Well,
we took another turn for the good as we went back to working on our turntable.
We had 5 volunteers on board during a HOT and sunny day yesterday. I figured it will take a few more weeks of this weather to get our blood thinned out for the season.
If you remember from the last turntable posting, the bridge had a bad bind as we turned it around, so we needed to back off the bridge and remove a couple of ring rails in order to fix the problem.
We wound up un-spiking and removing 3 ring rails. After shaving down about 2 dozen ties, we broke for lunch, then returned to re-spike 2 of the 3 ring rails back into place.
I'm sure that we could have done all 3, but we were fortunate enough to have had a site visit by some of the board members of our local National Railway Historical Society chapter, the L.I. Sunrise Trail chapter.
The president, Steve Quigley came home from Concord California (nice place-BTW) on the red-eye in order to make the visit, and we were very excited to see them. They presented us with a check for a large sum to help us start the steel work on our Ping Pong coach #7433. It needs some metal work where the roof sheet meets the side sheets.
I sent a diagram out to a RR Tie Manufacturer to get a quote on our needs for the turntable bridge and I hope to have that answer in a couple of weeks to present to the board of OBRM.
We do have a grant to buy and install the ties and if you remember, we have already brought back on site, the motor and electrical resistance bank as well as the split ring electrical collector for the top of the arch. We still need to get back the original control stand and finish the motor frame assembly.
Then it will be a heavy rebuild of the turntable. The town of Oyster Bay will need to get LIPA in in order to erect a new power pole west of the turntable and exactly 180 degress from the east pole that exists on site and to also give us a meter with 4 115 volt drops once the arch is in place. This will provide us with 460 volts to the motor.
Next week we will have on site, our locomotive rebuild contractyor Scott Lindsey from Steam Operations Corp. to start the running gear re-build of our favorite G5s LIRR steam locomotive #35 (but #1 in our hearts!)
Gary
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Saturday, May 1, 2010
A day that will live in our hearts!
Today as I write this posting, I am dirty, tired and very sore. Man am I gonna feel like crapola tomorrow.
We started around 8am, like we wanted to, with only 4 people. The weather was perfect, warm with a slight breeze off the water and sunny!
We had 2 new volunteers show up a little while later and we all jumped into finishing our list. Clean/degrease and coat the locomotive driver bearing boxes-all six of them. Sound familiar like a broken record????
Well, we also cleaned/degreased the pilot truck bearing boxes but we did not have to apply the Cosmoline to them as they have bearings that are removeable.
During this time, we had 2 more volunteers show up, then a little while later another new volunteer showed up. We had the newbies doing the greasy work with a couple of our seasoned veterans and we started clenaing up the journal pedestal boxes (which hold the bearing boxes for the drivers) of paint and old grease.
When these were finished we cleaned up the crosshead guides and brassses and left the cylinders for after lunch.
We now had a lot of volunteers on site and I felt that they need a good lunch-Pizza it was!
After lunch, 2 more new volunteers showed up and we dove into the steam cylinders and valve gear cylinders to clean/degrease and coat them with a little oil. Our job on locomotive #35 has come to and end for now. Now its time for the experts to come in from May 16th-21st to complete their end.
I also took the time to finally hook up the headlight and re-check the elctrical boxes in our Worlds Fair Cab display. After a while everything tested out fine and next week during our 1st open house, we will be dedicating this unit to 3 of our volunteers who have passed on. This is extremely important to me personally as I worked alongside these men for quite some time and one of them being honored is my brother-in-law and my family will be there.
Sometime later this season while its just cooling off, I will apply the 2nd coat of grey paint on this cab unit as the final touch to a great restoration.
Starting from the 15th and going forward, we will be adding a few finishing touches to Caboose #12 and then we will be going hog wild on our Turntable project. I would love to finsh the work season by having our tuntable move under its own power (electric) before the weather turns nasty.
On hand today were Steve Rothaug (sorry about forgetting you last week), Rich Brody, Leon Daitz, Betty Carley, George Mutari, Doug Kasner, ME, Steve Torborg, Steve McKeon and our New guys, John, Louis, Ricky, Michael and Mason.
Gary
We started around 8am, like we wanted to, with only 4 people. The weather was perfect, warm with a slight breeze off the water and sunny!
We had 2 new volunteers show up a little while later and we all jumped into finishing our list. Clean/degrease and coat the locomotive driver bearing boxes-all six of them. Sound familiar like a broken record????
Well, we also cleaned/degreased the pilot truck bearing boxes but we did not have to apply the Cosmoline to them as they have bearings that are removeable.
During this time, we had 2 more volunteers show up, then a little while later another new volunteer showed up. We had the newbies doing the greasy work with a couple of our seasoned veterans and we started clenaing up the journal pedestal boxes (which hold the bearing boxes for the drivers) of paint and old grease.
When these were finished we cleaned up the crosshead guides and brassses and left the cylinders for after lunch.
We now had a lot of volunteers on site and I felt that they need a good lunch-Pizza it was!
After lunch, 2 more new volunteers showed up and we dove into the steam cylinders and valve gear cylinders to clean/degrease and coat them with a little oil. Our job on locomotive #35 has come to and end for now. Now its time for the experts to come in from May 16th-21st to complete their end.
I also took the time to finally hook up the headlight and re-check the elctrical boxes in our Worlds Fair Cab display. After a while everything tested out fine and next week during our 1st open house, we will be dedicating this unit to 3 of our volunteers who have passed on. This is extremely important to me personally as I worked alongside these men for quite some time and one of them being honored is my brother-in-law and my family will be there.
Sometime later this season while its just cooling off, I will apply the 2nd coat of grey paint on this cab unit as the final touch to a great restoration.
Starting from the 15th and going forward, we will be adding a few finishing touches to Caboose #12 and then we will be going hog wild on our Turntable project. I would love to finsh the work season by having our tuntable move under its own power (electric) before the weather turns nasty.
On hand today were Steve Rothaug (sorry about forgetting you last week), Rich Brody, Leon Daitz, Betty Carley, George Mutari, Doug Kasner, ME, Steve Torborg, Steve McKeon and our New guys, John, Louis, Ricky, Michael and Mason.
Gary
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Still moving & shaking at OBRM
Hi folks,
It's now Sunday afternoon 4/25/10 and I have finally found the time to write down my impressions on Yesterdays (4-24-10) work session.
With plenty of hands on board, we were able to remove all of the remaining parts to be worked on from the trailers and moved around about 20 pallets of parts to get to them.
With the exception of the main driver bearing boxes, everything we removed has been cleaned, degreased and coated. They have also been wrapped, palletized and replaced into the trailers.
We also had a small crew working on the driver crankpins, bearing and journals as well as the pilot truck journals.
I took it upon myself to treat everyone to a nice lunch of BBQ burgers and dogs. I think they were getting sick of PIZZA.
For next weeks session the bearing boxes will be completed and that will leave us ONLY to clean out and coat both steam cylinders and both valve cylinders, the crosshead guides and the pedestal legs on the frame of #35.
With another crew like yesterday we can accomplish this task in about 4-5 hours.
This will then allow us to get back to working on the turntable.
During this coming week, a few of the volunteers who are retired will be going up to clean out and prepare the historic train station for our upcoming open house which will be on Saturday May 8th from 10-4pm.
We will also be dedicating our recently completed Worlds Fair Cab display which starts promptly at 2pm.
We are doing this dedication in honor of 3 of our volunteers who have passed away.
George Hunka, Pete "Fazoots" Taormina and James "Jamie" Carley.
This dedication meant more to me as I knew all 3 and Jamie was my brother in law. Many Carley family members attended the dedication and were grateful that we remembered him and our other 2 friends
If you are a faithful follower of my blogs, come on down and say hi. Unfortunately, I won't be able to attend as my nephew is making his communion, but stop by and tell everyone from OBRM that you are a blog follower!
Gary
It's now Sunday afternoon 4/25/10 and I have finally found the time to write down my impressions on Yesterdays (4-24-10) work session.
With plenty of hands on board, we were able to remove all of the remaining parts to be worked on from the trailers and moved around about 20 pallets of parts to get to them.
With the exception of the main driver bearing boxes, everything we removed has been cleaned, degreased and coated. They have also been wrapped, palletized and replaced into the trailers.
We also had a small crew working on the driver crankpins, bearing and journals as well as the pilot truck journals.
I took it upon myself to treat everyone to a nice lunch of BBQ burgers and dogs. I think they were getting sick of PIZZA.
For next weeks session the bearing boxes will be completed and that will leave us ONLY to clean out and coat both steam cylinders and both valve cylinders, the crosshead guides and the pedestal legs on the frame of #35.
With another crew like yesterday we can accomplish this task in about 4-5 hours.
This will then allow us to get back to working on the turntable.
During this coming week, a few of the volunteers who are retired will be going up to clean out and prepare the historic train station for our upcoming open house which will be on Saturday May 8th from 10-4pm.
We will also be dedicating our recently completed Worlds Fair Cab display which starts promptly at 2pm.
We are doing this dedication in honor of 3 of our volunteers who have passed away.
George Hunka, Pete "Fazoots" Taormina and James "Jamie" Carley.
This dedication meant more to me as I knew all 3 and Jamie was my brother in law. Many Carley family members attended the dedication and were grateful that we remembered him and our other 2 friends
If you are a faithful follower of my blogs, come on down and say hi. Unfortunately, I won't be able to attend as my nephew is making his communion, but stop by and tell everyone from OBRM that you are a blog follower!
Gary
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Some NEW information
Folks,
just to let you know, we are on facebook and my photos are up at PHOTOBUCKET under THEWINEGUY35. Soon we will be on TWITTER as well. I guarantee you that I WILL NOT be doing the twittering! I am enough of a twit and our FACEBOOK page will be maintained by one of our younger members. I'm too much of a dinosaur for FACEBOOK.
Gary
just to let you know, we are on facebook and my photos are up at PHOTOBUCKET under THEWINEGUY35. Soon we will be on TWITTER as well. I guarantee you that I WILL NOT be doing the twittering! I am enough of a twit and our FACEBOOK page will be maintained by one of our younger members. I'm too much of a dinosaur for FACEBOOK.
Gary
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Work, Work, Work!
A dreary start to the work day.
Thankfully the coffee was hot.
With only four people at the worksite, we managed to move hundreds of parts around in order to remove the first set of pieces from the parts trailer. We worked on 1 set of drive rods, 1 set of reverser links and quite a few sets of valve gear rods and eccentrics as well as a host of smaller parts that needed attention. As I last mentioned, we need to clean all bearings of grease and old alemite as well as all journals associated with the valve gear parts and reciprocating parts for #35's drive train. With a few more hands over the next 3 weekends, we should be able to complete the task at hand before the contractor, Steam Operations Corp. comes in for their inspection date in May.
Keep your fingers crossed for a great turnout next week!
Gary
Thankfully the coffee was hot.
With only four people at the worksite, we managed to move hundreds of parts around in order to remove the first set of pieces from the parts trailer. We worked on 1 set of drive rods, 1 set of reverser links and quite a few sets of valve gear rods and eccentrics as well as a host of smaller parts that needed attention. As I last mentioned, we need to clean all bearings of grease and old alemite as well as all journals associated with the valve gear parts and reciprocating parts for #35's drive train. With a few more hands over the next 3 weekends, we should be able to complete the task at hand before the contractor, Steam Operations Corp. comes in for their inspection date in May.
Keep your fingers crossed for a great turnout next week!
Gary
Sunday, April 11, 2010
The beginning of (we hope) the end-of the tunnel!
Well, we started the restoration of #35.
Shouldn't I be happier??
Our crew started the restoration by working on the braking system on our forklift. We were still encountering a major issue with the brakes applying automatically while in reverse. Not a way to work, so we adjusted them. This meant a 3 hour marathon wheel and axle removal/replacement session.
After a short lunch, we set up a work tent and moved one of the 2 heavy duty shop work tables inside of it and the other was moved parallel to the parts trailer so we can set up a second tent over it.
This will give us plenty of dry work space and allow 2 people to use the tables simultaneously to get more parts competed.
We were given a list by our contractor, Steam Operations Corporation (S.O.C), a very prominent steam locomotive rebuilder and most of the list if not all was regarding the reciprocation assemblies.
Drive & pilot trucks, Valve gear assembly, rods and steam/valve cylinder interiors.
There are a lot of parts involved and since we are just a Saturdays only volunteer force, we need to move out many parts at a time.
These parts will need to have their journal faces, bearing faces and crankpin diameters checked against the PRR/LIRR blueprints for the G5s class of 10 wheeler that #35 belongs to in order to begin a plan to restore the parts.
We will be cleaning all of the area listed for us and then coating the pieces so the contractor can do his work.
This is phase 1.
After this phase has been completed, Scott Lindsey (S.O.C), will bring in his crew for a few days and measure/record all of the findings. Then he will go back to his offices and create a master plan with associated costs.
This plan will then be submitted for verification against the blueprints and work will begin to move the parts to his shop for the rebuilding during phase 2!
Pray for us to
finish on time.
Then we can go back to finishing our turntable!!!!!
Gary
Shouldn't I be happier??
Our crew started the restoration by working on the braking system on our forklift. We were still encountering a major issue with the brakes applying automatically while in reverse. Not a way to work, so we adjusted them. This meant a 3 hour marathon wheel and axle removal/replacement session.
After a short lunch, we set up a work tent and moved one of the 2 heavy duty shop work tables inside of it and the other was moved parallel to the parts trailer so we can set up a second tent over it.
This will give us plenty of dry work space and allow 2 people to use the tables simultaneously to get more parts competed.
We were given a list by our contractor, Steam Operations Corporation (S.O.C), a very prominent steam locomotive rebuilder and most of the list if not all was regarding the reciprocation assemblies.
Drive & pilot trucks, Valve gear assembly, rods and steam/valve cylinder interiors.
There are a lot of parts involved and since we are just a Saturdays only volunteer force, we need to move out many parts at a time.
These parts will need to have their journal faces, bearing faces and crankpin diameters checked against the PRR/LIRR blueprints for the G5s class of 10 wheeler that #35 belongs to in order to begin a plan to restore the parts.
We will be cleaning all of the area listed for us and then coating the pieces so the contractor can do his work.
This is phase 1.
After this phase has been completed, Scott Lindsey (S.O.C), will bring in his crew for a few days and measure/record all of the findings. Then he will go back to his offices and create a master plan with associated costs.
This plan will then be submitted for verification against the blueprints and work will begin to move the parts to his shop for the rebuilding during phase 2!
Pray for us to
finish on time.
Then we can go back to finishing our turntable!!!!!
Gary
Saturday, April 3, 2010
The dreary side of museum work
What a day it was!!
Sunny, dry and unseasonably warm.
This was a day that was a long time coming. Years in fact!!
Plenty of hands were on deck, which allowed us to perform MUCH needed maintenance on our truck and forklift. Even though some always said we were throwing good money after bad on these two pieces of equipment, they have always proven themselves when we needed them.
The forklift had MAJOR work done to change all of the fluids/filters, new battery cables and a horn was installed. Unfortunately, the parts store could not get us the radiator hoses and an air filter for it and we have not gotten the special wheel hub tool which would allow us to service the brakes.
These parts will be in this coming week and we will need to spend a few more hours performing the needed service.
As for our truck, all of the fluids/filters were changed out and the entire truck was lubed up as well. We also needed to lube up the door latches in order to open them up more easily. We only need to change out 2 more belts and the windshield wipers. Again, not available.
Both units are working better than they have in years and the truck also received a new paint job. Worlds Fair GREY.
The forklift will receive a new paint job next time.
These two units will be in heavy duty use over the next 6 weekends as we prepare to unload the 2-40 foot trailers of parts for #35.
Why? because we are starting the restoration of #35's frame & running gear!
Gary
Sunny, dry and unseasonably warm.
This was a day that was a long time coming. Years in fact!!
Plenty of hands were on deck, which allowed us to perform MUCH needed maintenance on our truck and forklift. Even though some always said we were throwing good money after bad on these two pieces of equipment, they have always proven themselves when we needed them.
The forklift had MAJOR work done to change all of the fluids/filters, new battery cables and a horn was installed. Unfortunately, the parts store could not get us the radiator hoses and an air filter for it and we have not gotten the special wheel hub tool which would allow us to service the brakes.
These parts will be in this coming week and we will need to spend a few more hours performing the needed service.
As for our truck, all of the fluids/filters were changed out and the entire truck was lubed up as well. We also needed to lube up the door latches in order to open them up more easily. We only need to change out 2 more belts and the windshield wipers. Again, not available.
Both units are working better than they have in years and the truck also received a new paint job. Worlds Fair GREY.
The forklift will receive a new paint job next time.
These two units will be in heavy duty use over the next 6 weekends as we prepare to unload the 2-40 foot trailers of parts for #35.
Why? because we are starting the restoration of #35's frame & running gear!
Gary
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
