T minus Two Weeks

Time is ticking away on the contest clock as we try to get ready for the Illinois Terminal extravaganza on Saturday, April 30th. Just like July 4th last year, this will probably be down to the wire, but we'll have things ready for you. In the morning, I started by putting the window shade boxes and the remaining window shade tracks into place in the 518, and installed enough screws to hold them in place.

On the 319, I started working to get the hand brake system working. This was disconnected when the car's trucks were removed for shipment, and in any case I believe the hand brakes were not functional even on the CA&E, at least at the end of service. But I can fix this. The hand brake at the #1 end now works. At the other end, there are some missing parts which I'll need to get from storage, but that should not be too difficult. And then I'll start on the other cars.

Frank and David worked on fixing a burned-out grid on the 308, and we tested it. So the 308 is a motor car once again. Since they were around, it was a good chance for me to check out the roof on car 36.

On the whole, the roof is in good condition and will not need major repairs for the foreseeable future. The only serious part is that the end of the running boards where the hook should be connected seems to be rotted out at both ends. That needs to be fixed, by replacing one section of 2x6 running board. Otherwise, the canvas and the rest of the running boards are OK. Nonetheless, this is our oldest interurban car and it will not be cleared for operation in the rain under any circumstances.

In the afternoon, we went to the Safety Meeting, which was held in Marengo at the Legion, and conducted by Harold Krewer. The American Legion hall in Union has now turned into a restaurant, so we'll be getting another restaurant review soon!

After the meeting, Frank and David helped by putting all remaining screws in place in the 518, and we cleaned up the interior. The interior is now ready for service and looks great. I don't know what went wrong with my camera. Must be something it was pointing at....

Ed Oslowski has been doing a yeoman's job on the front compartment of the 277 for several weeks, and here he is in the midst of this project. This will be a great improvement to the car!

And in other news, here's the rear solarium compartment on Michigan Electric 28. The Michigan Electric crew have been working steadily on this car.

And new siding is being installed on the Schroeder store. This is a composite material of some sort which has a wood grain cast into it, so it looks like real wood.

Bottom line: you should be making plans now to attend the IT meet in two weeks. If you don't, you'll miss a lot of opportunities for riding unique equipment, photography, and informative talks and slide shows. You'll kick yourself. Or we can do it for you.

2011 Annual Membership Meeting-Live Blog

7:23pm Frank and I are at the meeting, everyone is milling around. Let us hope the live blog internet connection holds up.

7:34pm Jim Nauer calls the meeting to order.

7:35pm Meeting minutes from 2010 meeting approved.

7:36pm Election of Board of Directors. 3 seats open, 1 incumbent is running (the two others are term-limited).

7:37pm The candidates for the board are: Joel Ahrendt, Steve Jirsa, Harold Krewer, Rich Schauer, Bob Sunderlein, and Jim West. Ballots are being collected, vote totals to follow.

7:38pm Jim Nauer, President is giving his report. Votes are being tallied. Jim's report focuses on the challenges of attracting new visitors.

8:02 pm The vote tallies are in! The three positions were filled on the first ballot. It took 54 votes to get elected. The vote totals are as follows:

Joel Ahrendt 70

Steve Jirsa 27

Harold Krewer 46

Rich Shauer 84

Bob Sunderlin 22

Jim West 62

Congrats to Joel, Rich, and Jim!

9:15pm Before the meeting adjourned, Charlie King, who holds museum seniority number 1 presented a special Illinois Terminal-related gift to the museum. Charlie was in possession of the black bunting that adorned the last Illinois Terminal intercity train in 1956. Thanks Charlie!

The Ed Allen Movie Collection

This is a set of color movie clips taken by Ed Allen in the fifties and sixties. He worked for the CA&E until the company folded in 1962, so that's the main focus, but there are many other railroads represented. Click on the link for each segment to view it. Our thanks to Ed for making these unique videos available to you, the public!

These videos are copyrighted by Mr. Allen and may not be reproduced or sold without his express written consent.

CA&E In Action
The CA&E in action between 1953 and 1957, over all parts of the system.
Also (briefly) some Met cars on the Garfield Park elevated and a few other railroads.

CA&E In Action - Part 2
Travel along the AE&FR through South Elgin in the early sixties (where FRTM is now located).
Also some CA&E in service; EJ&E center cab Diesel.
Assembling the preserved CA&E cars for RELIC and IRM in 1962.

Miscellaneous
CB&Q fantrip with 4960 at Aurora. Chief Illini on the rear end.
The last steel car fantrip on the CA&E.
CNS&M action at North Chicago Jct.
CTA construction at Forest Park, and a ride on the Garfield branch.

Trip to Canada - C&NW Wreck
Ed visits Port Colbourne, the London and Port Stanley, and Niagara Junction.
A wreck on the C&NW at Wheaton in 1956(?); big hooks in action just west of the city.

And before anybody asks, I've noticed that the aspect ratio doesn't seem quite right: the horizontal is expanded, making everything seem too wide. Do not attempt to adjust your set....

Sandley Works Catalog

While sorting through old files, I came across this catalog. It's a little off topic from our usual full-sized railroad preservation, but still of interest.

Both of the locomotives shown here were built at the Dells for the Milwaukee Zoo; the 82 is now back at the R&GN. I must say that 45 MPH for a 15" gauge locomotive seems rather unrealistic.

Don Ross has a complete page listing every locomotive built by Sandley here.

And I see that there's more about this company at the R&GN website.

I had such a deprived childhood, I was never able to buy anything from this catalog. But I can remember wishing!

Annual Meeting and Rules Weekend

It is that time of year again, time for the IRM annual meeting, and rules class/safety meeting. As I write this, I am on Amtrak #302, part of the Lincoln Service heading north from St. Louis. Our long time blog readers will know that I attempted to do live updates from the annual meeting a few years ago, without much success. I have better mobile technology now, and let us hope that Union is now on the cell phone map for AT&T.

Besides the meeting and rules/safety meeting, Frank and I have a little project lined up as well, which will be the subject of a blog post. See everyone on Saturday!

Oh, We Get Letters!

Yes, here at the Hicks Car Works blog we get letters. Most recently, we received a piece of correspondence that is quite a bit nicer than the usual reams of hate mail that typically clog our inboxes. Recently, young blog reader Zach Ehlers sent us this drawing he made of CA&E 409. Zach is a high school senior and will be attending Rose-Hullman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Indiana in the fall. Thanks Zach!

A Rare Appearance

The weather was gorgeous on Sunday, partly sunny and about 85 degrees. I spent part of the afternoon helping with another in our series of switch moves, in this case some switching to further prepare for the imminent IT meet at the end of the month. The decision was made to pull IT line car 1702 outside for photography on the day of the meet, which meant it had to be "un-buried" from behind the Electroliner and a couple of other cars. "Doodlebug Dan" Mulvihill, shown at left, and Rod were our two intrepid engineers, while Joel, Dan F. and Greg worked as ground men. Below right, the line-up of some of the cars being switched out.










And then there was the 1702, which hadn't left Barn 7 in about 30 years as far as any of us could tell. The open platform end had been restored by Bob Bruneau back in the late 1980's but the car suffered from serious weather damage before it was put inside and would need a lot of work.
After the switch move was successfully completed, I spent some time putting more body filler on the 205, taking advantage of the warmer weather. Later I'll come back and sand it down before finishing work. The car is getting ever closer to being painted, and I spoke with both Jamie K. and Rod about the best way to paint the car when we get to that point.

CA&E Videos

Ed Allen has sent us a package with three DVD's of his personal movies from the 1950's. Most of it deals with the CA&E, since that's where he was working at the time, but there's a lot of other material, such the L, North Shore, some steam, and other things. As far as I know these have not been publicly available. He also included a flimsy from the CA&E, shown here. Thanks, Ed!!!

Update: Ed said I could post the videos to the site, but they're too big for the Blogger limit. Perhaps with some expert help I can break them down into bite-sized chunks. Ed also said that he did not want these videos reproduced or sold on the open market.

Shovel All the Coal In

Gotta keep 'er rollin'! The steam team was busy loading coal and water into the 1630 today, so that's a very good sign! (R) I just missed showing the coal dropping into the tender, but that's the way it goes. It will really be exciting to see steam return to the Museum this year! The steam guys deserve a lot of credit for all the work they've put into making this possible.



There are eight windows on the 319 that didn't get stripped in time to be painted with the rest of the car last May. Jamie Kolanowski has generously offered to spray them for me, so today I finished removing and masking them and took them over to Barn 2. I then got some spare windows from the container to fill the holes. These old windows from the 318 don't look like much, but it's just temporary. I promise.

A number of new display signs (known as "Kevin signs" in honor of the late Kevin McCabe, who designed and made the first set) have been produced, and are sitting in the car shop waiting for installation. Here's the one for the 36.

Ed Oslowski has been hard at work on the interior of IT 277, as seen here.

The front compartment is nearly ready to paint.

In the main compartment, Joel has installed all of the baggage racks, and the racks for the front compartment are ready for installation.

Mostly I worked on the 319's #1 vestibule. The best way to strip old paint from a pipe is to wrap a chain around it and pull it back and forth. I can't take a picture of myself actually doing this, but I hope you get the idea. This is an old Navy technique that I learned from some of the several IRM members who used to be sailors. They probably used bigger chains, on bigger pipes!

And then I did some more painting with white primer. The area around and behind the piping for the controls takes a lot of attention.

I also spent an hour or so installing the rest of the repainted windows in the 518; we're planning to paint the side of the car this week. And Bob Opal gave an impromptu seminar on FRA rules, which was quite informative and useful.

Here's an interesting operation. Max needed to pull three-phase wiring through a conduit along the length of most of Barn 4. His truck is parked out on Depot St., and the winch (red arrow) is pulling a rope through a couple of pulleys, and pulling the wire into the box (green arrow). The wire was being fed from a reel back at the east end of the shop by Max and Rod, several hundred feet away. Bob Sunderlin ran the winch and was instructed by radio. Just like downtown!

"It's the man that counts"

This car card is in the 36, where nearly all of them are in good condition.

Say, let's have a Contest: Your job is to photoshop the above ad into an IRM recruiting poster. Submit your artwork via email prior to the Annual Meeting. Entries will be judged by our panel of impartial experts. And me. The winner will receive fame and stardom. Void where prohibited or taxed.

319 Report

The Zephyr happens to be parked outside, and was posed next to the safety island at Barn 9 North. Nobody else has anything quite like this!

Otherwise, there wasn't a lot to take pictures of today. Mostly, I'm trying to get ready to repaint the #1 vestibule. So there was sanding, scraping, and other surface prep. I stripped the paint from the heater bracket and the brass brake handle, as seen here. It's too bad I then had to paint it again.

Most of the vestibule is now ready for finish red, but the last 10% always seems to take 90% of the effort.

And then there was more cleanup, since the cars have been rearranged. The front end of the 233 is now adjacent to the 319, so it can be pulled out for pictures. Looking in the front window, we can see it has a C6 controller, the same as the CA&E cars. But it has no MU connections of any sort, so there's no way to take advantage of that coincidence.

An old wooden grain elevator in Huntley is being dismantled, and as a result some very large pieces of lumber are available, much bigger than anything we can get new. Frank lives in Huntley and got in contact with the demolition contractor; he visited IRM today and Tim gave him a Cook's tour, focusing on the wooden cars. Tim was also busy taking measurements of things we might need new lumber for, such as the double-truck open car. And incidentally, you can even watch the building being demolished at this link. Ain't technology wonderful?

Inspection Time!

The inspection season is now in progress, and every electric car needs to undergo a thorough inspection prior to revenue service. I strongly suggest that everyone involved in electric car operations - all motormen and conductors - should spend at least one day a year helping on inspections. Due to recent acquisitions, we now have more operational cars than ever before. And if you want to operate or ride them, we need help. And not only could we use the help, but inspection is the most effective way for crewmen to be familiar with all the mechanical parts of the car, and what most often goes wrong. Classroom-type training is good, but it is not an effective substitute for hands-on experience. You'll be glad you helped!