Greetings!
Sunny all day but cool in the wind. But spring is right around the corner!
Bob Jachim made coffee this morning, but reported later that two of the "new" coffee pots weren't working. The old pot was put into use.
There was a Board meeting at the museum this morning. Doug Kosloske read the minutes and took care of other jobs in the absence of Kevin Kennedy. Some very Interesting discussions including Bob Barcus talking about a 5 year plan for Hoosier Valley. More to come on this! Also, guest Chris Costello of the Erie Business Car Society talked to the Board members about the Erie Railroad's President's car number 1. Also mentioned was a saddle tank steam locomotive and the possibility of bringing it to HVRM to celebrate the museums 30th year. No decisions made. Loretta Kosloske gave a report on passenger train and guest engineer happenings.
Mark Knebel spent the morning using the Payloader to finish a job he started last Saturday; that is, cleaning up the area behind the original Shop building (note photo 1). This is an area that is visible to train riders and was long filled with sections from cut trees saved for the wood furnace in the West Shop Annex. The large pieces were moved over to the wood pile and Mark spent these past two Saturdays, cleaning up the wood debris. A much better appearance for sure!
Joe Kingsbury continued working on ND&W diesel # 5332.
In the second photo, John La Orange is shown working on one of the trucks on Bessemer & Lake Erie caboose #1989. He replaced two brake shoes.
Charlene Gyurko fixed a terrific lunch today; chili, corn bread and lime jello (with pineapple and cottage cheese).
After lunch, Mark and I went into his office to look at a diagram of the Chesapeake & Ohio lettering for the tender on Kanawha # 2789. It appears that the letters in the diagram are the same size as the official C&O letters drawing.
Bob Albert got one of the windows in Nickel Plate caboose # 471 replaced.
Recently, some driver apparently lost control of his car over on Arlington Street and took out the chain link fence alongside museum property, as per the 3rd photo. Mark brought the Payloader over and we cleaned up this debris and took it over to the scrap pile. We also then decided that we should clean up another pile in the middle of that section of property that also contained some chain link fence parts and in the 4th shot, Mark is pulling those fence pieces out of that particular debris. This was also taken over to the museum's scrap pile.
Meanwhile Cory Bennett and Tom Rainford had been working on GE diesel # 11. There was a section of pipe that was part of the cooling system and somehow it had ruptured, perhaps from ice being trapped inside the line. In the fifth photo, Tom is shown trying to solder that narrow break closed. Tested with water in the system later, it appears that the repair was holding.
Bob Gyurko got the electrical line on the south side of the old, original section of the Shop working and also installed a new light over there. That is great news! Thanks Bob!
At lunchtime, Bing Risley told me that he had come up with a nice concrete slab that he thought we might be able to use for the entrance to the lower lever of Grasselli Tower. I looked at the slab, which measured 3' x 4' and thought that it would be much better that the concrete blocks we currently were "temporarily" using. So, I took the blocks all apart, and piled them next to the tower, then Mark and I went over and got some stone and dumped it into the now vacant spot in front of the door. I then smoothed the stone out as shown in the 6th picture. The old removed concrete blocks can be seen just beyond the new pad of stone.
Finally, as long as I was over by Grasselli, I thought I'd grab a quick shot of the 3 head Erie searchlight signal that stands next to the tower. In this last photo, you'll note that the bottom light (normally red) needs to be replaced.
Have a great week everyone!
Les
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