Greetings to all,
What a wonderful day it was today at HVRM, perfect temps in the 70's, low humidity,
bright sunny sky, not a drop of rain in sight. Many projects got done today. Train rides
total was 86 for the day. The civil war group shot off their cannon, with a large boom
often. Not so bad noise to the east, but if you where in the shop area, it litterally
gave you a jolt. I could feel the air blast first, then the boom. Lots of visitors were
over the see the civil war men in their uniforms and cannon. Fun day for everyone.
I arrived at 9:00am to find Les over by his passenger car assessing the NKP flat
car that had been coupled up to the his passenger car. Painting still needs to be done
on the east end and needs to get a ladder in there. Plans are to move the consist
a couple of feet to the east later in the day.
On my way back to the shop, Joe Baker was busy putting electric outlets back in service after the pole holding up the electric line to the east side of Mulberry St
had broke off at the base during Mondays rain storm with high winds. It happened
at night and litterally broke off at the base of the pole. NIPSCO was called on Tuesday
to disconnect the power line, as the pole was leaning in the road. The power line
never broke at the main pole, so it was holding up the broken pole. Cory, John LaOrange, Joe Kingsbury dug the bottom part of the pole out of the ground and
Norwayne Lumber had a pole to replace it. New pole installed, NIPSCO came out
again to restore power. Joe Baker was replacing the electrical outlets on the new
pole, making them secure for use again. Good Job Joe. Thanks.
West shop found Cory, John, Dave, Mark working on leveling the south side of the
dirt floor in the shop in preparation for concrete pour. Sand was brought in from
outside, shoveled on to the floor area, with John an Dave using a 2x6 leveling the
dirt an sand. The entire lenght was leveled, then the back hoe run up an down
packing sand down and more sand brought in, leveled again and then steel
fencing put down to prevent concrete cracking. Pouring concrete date has not been
decided.
Mark worked on the EJ&E transfer caboose earlier in the week repainting the outside,
completing orange on the south side, both ends, and black paint on the grating on
the platform and steps. Saturday Mark painted the gray seats on the west platform
and will continue on as time permits.
Doug was inside the IC yellow caboose working on wood work for the windows in
the cupola area and priming the new wood white. It is getting closer to having
windows installed soon. The outside is going to be painted IC orange with appropriate Illinois Central lettering from the IC historical society.
Bob Barcus worked the gift shop. The local American Legion folks were on the properity to provide lunch for museum members and the public.
I was down on friday working on grinding the upper level of the base of the crane.
Priming was done also. Saturday was painting the steel primed areas black again.
Filling the letters in will be done later with a small brush.
Les spent the day looking for 17 inch hand grabs for the PRR flat car, no luck,
cept for one 18 inch grab. What I suggested was cutting the longer grabs in half,
installing both ends and cutting the correct lenght out of the steel, welding the
two pieces together. That is the only solution to this problem. The original pictures
of the flat car had hand grabs, but sometime during its career, they were replaced
with large pieces of steel to better climb up the step to the car. Les has also
acquired a blue print of lettering for TTX, has the dimensions where the letters
and numbers are to be positioned and the height of the numbers an letters position
on the car. He is working on getting copies made for the blueprint and then
finding someone who can make stencils of the lettering.
Tuesday myself an the family rode the South Shore to Chicago. Took the 10:55am
train which is the bilevel cars, which I enjoy very much. A good crowd arrived at
Chicago Randolph station. It is interesting to look out the upper level windows,
getting a view on other things from a higher position. Lunch at Macy's Walnut
Room, with Linday Yu, WLS channel 7 newscaster the next table over from us.
Couple of weeks ago on a trip to Chicago, Rosemont near O'Hare, Gibson
Steak restuarant we sas Dennis Rodman, former basketball player for the
Chicago Bulls. Around 4:45pm, we were at the Chicago river, decided to take
a boat tour of the Chicago river of all the buildings along the river. Railroad
bridges of interest is the old bridge that use to bring newsprint into the Chicago
Sun Times building and Chicago Tribune printing buildings. The rail line once
ran to Navy Pier years ago to service ships at the pier with cargo. Navy pier early
time was not a tourist attraction, it was a working ship pier with Navy ships
being tied up there. The Chicago boat tour is a MUST DO if visiting Chicago.
Return to Michigan City was at 7:10pm. I got to see a couple of the new Metra
electric passenger cars, nice looking with bigger window than the old units.
Interesting item on the cars is the number of the train using LED lights, so
easily changed, Metra used train numbers, where South Shore uses number of
electric car for dispatching. SS trains are assigned a scheduled posted number
for trips. New Metra cars have a bathroom on each car, where the old cars did
not, so you made sure that you didn't drink anything before riding. No place to potty.
Interesting story friday in Michigan City, a man walking on Amtrak high speed rail
line listening to music, did not hear the approaching passenger plane behind him
going over 100 mph. The train hit him square on, he glanced off the nose into the
ditch area. A local La Porte deputy sheriff, was in the area when someone notified
him of the accident, he was on the scene in minutes, calling in other personell,
finding the man, in the ditch alert and responding with only a broken arm. He was
transported to Michigan city, St Anthony's hospital and is recovering okay. Luck
was on his side friday. Moral of story, don't walk on active railroad tracks.
I left at 4:00pm to attend a wonderful jazz festival in La Porte at Fox park, excellent
music with a large crowd. Music lasted up to 9:45pm an a large crowd still was
there at the time. Beautiful evening, close to full moon. From my vantage point
I could see the NS rail line across Clear lake, many trains passed in a short
period of time, then at 8:00pm Amtraks Capitol Limited passed thru town going
east. Daylight is growing short every day, soon it will be fall, harvest time an
winter, argh.... School starts Tuesday for me, driving school bus for La Porte.
Many schools in the area started last week including Know, North Judson,
South Central, South Bend area schools, so the busses are back on the road,
please be careful driving early in the morning an afternoon looking out for the kids.
Have a safe week.
Tom
What a wonderful day it was today at HVRM, perfect temps in the 70's, low humidity,
bright sunny sky, not a drop of rain in sight. Many projects got done today. Train rides
total was 86 for the day. The civil war group shot off their cannon, with a large boom
often. Not so bad noise to the east, but if you where in the shop area, it litterally
gave you a jolt. I could feel the air blast first, then the boom. Lots of visitors were
over the see the civil war men in their uniforms and cannon. Fun day for everyone.
I arrived at 9:00am to find Les over by his passenger car assessing the NKP flat
car that had been coupled up to the his passenger car. Painting still needs to be done
on the east end and needs to get a ladder in there. Plans are to move the consist
a couple of feet to the east later in the day.
On my way back to the shop, Joe Baker was busy putting electric outlets back in service after the pole holding up the electric line to the east side of Mulberry St
had broke off at the base during Mondays rain storm with high winds. It happened
at night and litterally broke off at the base of the pole. NIPSCO was called on Tuesday
to disconnect the power line, as the pole was leaning in the road. The power line
never broke at the main pole, so it was holding up the broken pole. Cory, John LaOrange, Joe Kingsbury dug the bottom part of the pole out of the ground and
Norwayne Lumber had a pole to replace it. New pole installed, NIPSCO came out
again to restore power. Joe Baker was replacing the electrical outlets on the new
pole, making them secure for use again. Good Job Joe. Thanks.
West shop found Cory, John, Dave, Mark working on leveling the south side of the
dirt floor in the shop in preparation for concrete pour. Sand was brought in from
outside, shoveled on to the floor area, with John an Dave using a 2x6 leveling the
dirt an sand. The entire lenght was leveled, then the back hoe run up an down
packing sand down and more sand brought in, leveled again and then steel
fencing put down to prevent concrete cracking. Pouring concrete date has not been
decided.
Mark worked on the EJ&E transfer caboose earlier in the week repainting the outside,
completing orange on the south side, both ends, and black paint on the grating on
the platform and steps. Saturday Mark painted the gray seats on the west platform
and will continue on as time permits.
Doug was inside the IC yellow caboose working on wood work for the windows in
the cupola area and priming the new wood white. It is getting closer to having
windows installed soon. The outside is going to be painted IC orange with appropriate Illinois Central lettering from the IC historical society.
Bob Barcus worked the gift shop. The local American Legion folks were on the properity to provide lunch for museum members and the public.
I was down on friday working on grinding the upper level of the base of the crane.
Priming was done also. Saturday was painting the steel primed areas black again.
Filling the letters in will be done later with a small brush.
Les spent the day looking for 17 inch hand grabs for the PRR flat car, no luck,
cept for one 18 inch grab. What I suggested was cutting the longer grabs in half,
installing both ends and cutting the correct lenght out of the steel, welding the
two pieces together. That is the only solution to this problem. The original pictures
of the flat car had hand grabs, but sometime during its career, they were replaced
with large pieces of steel to better climb up the step to the car. Les has also
acquired a blue print of lettering for TTX, has the dimensions where the letters
and numbers are to be positioned and the height of the numbers an letters position
on the car. He is working on getting copies made for the blueprint and then
finding someone who can make stencils of the lettering.
Tuesday myself an the family rode the South Shore to Chicago. Took the 10:55am
train which is the bilevel cars, which I enjoy very much. A good crowd arrived at
Chicago Randolph station. It is interesting to look out the upper level windows,
getting a view on other things from a higher position. Lunch at Macy's Walnut
Room, with Linday Yu, WLS channel 7 newscaster the next table over from us.
Couple of weeks ago on a trip to Chicago, Rosemont near O'Hare, Gibson
Steak restuarant we sas Dennis Rodman, former basketball player for the
Chicago Bulls. Around 4:45pm, we were at the Chicago river, decided to take
a boat tour of the Chicago river of all the buildings along the river. Railroad
bridges of interest is the old bridge that use to bring newsprint into the Chicago
Sun Times building and Chicago Tribune printing buildings. The rail line once
ran to Navy Pier years ago to service ships at the pier with cargo. Navy pier early
time was not a tourist attraction, it was a working ship pier with Navy ships
being tied up there. The Chicago boat tour is a MUST DO if visiting Chicago.
Return to Michigan City was at 7:10pm. I got to see a couple of the new Metra
electric passenger cars, nice looking with bigger window than the old units.
Interesting item on the cars is the number of the train using LED lights, so
easily changed, Metra used train numbers, where South Shore uses number of
electric car for dispatching. SS trains are assigned a scheduled posted number
for trips. New Metra cars have a bathroom on each car, where the old cars did
not, so you made sure that you didn't drink anything before riding. No place to potty.
Interesting story friday in Michigan City, a man walking on Amtrak high speed rail
line listening to music, did not hear the approaching passenger plane behind him
going over 100 mph. The train hit him square on, he glanced off the nose into the
ditch area. A local La Porte deputy sheriff, was in the area when someone notified
him of the accident, he was on the scene in minutes, calling in other personell,
finding the man, in the ditch alert and responding with only a broken arm. He was
transported to Michigan city, St Anthony's hospital and is recovering okay. Luck
was on his side friday. Moral of story, don't walk on active railroad tracks.
I left at 4:00pm to attend a wonderful jazz festival in La Porte at Fox park, excellent
music with a large crowd. Music lasted up to 9:45pm an a large crowd still was
there at the time. Beautiful evening, close to full moon. From my vantage point
I could see the NS rail line across Clear lake, many trains passed in a short
period of time, then at 8:00pm Amtraks Capitol Limited passed thru town going
east. Daylight is growing short every day, soon it will be fall, harvest time an
winter, argh.... School starts Tuesday for me, driving school bus for La Porte.
Many schools in the area started last week including Know, North Judson,
South Central, South Bend area schools, so the busses are back on the road,
please be careful driving early in the morning an afternoon looking out for the kids.
Have a safe week.
Tom
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