Spark Gap Lightning Arrester

As part of our earlier discussion of car lightning arresters, Dan Mulvihill has provided some new information.

This comes from an ARM reprint of a New Orleana Public Service equipment book. 

This is a nice, clear explanation of how a spark gap arrester works.  (Although there seems to be a misprint in Design Principles #1.  Should be   "Arrester must be inoperative on trolley voltage.")

I was struck by the reference to the "left hand three-finger" rule.  In physics we always use a right-hand rule, although there are various versions of it.

And I still don't understand the statements in the Westinghouse AMM manual about leaving the light circuits on during an electrical storm.  In any case, thanks, Dan!

That Was Easy

Every so often, clean living seems to pay off.  I had been worried about what might be wrong with the 308, and what I might find when I opened the reverser.  There was a slight chance it was a motor problem, which would be awful, and otherwise it was either a blown operating coil, or wrecked contact fingers, or the blowout coil inside the rocker arm....

It took a while to find the problem, but it was just a couple of loose screws.  The contacts on the rocker arm are held on by flat head machine screws, and a couple of those for the control circuit had worked loose.  The finger then is resting on the screw, and if the screw is out far enough it's no longer making electrical contact.  So the problem had just been an open circuit in one direction, and no damage was done.  Once identified, the problem was easy to fix, of course.  After  careful testing, I ran the car back and forth five or ten feet a couple of times, coupled it back up to the 319, and decided we're ready for service!  (I also then checked the reversers on the 309, but they have contacts held on in a different manner, and it's not a problem.)    So.....

It can now be revealed that we're planning to run all four cars on Saturday, Sept. 14, for Museum Showcase Weekend (also dba Member's Day) and we need another trainman or two. Or even three, come to think of it.  For the first time we'll be carrying passengers in one of the oldest operating interurban cars, so you want to be there and help out, if you think about it.  Nobody else on the planet has anything like this.

I then worked on retrieving shims for the 36's side bearings from various spare trucks, but that will take some more time and effort.  And I bolted up the brackets that hold the motor leads more securely, and a few other boring tasks like that.  Nothing worth taking a picture of, I'm afraid.  So after the work is done, let's take a brief walk to cool off.  The weather is great, and there's a lot to look at.

That's funny, Yard 5 looks kind of empty -- what could be missing?

Oh, of course!  There's a UP turbine they somehow moved out onto the main.  With the Centennial behind it.  Now if we only had a long coal train, and some sort of mountain to pull it over....

Just east of it is this unusual consist.

Among other things, another movie crew was busy setting up today for a film shoot, and our guys were switching all sorts of cars around the property.   Back on the connector we have this string of tank cars.  Let's see, this must be where Bob keeps his wine, his molasses, and the last one is lettered for DoD, so maybe that's rocket fuel, I'm not sure.  Don't get too close!

And here's one of the world's most beautiful Hudsons.  The sand tower is always a nice accent to any locomotive picture.

 

 While it's true that we have not yet finished painting the 451, at least we keep it inside and out of public view, rather than rusting away not far from a busy highway.  There's no substitute for indoor storage.

Anyway, remember that Museum Showcase Weekend will be Sept. 14 and 15, and our showcases will be showcasing all the most showcaseable railroad equipment around!   Be there!

More pilot work, or following the Primer Directive.

Al writes…

Went out yesterday morning with plans to do a bit more work on the 36's pilot. Arrived and found the shop building almost empty. It seems most folks were out helping to load that blue thing on a flatbed truck. The pilot had been moved and turned over so I had access to its backside so to speak. With the opportunity to wire wheel most of it although the structure that supports the trip lever prevented some access.

I then took the opportunity to give that side of the pilot a coat of primer.

Also displaying a fresh coat of primer was the roof of the Michigan Electric 28.

In the afternoon Bob Kutella's gang started work on the Great Northern tank car. Plans are to have the car sandblasted and to begin painting fairly quickly. Bob detailed the history of the car in his recent blog.

There were a couple of unusual sites around the campus. One was the UP turbine sitting on the main. This is a leftover from the 60th anniversary celebration on Labor Day.

Another was the unusual appearance of the Lackawanna  3001 box cab outside of barn 2. I don't know if there are any plans for it or it was simply outside to allow access to the 803 in the barn 9.

Best Labor Day Ever

Today was probably the best Labor Day ever, unless my memory is getting senile.  The weather was perfect, lots of trains were running, and we had a great crowd of visitors enjoying themselves. What more could you want?

We had two steam locomotives operating, as before, along with many other trains.  Attendance was huge.

The 308 and 319 were operating again.  I was the motorman, with Larry Stone as conductor.  We were nearly full on every trip, and never had time to take a break, so we never got around to the usual crew portrait.  Sorry, I'm sure you're crushed.  But things went well and we both had a great time.

I saw lots of old friends.  Phil Hehn was running the 63, Dennis Daugherty and Larry Goerges were there, and so on.  With all the various trains running, there were some unavoidable delays, but the visitors seemed more than satisfied.  It's always sort of amusing when someone is pleasantly surprised to learn that his ticket is good for unlimited train rides.  "Wow, let's ride all the trains we can!"

It takes a large number of people to keep this sort of operating going, and with several unusual features, it's a a challenge.. I can't even begin to list all the people who were involved in operations.  Jeff Fryman was the dispatcher, and managed to keep things going well, and keep cool at the same time.

But there's a fly in every ointment.  The 308 developed a problem: it seems to be motoring in one direction but not the other.  I didn't notice this until late in the day, since the difference between four and six motors is not immediately obvious.  With Larry's help, I did some testing, and then I decided to cancel our last trip.  We haven't blown a fuse, it can't be a grid and I'm pretty sure it can't be a motor problem, it's got to be something in the reverser.  We have several spare reversers of this type (DB-20), so a defective finger or coil can be replaced as needed.  By the end of the day, I was not willing to crawl under the car and start investigating further.  Next time.  I'm sure it's something we can fix.

Chuck Amstein Photos from Saturday

Chuck has been working overtime, and you can be sure we'll remember that when his annual performance review comes up.  Here are his pictures from Saturday, including the night photo shoot.  (Insert usual threats and admonitions.)  Enjoy!

Update:  Here's his video of the Centennial in action!

And here we see Engineman Amstein, enjoying his job.

Lots of CA&E pictures.  He knows which side his bread is buttered on.

 

Chuck points out that the 803 still has a push pole, but no poling pockets.  Good luck with that!

Saturday Night Photo Shoot

First we concentrate on the UP.




















Then everything Burlington.







Unfortunately his lens fogged up, so several parts of the night photo shoot were missed.  If anyone can fill in the gaps, please do so!   Thanks.

Let Us Level With You

Frank and I don't often get to work together, but on Saturday we completed two major projects.  We were busy and don't have much to show of the various trains that were running; we'll catch up on that later.  But it was great to hear steam whistles every so often as we were working.  And also the sound of CA&E trombones -- the 308 and 319 were in service, with Dan Buck as motorman and Larry Stone as conductor.

In the morning, I helped Frank paint the 205, our Indiana Railroad streetcar, as posted earlier

And in the afternoon, he helped me put CA&E 36 on the level.  The problem was explained in an earlier post here.  We had all the necessary parts and tools available, and I had finished the prep work, so this seemed like an opportune time.  While the 308 and 319 were in revenue service, the 36 was moved to the door.  The sidewalk provides a good surface for supporting the jacks.  The body did not have to be raised very far, and the kingpin remained in position.


We then let the car down onto blocks between the side bearings for added safety.  The arrows point to the new 2" thick shims inserted above the old 1" shims, and new bolts were used to hold it all together.

It took a while, but everything went well.  The shims are heavy, but Frank was able to lift them into position in spite of the inconvenient location. And thanks to Rod Turner for supplying the new hardware.

When we were done, of course we wanted to try it out.  The 36 and 309 were run out to the road on a brief fan trip.









And this is the result of all that effort: the two cars are parallel!  It looks much better, and both ends now have couplers at the correct height.  Who would think 2" could make that much difference?

At Long Last

It took enough time, but over the last two days we got the 205 painted Indiana Railroad orange.  Finally!

I took Friday the 30th off of work and headed out to the museum early.  I removed the side windows from the car (below) and opened up the can of IRR orange we had procured a year or two ago.  I wanted to get some of the more time-consuming painting out of the way as well as paint around the windows, so that I wouldn't have to leave the car with the windows out for longer than necessary since it's in a public barn.  So I painted around the side windows and also did the anti-climbers at both ends, the fold-out roof access steps, and edged around the door windows.  Afterward I went up to the station to see what was running; Chuck Amstein photos of the day's trains are in the previous post.

Saturday I again got out to IRM early and met my father.  We got to work on the remaining portions of the 205, starting with the letter board and then continuing onto the side sheets, the ends, and finally the doors.  For the letter board and side sheets my father ran the trim roller (below) while I did corners, rivets, and touch-up with a brush.  We covered a lot of ground quickly; once we got down to the ends and the doors the roller work was pretty much done so I tackled those areas with the brush while my father headed over to Barn 8 to the CA&E woods.  It took about five hours but we got the entire car done with the results seen at the top of the post (after I put the side windows back in).

 So what still needs to be done?  First, I need to buy more IRR Green paint.  The west end anticlimber and steps still need to be painted and I'll need the green to do the lettering and striping.  Other than that, there are a couple of pieces of wood trim I'd still like to replace; I still need to install new door edge rubber; and I need to vacuum the interior and wipe down the seats.  Then this job is done and the museum has a nice, presentable display piece.

When I was done painting the 205 I headed over to Barn 8 to help out my father, but I believe a separate post on our activities there will be forthcoming.  I eventually ambled up to the depot where there was a truly impressive array of equipment in operation.  As shown below, there were two steam engines in operation - 0-6-0T 126 is shown on Station Track 1 with a caboose train and the "Leviathan" is on Station 2 with a coach train.

In addition the Zephyr was running (and even serving lunch!), the bi-levels were out, South Shore 803 was doing light engine moves for photographers, and of course the CA&E was well represented with the 319 and 308 in service.  I took the below photo; hopefully I'll be able to do a more faithful re-creation of this shot sometime soon.

And there was more to see, including the UP turbine set out on the West Wye along with the Union Pacific's own (operating) Centennial, shown below.  The festivities aren't over - there will be a lot of neat stuff operating throughout the weekend.  Hey, you've been looking for a good excuse to visit McHenry County; why not come to Union this weekend and join in the fun?