears to be wide enough for two tracks. 

Looking east towards the curve.

And they are putting in the switch for the car line on the lead to 15. 

I went over to Barn 11 to do some more cleaning in the 321.  If I do a little each day, perhaps it will eventually get done.  I ran into Dave Rogan and Victor H., who are working on the Pennsy bobber.   

Here Victor points out all the fixes made to the platform.  You've probably never been inside the car, so come on up!

Much of the ceiling structure had to be replaced; the new boards are evident.

 And likewise at the other end.

 Looking up into the cupola.

This is an authentic PRR stove.

The tan color is the final finish.

And later, in the shop, Victor showed me one of the grab irons from the car, an unusual type of casting which will have to be reproduced.

Then I wandered over to Barn 4 to see what was happening.   Pete Galayda was working, as usual, on the Charles City engine.  

Gerry Dettloff and I helped out with sequencing the control, with Mike McCraren recording the data as the sequence proceeds.

It's not as easy as it is on the passenger electric cars.  The contactors are under this hood, which cannot be disassembled, so two of us have to squeeze into this narrow space and watch the contactors operate on 600V a few inches away as the third person operates the controller.  Pete helpfully explained that "nobody has been zapped yet."  There's not much room, and all you can do is crouch there and hope that the electricity doesn't leak out.

(Illustration by James Thurber)

As before, the contactors sequenced in series but not in parallel.  So we got out the circuit diagram and traced the parallel control circuits to find the open.  It turns out there's an interlock on the reverser which is connected to the motor cutout switches.  This engine has four 600V motors in two permanent series pairs, for operation on either 600V or 1200V trolley.  Motors are cut out not by opening the connections, but shorting across the pair of motors.   So if either pair is cut out, and you try to advance beyond full series, nothing happens due to this interlock.   I crawled back under the hood; this part of the reverser is in the most inaccessible location, but I was able to fix it, and now everything sequences properly.   So that's a big step forward.   We should be able to test the locomotive for operation soon.

Jon Fenlaciki is still working on Indiana Railroad 65; there are still a few details to be taken care of.   The seats all had a small metal pamphlet holder attached to the back; here's one of the many Jon has been painting.   The IRR put out a newsletter called the "Hoosier Traveller" for passengers to read, much as Metra does today, and they fit these metal holders exactly.  And Jon asked me to point out that the 65 project is still in the hole, so your donations would be most appreciated.

 The rest of the day was mostly spent sanding and painting in the #2 vestibule of the 36.  Here it is after the flag box and the shelf have been removed.  They were taken over to our nice air-conditioned shop for further work.

 It usually isn't necessary to remove all of the original Pullman Green paint in the vestibules.  This stuff is like glue and very hard to eradicate.

And here's some more brown primer on the ceiling and other parts of the vestibule.   This will continue as time permits.  But this Saturday will be Thomas again, so I don't know what I will be doing.  But we'll post it here, newsworthy or not.