Greetings -
Snow in the forecast for the day, but just had a light rain most of the afternoon with temps in the mid 30's all day.
Bob Albert has been working on the photo displays in Pullman Troop Sleeper # 7256, including those highlighting the Studebaker Automobile Company in South Bend, Indiana. Photo one shows a photo display of historical photos relating to Studebaker. Note the photo of Wabash boxcar # 49114, a car that is displayed at Hoosier Valley. The company used box cars like this to ship parts and also entire automobiles to Studebaker dealers around the county. The second photo shows one of Bob's previous Studebaker displays that he recently renewed with new wood frames.
While in the Troop Sleeper, I checked for recent additions to the N scale display of North Judson. Jon Oram has added grass and a number of trees to the display and also told me that a N gauge 1951 Desoto had been placed on the layout. I looked, and actually found the maroon colored car!
Joe Kingsbury continues working on our Porter diesel. Photo number 3 shows one side of the cab with its finished ND&W 5332 lettering. Also note the template on the hood of the unit. The 4th shot shows Joe working on the lettering on the other side of the cab.
Work also continued on putting ballast down on the new spur going into the west side of the museum's Shop. Dave Cook with the air hammer is at left in photo number 5, while John La Orange handles the second air hammer with Tom Rainford behind John using his shovel to spread the stone. Later Mark Knebel (left) and Cory Bennett took over the hammers, as seen in the 6th shot.
Two Saturdays ago, the museum started putting down new stone for the upcoming arrival of Erie Lackawanna open window coach # 4328. Last Saturday, additional stone was put down from the Mulberry Street pavement over to the track where the car was to be unloaded. The job got finished just in time, because word was received mid-morning that the truck bringing the car to HVRM, was on its way up from Noblesville!
There was no formal lunch today so after finishing work on the west side Shop spur mentioned above, Tom Rainford and I went over to Subway for a quick lunch. Upon our return, we found EL number 4328 sitting on Mulberry Street, waiting to go onto museum property (photo 7). The unloading of truck-shipped railroad equipment is a long and involved, and we aren't able to document each step, however these next photos will give you an idea of the work. Schlatter Boys Trucking handled the move of the 1917-built car and in the 8th shot, we see the two sets of trucks up on the roll off truck. The first set of trucks has to be placed on the unloading track before the unloading of the 4328 can be started. The 9th photo shows the first set of trucks coming off. Doug Kosloske, who arranged to purchase the car, is shown in the 10th pix, putting heave grease into the bowl of the unloaded truck. Once the first truck is on the unloading track, the car can be brought onto the property. This move was not without problems as the truck got its wheels stuck in the new stone necessitating bringing out the museums Payloader to provide some helper service (photo # 11). The car eventually was carefully positioned over the unloading track and the jacks positioned to lift up the front end of the car (pix 12), and once raised, the truck was pushed back (photo # 13) and lined up with the cars bolster with the jacks lowering the car onto the truck. Not as easy as it sounds, this particular operation took quite a while. With the car now sitting with a railroad truck on one end and the highway bogie on the other end, work commenced on getting the second railroad truck under the car. This first entailed removing the third axle from the rear highway bogie and then pulling out the remaining two axle bogie as seen in the 14th photo. The jacks were placed in the proper spot, and the car was again lifted up as can be seen in the 15th shot, with Doug again getting ready to apply heavy grease to the truck. The second truck was unloaded from the roll off truck (photo 16) and then, after being greased, was carefully backed under the car. With both trucks now in place and the car safely sitting on Hoosier Valley track, a quick inspection of the interior took place (photo 17). Much work now has to be done to the car, but one day it WILL run down HVRM rails. Thanks to Joey and Jake Schlatter for the move of the car to North Judson.
Hope everyone has a great week coming up and a most wonderful, and enjoyable, Thanksgiving. Don't eat too much now!!
Les
