New Trucks and Tarp

Today the 321 was retrucked and tarped, thanks to cooperation from many Car Dept. personnel. The main people who helped with changing the trucks were Joel, Warren, Stan, Ray Weart, and myself. Here are some views of the progress during the day.

The needle beam supporting the car.

L to R: Ray, Stan, and Warren.

This was the first time the 321 had been off its trucks since it left Wheaton.

(L) Joel drives the forklift after we picked up a 4000 truck from its storage location along Bruneau Rd.

For tarping the car, we had help from several more, including Tim, Bill, Charlie, and Vic.

It was a lot of work, but things went well. Thanks to everybody who helped!

I also got a chance to ride the open car for a short trip.

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More Preparation

I installed some more carpeting on the roof of the 321 today, so I believe it is ready to tarp. The used carpet came from an anonymous donor down the street from me. And then I spent most of the rest of the time removing my personal belongings and tools from the car, since it will be very difficult to get inside once the tarp is installed. That took longer than expected. For the time being, the baggage compartment of the 277 will be my workshop. Not much to see here, so let's look around a little.

On Sunday the crew did some switching, and the 205 was moved from track 81 to track 73, among its fellow streetcars, where it fits in much better. It also relieves the worries I had about backing the IT cars into it! Here (L) it is on 73, just about where the 309 and 321 lived for many years. The PFE reefer was then moved to track 84; here it is between the 218 and the IT train.



And contractors are making progress on framing the car shop extension over on the south side of Barn 4.




Preparations for moving the Trolleyville collection are in progress, and the excitement is building. I'll be going to Cleveland for the weekend of the 31st to help collect the parts that belong to our cars. News and views will be posted here, of course.

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321 Update

There were no classes to teach today due to Columbus Day, but there was still plenty of work to do on preparing the 321. I finished disconnecting the motor leads and brake rigging from the trucks, and cleaned up some parts left over from yesterday's activities. Here's what the 321 looks like minus the steps and pilots. (One ground shunt had welded itself to the truck; that needs to be fixed with a torch. And one kingpin could only be raised an inch or so before it jammed, but I think that will be no problem if we can jack the car up slightly.) And I did lots more work on the roof, and removed some more parts and personal property.

With the steps and pilot out of the way, we can get a better view of how an inside-hung motor mounts on the truck.
Legend:
Red circle: motor leads.
Green arrows: Ground shunt.
Yellow arrows: Axle cap bearings.
The cover plate over the armature is below the motor leads, and the gear pan is behind the ground shunt wire in this view.

And here's the 4001 under its new tarp, nice and secure, and completely hidden.

Stan and I walked through the material yard and looked at spare trucks that we might be able to use to put under the 321. Unfortunately, the ground is pretty soggy.

And for Columbus Day, I discovered that work has started on the new Car Shop extension on the south side of Barn 4. There were two contractors earlier, but they got away before I took this picture. As you can see, materials are being staged for construction to start.

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What's cream and maroon and looks like an "L" car?

Answer: the 321, now! Today we made more preparations for the impending arrival of the Brookins equipment by taking step wells and pilots off the 321 to facilitate removal of the car's trucks so that they can be used under the 319. I started off by removing three of the car's step wells (the fourth was left in place to ease continued access to the car's interior); Dan Fenlaciki then helped me move them to the center aisle of the barn between tracks 82 and 83. Dan and I removed the car's four third rail beams, reunited them with some hardware that had been removed previously, and put them along the barn wall. By this time a sizable crew had arrived on Track 84 to tarp CSL 4001, and several people lent a hand in removing the 321's pilots. Dan Mulvhill and Joe Stupar both helped with some particularly balky bolts; Joel Ahrendt assisted in taking the pilots down. Thanks to everyone who helped - it was not an easy task and it would have been impossible without everyone who lent a hand! The 4001 is now tarped for outdoor storage and the 321 is a big step closer to outdoors-ready.

EDIT: Unofficial Company Photographer Gwyn Stupar sent along some photos of the proceedings. At left, I'm loosening bolts on the third step well; at right, Dan Mulvihill (R) and I take off some difficult bolts from the #2 end pilot. Below left, I'm removing bolts from the pilot braces at the #2 end (the little air tank over my head is the equalizing reservoir for the M23 brake stand, something the 308 and 309 don't have). Accessing these is a lot easier with the step well gone! "Watch Your Step" indeed! Below right, Joe Stupar doesn't mess around - he's seen here using a cheater bar to remove one of the final nuts holding up the #2 end pilot.

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Putting a Better Floor on the Roof

This may seem like one of the strangest things I've done yet, and that's a hard act to follow.

The 321 will need to be moved outside to make room for the new cars from Cleveland, and to protect it will be tarped. The roof needs lots of work, and it quickly became obvious that I didn't have time to do the necessary wood work. So pieces of carpet will be used to protect the tarp from nail pops, loose boards, sharp edges, and so on. I started installing them as seen here.

(L) Before

(R) After

The roof of the 4001, which will also be tarped.

I also had to finish removing all of the old tacks left over from the tar paper which was installed at North Chicago. That took a while.

And I disconnected the motor leads and brake rigging from the #2 truck, so the car can be put on shop trucks.

Tom Cornillie was visiting, so we looked at the 277.

By the end of the day I had done most of the center part of the roof, but ran out of carpet. I'll need to find some more, if I can. Or if you have a pile of rolls of used carpet, please let me know. Condition isn't important. Of course, I'd like the color to be as sophisticated and stylish as possible, but otherwise anything goes.

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Time and tidying wait for no man

Wednesday I took a day off of work and went out to the museum to work on cleaning out the 4001 and 321 in preparation for those two cars being tarped and put outside, so that cars from the Trolleyville collection can be put indoors immediately. This should only be a temporary situation but the cars will still be inaccessible for a few months, and it seemed like a good time to clean out a lot of the "dead storage" materials. At left is the interior of the 321 after this tidying-up effort... there's still a lot of stuff in the car but most of it is related to the car's function as a workshop. Tools and other easily movable items will be moved out before the car is tarped, so that they will be usable over the winter.

After a lot of moving and sorting, attention turned to the roofs of the two cars. My father did some work on the 321's roof to install some roof covering, so that the tarp won't chafe and rip on a few currently-exposed sections of framing. I covered over the roof boards and trolley hook bolts on the 4001's roof with carpet; this car is now ready to tarp, as it is completely emptied of stored materials and the roof is about as snag-free as it's going to be.

Below is a picture of one of the trips we made to the container with the department truck, moving spare parts out of the 321. Ever wonder how we're able to keep this stuff going and restore cars that are just shells? Spare parts! As Bob Bruneau always said, "parts is parts!"

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