Sunday Report

Frank writes...

Guess what? More seats!

Above is the "before" picture taken at the start of Sunday's work; the seat back on the right is wedged into place but isn't actually attached. Below is the "after" picture showing the three newly installed seats.

Two of these needed to use antimacassars from the 451 because theirs were damaged; since the 451 is being backdated and won't need its, it can supply spare antimacassars to the 460 (and, eventually, to the 453). The third seat put up a tremendous fight; I even managed to break off a tap trying to get the seat back installed. Many thanks to Richard, who extracted the broken-off tap, and to Matt K, who provided the horsepower and extra hands needed to finally force the seat into position and get it screwed in. I also carted some old seat backs over to the 451 for storage and returned with more reupholstered cushions. We're now over the 50% mark - 14 seats down, 13 to go!

I found a second cash fare receipt wedged into one of the antimacassars; this one is from an unknown August 11th (though after the cutback to Forest Park, so that limits it to the years 1954-1956) for an eastbound trip from Glen Ellyn to Lombard for 20 cents.

Next door, Jimmy and Greg were working to diagnose an issue with the Illinois Central 1920s MU cars. These cars run, but a short between the conductor's signal buzzer wire and the electric brake wiring means that whenever the train is in "release," the buzzer sounds incessantly. That's certainly annoying! The two investigators, with some help from Richard, were able to trace the short. The next step will be to fix it.

These cars are a bit tired, but they're in remarkable condition considering that IRM has done only minimal restoration. Basically everything you see, from the paint to the seats, is original to when these cars left service 50+ years ago.

Over in the new shop extension, Joel and Will were working on installing shelves and support stringers. This is shaping up to be an extremely impressive storage facility!

"Here we see the North American Railway Museum Volunteer in his native habitat." Working on a different kind of shelf, Richard was back to work on the display of historic rail sections in Barn 8. He's finishing up signage for the bottom shelf, after which the shelf above it - which will feature LED lighting to illuminate the rail underneath - will go in.

Good Nick spent the day refinishing hardware for hanging trolley wire from the new troughs, shown here, that will go over track 41 in the new shop extension. Many thanks to the B&G crew who built these! Nick got all the hangers repainted and installed by the end of the day.

Housecleaning

There are several ongoing projects during the winter in the Car Dept., and Frank will probably have a more detailed explanation than I can give.  But I spent some time cleaning up the interior of the Jewell Road shelter on Saturday.

This is actually an improvement.  With some work, I finally found the floor, as Bruneau would say.

And I plan to start repairing and replacing the interior woodwork soon.

But that can't compare to the new shelves being installed in the Lean-Zero.  This will be just like going to your favorite big-box store, looking through the shelves and picking out what you want with help from the friendly staff as needed, and saving big money.  

The 4290 was over the pit for inspection.

And Tim continues carefully stripping the interior of the 1268.

In Memoriam Larry Goerges

We regret to announce the death of Larry Goerges, one of the earlier and long-time members of IRM.  Details of his life and funeral arrangements are in this obituary.

And here are the few pictures of him I could find quickly:

Larry in the T shirt, unloading seats from the 1129.  Probably in the late 50's!

The 1960 Annual Meeting.  Larry is in the middle, in suit and tie, facing the camera.

And as we more likely remember him.  On the right, in 2021, with Dick Lukin.

He was always a great guy to talk to and will certainly be missed.

In Memoriam Henry Vincent

We regret to announce the death of a long-time IRM member and friend of everyone who knew him, Henry Vincent.  He died on Feb. 2nd, after a long illness.  At the present time there will be no visitation or funeral.  A Celebration of Life will be held later this year at IRM, and details will be announced when they are determined.  

In the meantime, we present just a few pictures of him at work at the Museum.

General Vincent, Army of the Kishwaukee

A Visit to IRM in 1970

Art Peterson has sent in a number of photos he took on two visits to IRM in 1970, the first on July 22nd and the second on September 19th. Enjoy!

All photos are by Art Peterson and may not be reproduced without permission.

We'll start with the July photos. Here, of course, we see the E5 and the Zephyr on the east leg of the wye. But something's missing - namely, the south wye switch! The E5 had only been on the property about a year at this point. In the back left is the depot, with a Burlington coach behind it (and if you look really closely, I'm pretty sure that's the Clark "demonstrator" B2 PCC truck sitting just east of the depot on display). At far right that looks like the Santa Fe combine behind the "Juno."

Here's the E5 looking west, with Yard 1 in the background. The Santa Fe lounge and the 431 are visible. The E5, of course, is still identified as C&S 9952A with "Texas Zephyr" lettering and no name on the flank.

Today this spot is just east of the Depot Street platform. We're looking west-southwest with the 144 visible on (what today is) the west wye. Ties are laid out for one of the stub tracks east of the depot. In the left background that's probably the 160, though it could be the 253.

The "Venus" hasn't changed too much over the years, though I'm not sure how often we lower the shades.

This is the old "caboose track" near the substation that roughly followed what today is the route of the car line onto the tail track. Someone, probably Ray Neuhaus, has been hard at work giving the 1268 a coat of paint. I don't believe the 1268 was ever really used in the old days, not until Tim restored it in the 2010s; the standard CRT train in the 1970s was the 1808 pulling/pushing the demotored 1024.

I suspect this is the 1797, as the 1808 was operational at this time and would have looked better. Anyone know where this photo was taken? Is this the caboose track?

The 65 is looking sharp with a fresh coat of orange (albeit Transport Company orange, which was available and cheap, I suppose). It's in Yard 1 and Art is standing roughly where the north end of the 50th Avenue platform is today looking northwest. IT 277 is behind it.

And then, we have a batch of photos from September:

 

Here's an unusual shot: this is CGW 99, our business car, before it got painted red. I'll confess, I didn't realize that had happened at IRM. Beyond it is the "Ely." I'm not sure where this photo was taken but it might be in Yard 3.

This is North Shore 202, the last NSL wood interurban car. This photo was taken shortly after the car arrived in Union - it wasn't moved until mid-1970, which I guess makes it the last car moved from North Chicago. By the time it came to Union, it had spent years as an MD car (complete with extra baggage doors and wood-block flooring) and after that had spent years as a grounded body. At some point after this photo was taken the car was painted dark green, but it was judged to be too much of an eyesore and was scrapped in 1974. One of the Milwaukee Twin Coach buses, possibly the one that ended up as the infamous "terrarium," is in the left background. This is about where the northwest corner of Yard 5 is today.

A very recent arrival was Chicago Surface Lines 9020, which like the 202 arrived at Union in mid-1970. This photo shows it in the middle of being repainted. To the right is CSL 4001, which arrived at the same time and received a paint job shortly after the 9020 did. These cars were stored about where track 54 is today. In the left background can be seen Shay 5, still wearing its Klickitat Lumber lettering.

The Class B is shown pushing Soo Line 33096, a very historic 1913 single-sheathed boxcar that had just arrived at IRM about a year earlier under the guise of its work car number, X1632. I believe this is out by the west switch, near where Spaulding Tower is now.

And to finish the presentation we have Howard Odinius, the museum founder himself, at the controller of the 144.

Click to return to the Krambles-Peterson Collection

"Streetcar Available"

Our old friend Ron Smolen informs us that a streetcar body inside a spaghetti restaurant in Columbus, O. is available, because the building is about to be demolished, after part of the roof collapsed.  This body didn't appear on either PNAERC or the "chicken coop" list, but from the two pictures at this link it looks like it might have been legit.  I certainly want nothing to do with it, but there it is for the historical record. 

 

Though if you want it, you'd better act now!  :)

Frank adds...

It is indeed legit, or at least parts of it are. I'm reasonably certain it's an ex-Dallas Railway & Terminal 111-115 series double-truck Birney that was built by American in 1922 for Texas Interurban Railway as part of the TIRy 100-104 series. I'm not sure how much of the wood is original; these spaghetti restaurant cars vary a lot, from cars with mostly original wood to cars that look like they were torn down to a steel skeleton and all the original wood replaced by house construction-grade wood.

Refining the Process

Frank writes...

You get one guess about what I was up to on Sunday. ...did you guess "seats in the 460?" Then you win the prize - Andy Sunderland's voice on your home answering machine! But I digress.

I could have called today's post "I get by with a little help from my friends" because it was a real team effort. To start the day, Greg and Good Nick helped me use the Taylor-Dunn to take all the old seats from the 460 that we'd already removed over to the 451 for storage. We also brought back all the reupholstered seat backs and a few cushions. Above, you can see the interior of the 460 with fewer old seats and more new seats stored throughout the car.

As we go along, we're steadily refining the process for replacing these seats. The seat backs are attached with three 1/4-20 machine screws that go in through the tubular frame along the top (the seat backs have wooden frames but these screws thread into steel inserts), plus anywhere from zero to three wood screws that go at the bottom from underneath the cushions. They seat into the base of the frame. It's a tight fit, which of course is intentional. The antimacassars add a degree of difficulty, because not only do we need to wedge the new seats into place, but we need to line up the original holes in the antimacassars with the holes in the tubular frame and the threaded steel inserts. Some of the seats only need a "normal" amount of horsepower to get into place; above, I'm using an awl to ensure the seat back is positioned correctly in line with the frame.

And then sometimes you really need to push to get the seat back seated all the way into the frame. Above, I'm pulling on the seat frame for leverage and pushing on the seat back with my knee while Nick (right) gets an awl into the hole. The previous two photos were taken by Zach while we were working on the second of today's seats to be installed.

As we line up the holes, it's helpful to "pin" them in place with an awl or a punch. One of our volunteers works for Metra in car maintenance, and he reports that pinning fabric to seat frames is done much this way by the professionals. In the view above, this is an initial test fit without the antimacassar in place; once the threaded inserts are located, small holes in the fabric are created and a tap is used to chase the threads and get rid of any upholstery material.

Above, the first seat we installed Sunday was a real bear - it was just an extremely tight fit. Richard, shown finishing up the process by running the machine screws in, was instrumental in getting this seat installed. Jimmy is in the background looking on.

Here's Zach testing out one of the newer seats.

At the end of the day, the car looked like this. We got three more seats installed with a fourth started.

We're making good progress! The majority of the non-bulkhead seats have now been replaced.

So, what else was going on? There was a group from another museum visiting, so a few of the guys were showing them around and discussing joint exhibit opportunities. Richard, Will, Ashton, and Matt moved the (extraordinarily heavy) IC Highliner adapter coupler from the cars in Yard 14 over to the cars in Yard 5 so that track 51 can be switched out at some point. Jimmy was working on testing recent air brake work on the 309 and 460.

Above, Nathan was working on cleaning out a gummed-up double check valve from the D13 that was affecting operation of the straight-air side of the brake system. We're hoping to operate the dump car for the public once or twice this coming year. It was very popular when we ran it briefly on Showcase Weekend this past year, and although it failed following a few trips, that issue (a blown control resister) was fixed pretty shortly afterward.

Thanks to Richard and the others who concluded a mutually beneficial trade between IRM and another organization over the past week. Among the items we received were a set of batteries for CTA 2200s, shown here, which our set needs; the control box and "card box" behind, which I believe are for CTA 2400s; and some other 'L' car parts.

Saturday Report

 Work is continuing steadily on the 306, mostly during the week.  There was no one on this project on Saturday, but the blower remains connected to make sure the car doesn't deflate.

Tim just never stops working on the 1268.  Here he continues to strip the paint from the interior of the 1268.  The interior will look great when he's done -- maybe nearly as good as the 309!

Meanwhile, in astronomical news, nothing can eclipse this: the fender got installed on the Michigan Electric 28.  It goes quickly if you have enough hands; the crew included Norm, Greg, Nick, Jimmy, and Bill.    

And here Jimmy shows how you can hitch a free ride without buying a ticket.

I spent much of my time sorting and counting various car parts in storage, for some of the projects that are under consideration.

Finally, I checked on the Jewell Road shelter.  We've been getting a lot of rain and snow recently, and I wanted to check that the roof wasn't leaking into the building.  Some of the structure, especially in the northwest corner, is partly rotted out due to leaks in the past.   But everything appears to be dry, so at least it isn't getting worse.

I need to replace some of the joists and sister a couple of the studs, all of which are 2x4s.  That won't be difficult once I remove the interior paneling.  

I think this type of paneling can still be purchased; I just need to check the dimensions.  The amusing thing is that it is called "carsiding", although I wouldn't actually use it for that purpose.