FW: Weather, An Almost Spring Day, Wednesday--SNOW

The day was going to be bright an sunny an WARM, which it got into the low 60's, lots of activites
going on. Sorry for the late report, my internet was out from Friday thru Sunday evening due to the
high winds that happened on Friday. Today a major blizzard is ongoing in the NW Indiana area today.
School closings everywhere. Road conditons horrid, just a good day to stay at home.
 
Saturday started with the monthly board meeting in the depot at 8am. No major happenings.
Les Beckman was kind enough to take some pictures for the report.  The desk that Bob Jacqim has
completed in the shop area has been moved to the ticket area of the depot an the old desk was
removed. Bob has cosmetic work to do on the new desk moved in. The physical condition of the
desk been fixed, but will be easier to do the touch up work in the depot.

1.  Loading old desk from depot after putting Governor's desk in its place.  Dave Cook (back to camera), Cory Bennett (obscured in back) and Tom Rainford (on right).

2.  Loretta Kosloske working on Guest Engineer lists on her computer in depot.

Lots of folks for this spring for the guest engineer program, producing much needed

revenue for the museum.

3.  Joe Baker working on lighting in display caboose, Illinois Central # 9914.

Joe told me that he has completed the electrical work an lighting in the caboose.

4.  Fred Boyer continues with removal of old paint from levers in Grasselli Tower.

Les Beckman assisted Fred in the tower during the day.

Fred says that he an Judy will be moving to Florida soon, good luck Fred an Thanks

for all the work over the years at HVRM.

5.  Switching cars around using EL Alco # 310.  John Degan as engineer and Steve Henrichs as conductor.

One of the major projects of the day was to move cars from the shop area track back to

the caboose track. These 3 cars had been inspected an new graphite discs put in to replace

the grease in the pin area on the bolster. John LaOrange got the disc from Trans-Co.

These cars were put on the main line of the  museum to wait till the other 3 cars were

retrieved out of the caboose track. The final 3 cars were moved into position an all were

raised by the air jack, inspected an graphite disc put in the pin area. All went fine until

the Katy open air car came up for lifting. The east end of the car was found to need some

welding done to the pin area. Mark Kniebel called a welder qualified to do the job an if

weather is good next weekend, it should be fixed with a new weld. Mark Kniebel ran the

air compressor, Tom Rainford moved the heavy air jack around and John LaOrange

inspected the greasy flange area for defects.

 

The GE # 11 had the water holding tank removed an rebuilt by Richard Warner into

a brand new tank. The old tank was totally encrusted with rust an valves blocked to

the radiator. Richard spray painted the new tank an left to dry inside the door of the

shop. Next week it will be installed back in the cab. John inspected some of the pipes

that needed to be replaced for the radiator functions.

 

Cory Bennett an David Cook worked on replacing fogged plexiglass with a new piece

of Lexan glass in the cab of the back hoe tractor. The new glass needed to be cut with

the old piece for a good fit. Cory an John did a very good job, now when using  the back

hoe an clear vision in all directions.

 

Joe Kingsbury worked on the Kitchen car floor inside the shop area. Progress is being

made. Joe was given a check to buy needed construction materials for the inside

of the tool car. The trailer was connected to Joe's truck for transportation of the material.

The trailer will be parked inside the west shop area an material removed as needed.

Some things need to be moved away from the west door for easier access to the

trailer.

 

The Erie 310 completed its switching moves an returned to the shop. The tourist train

is arranged for the Easter train rides in March. Check the HVRM website for details.

 

Mark Kniebel did some brush cutting on the CKIN right of way near the Arlington

Street crossing for the last couple of hours of work.

 

Lunch was Pizza from the Wooden Nickel, Margret was unavailable Saturday.

I sort of got rid of the trash from the kitchen car an depot bathrooms making a

run to the dumpster.

 

Temps are expected to rise above 40 by the weekend, snow should be mostly melted

by then. A very heavy wet snow fell today, but the driveway is mostly driveable to get

out to the main road. Still have March/April to deal with, winter is not over yet. Be safe

out on the roads this week. Hope to see all down at museum next week.

 

Tom Travis

 

 

         

Frigid winter day at HVRM 2-13-16

Greetings!

Bright sun but temps in the teens at Hoosier Valley today.  Despite the cold, still had 11 members show up and even had a couple of visitors to boot!

Mark Knebel didn't let the weather stop him and continued his effort of cutting down small trees along the railroad right-of-way west of the museum.  Photo number 1, taken from my car, shows Mark at work.

In the West Annex of the shop, the wood stove was stoked up and managed to keep it at a comfortable 65 degrees and worked continued there on C&EI tool car # A-1054.  The second photo shows Joe Kingsbury screwing the plywood floor into place.  In the third photo, Sparky Byers is repairing a hole in the cars roof and Rich Warner is shown in the fourth photo, welding the hole shut.  Later, a steel awning was put in place over a set of the cars windows and the fifth shot shows Rich getting set to tack weld it into place.

Finally, John La Orange in the yellow coat and Cory Bennett decided to remove the frosted over plexiglass panel from the back hoe as shown in the 6th photo.  John took the panel with him and will get a new one cut to fit.  

Weather is gradually supposed to moderate and be near 50 by the end of this coming week.  Let's hope the weatherman knows what he's talking about!

Have a great week.

Les 

Testing and installing at HVRM 2/6/16

Greetings!

Bright sun all day, but although temps were slightly above average at around 40 degrees, a crisp wind made it feel more like it was in the 20's.

Despite the cool temps, Andy Hershmann and Mark Knebel performed single car air brake tests on all of the equipment we use in our passenger train service. The

first photo shows Andy testing Erie Lackawanna caboose # C345.  Later in the day, the air compressor was moved from the Shop area out to the storage track and

testing continued.  The second shot shows Andy working under Bessemer & Lake Erie caboose # 1989.

In reference to our photos in last weeks report, Cory Bennett and John LaOrange completed the bolting down of the new radiator (photo 3) in place in GE 95-ton

diesel, Interlake Iron # 11.

The sun brought out a surprising number of visitors, including a couple from Germany who were visiting friends in La Porte!

I, like others, spent the day doing some minor things around the museum including replacing a light bulb and scrapping paint off of areas on the levers at Grasselli

Tower where paint wasn't meant to be. 

Steve Henrichs explained how the newly reconditioned lockers that are to be installed in Grasselli will be locked since the old locks are jammed and can't be used.

Very ingenious!  Steve, Fred Boyer and I also talked about how the brick chimney should be put back into the tower.  This chimney will strictly be for looks and will

not actually be used.

Bob Barcus, Doug Kosloske and Loretta Kosloske manned the depot today while Margrett Cook provided lunch.

Rich Warner did some welding on our maintenance equipment back in the West Annex of the Shop.

Have a good week.

Les