Sunny spring day at Hoosier Valley 3/28/15

Greetings -

Temps stayed in 30's all day although the sun made it seem better.

Kind of a slow day at the museum as we prepare to run first trains for the season next Saturday with the special Easter Egg trains.

The three trains are all sold out although nice weather might permit us to sell seats in the open cars.  Time will tell!

Erie Alco # 310 was fired up to switch cars around and set up the train consist we will be using for the specials next Saturday.

The S1 will also be at the head end for the trains.

Cory Bennett ran the Payloader and with help from Dave Cook, loaded five of our old telephone poles onto a trailer.  The poles

were purchased by a private individual for use on his property.  The poles had been sitting in our storage yard for some time and

its good to move them, and make a few bucks for the museum. 

Members Bud Tribbie and Kevin Kennedy helped me dig out the main rods for the Porter steam engine and move them to a better

spot at the museum.

Bud told me about a GM&O signal head from Dwight, Illinois that might be available as a trade.

Joe Kingsbury worked on Notre Dame & Western diesel # 5332.  Joe says that the FRA regulations on the locomotives air tanks

are discouraging.  There are four of these tanks on the unit.

The company that is going to be doing tie work on the track between the museum and English Lake have been spreading the ties

out along the right-of-way.  Actual work won't begin until after the special trains are run next Saturday.

Had a number of visitors at the museum today.

Apparently there was an air problem with the Purdue crane and it was not used to unload NKP gondola # 45622 as had been planned.

Will have to do it another day.

Enjoy the coming week everyone.  Weather is supposed to become more spring like with temps moving into the 50's and 60's.

Les

   

Ties, Ballast, Spikes, All Ready For Tie Replacement Soon 3-21-15

Greetings to all,
 
Hope everyone is enjoying some spring type weather. Yes it will snow near Chicago tomorrow, but won't last
long with 60's coming Wednesday. Another busy week for driving school bus, up to close to 40 hours a week
for the past 3 months, but that will slack off soon an be able to get some projects done around the house.
A very welcome guest showed up Monday afternoon, Jeff & Cathy Jacobs from Bath Maine for an evening of
dinner an long time catch up news. They are on cross country trip in a Winnebago camper an visiting sights
of interest, from Florida to California. Jeff & Cathy wanted to tour Kentucky and the southern states before
returning to Maine in a couple of weeks. Jeff was able to glimpse the ballast cleaning Tuesday an movement
of equipment to the passing siding in preparation for rail equipment coming in for tie replacement soon.
 
Arriving late to North Judson on Saturday was viewing the ballast cleaning operation. This project has
gone on all week an estimates of 700 tons of ballast has been cleaned an piled up along the rail line. Some
slight setbacks early in the week, the payloader's waterpump broke a shaft an took 24 hours to replace,
Many helped all week, Cory Bennitt, John LaOrange, Joe Kingsbury, Dave Cook, Bing Ringsley, Corky,
Richard Warner, Bob Jachim,may of missed some, but a lot of ballast was cleaned for tie replacement
project an for future projects. Fines (dirt, small stones, etc) what the machine extracted an piled along
the C&I ROW, will be removed by Troike Farms for use in some projects. It makes good base for roads,
filling in potholes etc. Thanks very much to all for a intense work week. Ballast cleaning concluded
Saturday afternoon and next week the machine will be removed. Special thanks to Mark Kniebel
for the endless time an effort of walking the 6 miles marking ties an calculating exactly where ties
are needed.. Years of effort have gone into this project, along with the help of the City of North Judson,
countless delays, mountains of paperwork involved, Government issues, it has finally come to
this point. WELL DONE to everyone involved.
 
During the week, 4500 ties, including switch ties, were brought in by semi truck, unloaded an stacked
along the C&I passing siding for the tie crew. Shortly rail equipment will be brought in an unloaded on
the street crossing and stored next to the shop building. Four day weeks, 10 hours a day, for however
amount of time it will take to replace ties, ballast, spike, tamp, level will be allotted. Work will start
at the English Lake end an work towards end of line at North Judson. Rail equipment will be stored
each night at the shop under watchful security. The rail line on weekends will be open for museum
operations of tourist trains.
 
Most of the shop activity was Joe Kingsbury an Richard Warner working on the ND&W 5332 diesel
tracing wiring in the cab. Fred Boyer and someone else painted primer on the outside of the tool
car.
 
After lunch, the HVRM general membership meeting was held in the depot waiting area. A large crowd
was in attendance. Reports were given an updates given on all projects. Big discussion was about the
crowd expected at the Easter trains on April 4th. All trains are maxed out with riders. Open air cars,
cabooses. handicap car will be used the train. Weather will play a big part on riders on the open
air cars, filling up the cabooses. Trains will run in all type of weather,  no exceptions. A new policy
for future excursions in iffy weather periods will be in use for the Christmas trains for 2015.
Riders an workers are expected to dress accordingly for the weather. First come, first serve is
the policy. It will be a very very busy day for HVRM workers. Please come out an help if possible.
 
Remember safety is paramount around the museum equipment. Everyone needs to be extra vigilant
to riders on the train, loading an unloading at the depot an Easter egg location. Visit the HVRM
website for further information on ride times an events for the upcoming season. Guest engineers
and throttle time will be a big draw during the summer season.
 
Please be safe on the roads and watch those railroad crossings, always expect a train at any time.
Stop, look & listen if need be. Too many large accidents that were avoidable with a call on the
railroad crossing posts could of prevented some, along with loss of life, wrecks costing millions of
dollars to Amtrak and host railroads. Watch out for school busses also, in the last 2 weeks, two
wrecks with a head on near Hebron IN, killing 2 people in the pickup truck. One drunk driver at
3:30pm in the afternoon in La Porte IN ran a stop sign, hitting a rear dual tire, shaking up a lot
of kids being transported home from school. Put a school bus out of operation for a couple of
days. The driver was booked into LP County jail, charged with a number of offenses and WILL
spend time in jail plus a large fine eventually, plus court costs an a lawyer, be smart, don't
drive drunk.
 
Tom Travis La Porte IN

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No pie day (3-14-15) at HVRM!

 

Greetings!

The Pie (Pi) day observance at Hoosier Valley today was marked by temps in the 50's, sunshine all day, and much activity!  We'll settle for that!

Managed to make it to the museum in time for the morning Board meeting.  The ladies from the Starke County Community Foundation gave the Board a report on the museums Endowment Fund.  Along with a nice check for the 2015 distribution.  Worth considering a donation to the Fund for sure.

One of the things reported on at the Board meeting by Joe Kingsbury was the fact the the ND&W Porter diesel, after Joe and Rich Warner had worked on the wiring, had been successfully moved slightly forward and backwards with the throttle.  Progress continues!  Joe also reported that both the headlights on ND&W #5332 are now operational (see first photo for the recent installation).

Also reported was that the new ties for track repair would be coming in this week.  A contractor is performing this work.  As part of the museum contribution. we will supply ballast and to make sure that we have a supply of good ballast, a machine has been rented that will sort out our rock pile to remove dirt, "fines", and give good rock to the contractors.  

It was noted during the meeting, that one of the boards for the walkway from the parking lot across the track to the depot, was missing.  This board was replaced during the day.  Not sure whether Bob Albert or Bob Jachim, did the work, but excellent work.

More info on Board activities will be found in the upcoming museum newsletter.  Lots of interesting things going on.  And also, a membership meeting coming up next Saturday.   

Steve Henrichs used his grinder to wire brush levers 1 through 6 in Grasselli Tower, removing 100 years of flaking paint (see second photo).  Hard to see in the photos, but the cleaned levers look really good.  Nice job Steve!  Also took measurements for leg supports for the old sink which he will re-install in the near future.  And there are a lot more levers to be taken care of!

John LaOrange fired up Alco # 310 and went down a pulled out the Purdue crane and gondola NKP # 45622 and moved them over to the rock pile near Main Street so that they will be ready when the fore mentioned rock sorter arrives this coming week.  The gon will be used for the storage of the "fines" until they can be moved to a suitable place on the property for fill.  Dave Cook worked on getting our Chevy dump truck back in operation after it had been sitting all winter.  The dump truck will be used to move the good ballast over to the location where the contractor is installing the new ties.

Fred Boyer was priming recently cleaned areas on C&EI work car # A-1054 (see third photo).

It was recently reported that Bob Albert was working on a set of metal steps.  Today, Bob took those steps down to the ICRR display caboose today and installed them in place to be ready when the displays are put into the car.  Check the 4th photo for the arrangement to make it easier for future visitors to access the caboose.

Finally, in reference to the installation of headlights into the Notre Dame Porter diesel, those headlights came from the Whitcomb 44 ton diesel, which is currently out of service.  I felt that this left the Whitcomb looking a bit "naked" so I found the old reflectors up on the storage shelves.  These reflectors had been sitting up there since the headlights had been changed on the Whitcomb a number of years ago to improve "lamp power".  After quite a bit of trial and error, I finally got them both installed back into the Whitcomb's hoods.  Photos show the "before" and "after" views.  I think there's an improvement.  Hopefully you might agree.

Loretta Kosloske and Bob Barcus ran the gift shop today.  Margrett Cook provided lunch, including liver and onions and/or tacos (mild or spicy).

Good to see the signals operating today as the Alco moved over the museum trackage.

Spring seems to finally be here, even if it's not quite "official" yet.  We had quite a few visitors show up today.  We can always use help at the museum.  Come out if you can!

Les

 

       

Minus 5 Degrees at HVRM Saturday February 28th 2015

 Greetings to all.
 
The north has been in a deep freeze for weeks now, getting tired of it all, especially around the
shop building. Too cold to work on much inside and snow is too deep to work outside. But in
the west shop restoration continues, slowly, but steady. Have had too many snow days with
2 hour delay, school closed, an early dismissals. I drove a bus load to St John IN three weeks ago
in a blowing blizzard, made it back to La Porte but almost three times the amount of time that
I normally make the drive. Just looking forward to spring in three weeks.
 
After catching up on errands early Saturday morning, I finally made it down to HVRM after 1 pm.
Stopped to talk to Bob Barcus in the depot for a while. Loretta was off doing a errand and returned
shortly after. Mark Kniebel was setting up the depot waiting area with tables an chairs for a planned
NARCOA meeting Sunday afternoon. This is their annual meeting for the season.
 
Made my way over to the shop area, walked into the west shop area, nice an warm with the wood
stove doing a great job of heating the inside. Need fans up on the ceiling to bring down all that warm
air that collects near the ceiling. A number of members working on clearing the east end of the
shop for possible pouring of concrete in the near future. Don't know how much was thrown away,
but with John LaOrange eyeing everything, I doubt much got tossed. Steve Newland told me that
on the north side of the building, items were frozen to the ground. Lots of big items need to be
removed yet, my small wood burning stove, a pallet of nails donated by Norwayne Lumber years
ago, a welder unit that has not been used. Maybe an auction of selected items could be put up for
sale. Don't know the details of how much concrete will be poured or if rail will be put in to the floor.
Bjarne Henderson, Bob Albert, were also working on the shop clean up. Noticed that the tool car
has been worked on in the last couple of weeks. Grinding paint on the north side was evident with
lots of paint dust everywhere. A side window was torched out for building frame for a new window.
Lots of work to be done yet. I did notice that a possible railroad marking under the new number
as MP, MISSOURI PACIFIC, a possible number was underneath, but could not make it out.
 
Joe Kingsbury and Richard Warner were working on the ND&W Porter engine tracing wiring. A very
slow process of trying to match up connectors. Nothing in writing can be found on how the
engine was wired. A long process ahead of them.
 
Hopefully March will pass quickly into warmer weather. The museums first train of the season is
April 4th. For more info go to HVRM's website. Easter train. Loretta has got a busy season of
trains and special events for the season. March is general membership meeting March 21st.
Board of directors meeting is March 14th.
 
FYI, ICBX has bought two F-7's from ERIE MINING an are being transported to Vermillion Railway
here in Indiana. So maybe the sweet chant of EMD 567 engines will be running soon. A couple of
pictures have appeared on RAILPICTURES.NET. Here is one of them.
 
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=520960&nseq=4

 

 Another picture of Lehigh Valley 128 has also showed up down at Spencer running in the snow
around the museum.
 
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=521063&nseq=58
 
 N&W  611 restoration is progressing nicely also. Down in Stearns KY, the steam locomotive is getting

needed attention also, and may be steamed up sometime this year.

 

Tom Travis HVRM La Porte IN
 

Weather respite at HVRM 2/21/15

Greetings one and all!

After frigid weather (below zero at times) this week and more in the forecast for the upcoming week, old Mother Nature gave us a break today at Hoosier Valley with temps approaching 40 degrees!  Thank you...thank you....thank you!  There was no museum report from last week as, right after the Board meeting, everyone hit the road.  There were white out conditions on the way home, and a number of accidents, but fortunately none involving HVRM folks.   

Arrived at the museum today a bit after 9:00 a.m. and talked to Doug and Loretta Kosloske in the depot.  Then over to the Shop, where things were humming!   Fred Boyer was on the green manlift, grinding rust off of the car sides of C&EI tool car # A-1054.  John DeGan was "relaxing" by laying on the cold concrete floor, where he was wire brushing and using the grinding wheel on one of the cars trucks (see photo #1 below).  Fred eventually determined that some steel patches needed to be welded to cover holes in the car side of A-1054.  Fred found a suitable piece of steel so enlisted Bob Albert to start cutting (second photo below).   John was called to do the welding job and I took over cleaning the cars truck.  Unfortunately, John found a bad part on the welder and had to run out to the local farm store in Knox for a replacement only to find out after returning that something blew in the welder, and repairs need to be made.  Next week!

We seem to always have visitors to the museum, even in the winter.  Shown below is a photo of Bob Jachim finishing up a talk on C&O 2-8-4 # 2789 and HVRM with a mother and her interested son.  Always glad to take the time to do these and Bob especially, is an expert.

Lunch at the museum is often mentioned in these reports, but I thought that today I'd include a couple of photos of our lunch car before the guys came in to eat.  NKP # X58538 started out as a box car and was converted by the Nickel Plate into a camp car.  As you can see, it's a bit crowded, which is the reason why we are restoring our C&EI tool car, which will be used for table space after it is finished.  Members are encouraged to spend a Saturday or two with us, and help us in our efforts.  Margrett Cook provided todays lunch.

After lunch, Steve Newland cut out one of the window inserts that the C&EI put on the A-1054 when it was in work train service.  We needed to cut out these old inserts as we prepare to put in new moveable windows.  Unfortunately, the photo of Steve's work didn't turn out.  Will try to get one next time.

Joe Kingsbury and Rich Warner continued their efforts in restoring the cut up wiring in our ND&W Porter diesel # 5332.  Hard to get a photo in the tight confines of the Porter's cab, but here is one of Rich doing his thing.  There was some hope that today, the wiring for the reverser on the unit had been figured out, and it was decided to test it.  John LaOrange brought up the 55 gallon drum of fuel and pumped some into the 5332's fuel tank, but although the diesel power plants then fired up, the unit just wouldn't move. Back to the drawing board!

John and Mark Knebel then opened the back door of the West Annex of the Shop and replenished the inside pile for the wood stove.

Also at the museum today were Dave Cook, Randall Downs, and others I probably missed.

Have a great week everyone.  And....STAY WARM!

Les  

Welding & Grinding Tool Car/ERIE 310 2-7-15

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Greetings,

 

After a snowy week in Northwest IN, it was a delightful day at North Judson, temps were in the lower

40's with a bright sunny sky. Snow was rapidly melting off the shops roofs an large chunks of snow

falling below. A record snow level of 15 inches plus fell Super Bowl Sunday. Cory had the back hoe

out pushing snow for a place to park an drive.

 

I arrived about 10am an went into the depot. Bob Barcus and Loretta were both working. Spent a

few minutes talking to Bob about his week. Had been a hard week on everyone.

 

Driving down to the shop, snow was melting fast in the bright sunshine. Entering the shop a couple

of projects were in progress. Doug an John DeGan had taken off a bent bar on the ERIE 310

and applied the torch to it to heat it up and bend it back in a straight. After twisting an turning the

steel rod, it was finally straight on the uncoupling rod to pull the pin. Just a cosmetic thing, but

made the steel look better.

 

Joe and Richard were at it again in the ND&W 5332 tracing wiring an replacing worn wire. The highlight

of the day was when the diesel engines were started in an attempt to trace an electrical problem.

The engines sounded great. Don't know if that helped or not. The shop door was opened to let

out exhaust. The wood stove had the shop at a nice temperature, an was actually getting a little

too hot.

 

Fred Boyer was busy grinding on the outside of the tool car. Dave Cook an Grandson were up on

the manlift working on grinding down the edges of the old ventilation openings and welding blanks

over the open holes. So this completes work on the vents, Doug has come up with an idea

for replacing the window openings with a wood frame glass window that will open in the summer.

Doug will make up a model to show how the wood frame an window will work. When its decided

to torch out a section of the windows, the size will be known or decided on. The frame will be built

when the inside is framed out with wood.  A number of people worked on grinding today, Steve Newland,

Les Beckman. Many thanks for working on the tool car.

 

Back to the ERIE 310, once the steel rod was fixed, it was decided that the drooping coupler had

to be fixed somehow. It ended up taking the big steel plate on the end of the diesel body off, to get

at the bolts holding the coupler in position. After using the torch to loosen up a couple of nuts,

the bottom plate was finally free an fell to the ground, and after that the coupler pin fell out an

the shaft itself easily was pushed out on the ground with a thud. John Degan did his torching work

of removing the old plate installed years ago. The old plate was used as a pattern for a new 3/8 inch

plate. In the meantime, Cory an John LaOrange took the bottom plate down to the hydraulic press to

bend the steel flat and after putting some heat to it, the steel plate finally was flat again. Over the years,

hard couplings wore the old plate down and bent the bottom plate, resulting in the drawbar to sag some.

After John DeGan welded in the new plate, Doug, Cory & John lifted the heavy coupler back into the

pocket. That was it for the day, time was 3:30pm. Tools were picked up, power to the welder was

turned off, light turned off. The only thing left is to reassemble the drawbar and put the steel plate

back on the front of the engine.

 

Next Saturday is Board meeting at 8am in the depot. Days are getting a little longer, lighter earlier

in the morning, soon to spring ahead next month to CDST. Spring is on the way, soon to turn to

outside activities, track work is top on the list, with new ties arriving next month for the replacement

program. New train times are being implement this year, along with guest engineer programs.

Come on out an volunteer soon.

 

Regards

 

Tom Travis

Jumping into February 2015 at HVRM! 1-31-2015

Greetings!

With a major snowstorm due into the area as we move into February, the weather was still nice at Hoosier Valley today.  And there

were a number of  things going on.

Tom Travis arrived at the museum today to find John LaOrange in the process of doing the COT&S on Erie Lackawanna Alco # 310.

Naturally Tom offered to give John a hand with all four of the brake valves.  The first 2 photos attached to this report, show some of

the work that went on in this effort.  This was a job that pretty much took all day.

I arrived shortly after Tom and went up to check on Steve Henrichs to see what he was doing in Grasselli Tower.  Soon ended up

going over to Hoppe's Hardware in town to get a piece of 1" pipe, that was 6" long.  It took a while to get that piece into its proper place.

Then Steve needed to turn the main pipe slightly and didn't have a pipe wrench big enough to do it, so walked over to the Shop building

where I found the one that Steve is using in the third photo.  This part of the effort is now finished.  Two more sections to go!

Bob Albert was working on repairs to one of our portable steel steps and the fourth photo shows him cutting a section of steel to make

a new angle piece for the repair work.

Dave Cooks grandson is shown in the last photo doing some grinding on C&EI tool car # A-1054 preparatory to welding a plate onto

the old ventilation windows.  In the meantime, Fred Boyer was cleaning rust side sections of the car.  I did some grinding on one of the

previously welded ventilation windows that Cory Bennett had done.

Joe Kingsbury continued his efforts in tracing the mangled wiring in ND&W Porter diesel #5332.

Doug Kosloske manned the gift shop in the depot today in the absence of Bob Barcus.  Loretta arrived after lunch, and took that job over.

Others at the museum today included Bob Jachim (who as usual, made the morning pot of coffee), Mark Knebel, Joe Baker, Dave Cook.

Margrett Cook provided lunch in the NKP kitchen car.

As usual, we had some visitors come by.  We are always open on Saturdays (except major holidays) and always enjoy having visitors

stop in and see us.

Have a good week and keep the snow shovels handy!  Winter is quite done with us yet!

Les