Restoration Progress
By Ted Kornweibel
July has been one of the most productive months I can remember for Restoration. We've worked mostly on RS&S Jim Crow combine #3. Harold Whalen, our second "metal magician," is spearheading work on the Janney couplers, one missing a knuckle. He took both couplers apart, straightened out a bent shaft for the uncoupling mechanism, and built up its shank with welds to restore its original hexagonal configuration. Harold has also made a beautiful wood pattern for the missing knuckle and, if we can't locate an exact duplicate, we will have a foundry cast one out of steel. Needless to say, it's great to have a true expert, in both the technical but also the engineering aspect, working on this. Joe and Troy Shelly and Ted Komweibel have put in many hours sanding, spackling, and priming the south side of the Jim Crow car. Joe is a careful worker, and he really does a fine job. Now Joe and Ted have attacked the west open platform, and have that more than half done. At the same time Troy and Ted removed all the windows from the south side so they can be repaired, painted, and reinstalled. Bob Schussler did a great job of sanding the entire south-side window sill (actually spanning all of the windows), and then priming it. This was a major accomplishment. We now have the entire south side of the car sanded and repaired from the window sills down to the bottom of the car body
One of our big challenges was the rotten lintel over the baggage door on the south side of the Jim Crow car. It was attached with many nails and spikes, but Troy and Ted managed to remove it, with Troy expertly using sawzall and hand saw. During the week Frank Stites and Ted milled a new lintel out of a 4x8 header. Before it could be installed, however, Frank had to restore the left side support beam for the baggage door opening. It was quite rotted at the top, so he saturated it with "Rot Fix". Seven days later the formerly spongy rotten wood was hard as rock. That enabled Frank and Troy to install the lintel.
With the top of the damaged vertical member now stable, Frank used "Sculpt Wood" to recreate the top of the piece, expertly curving it to fit its quarter-round profile. The following week Troy sanded it smooth. Once painted, no one will know how rotten and disintegrated, it once was.
Harold Whalen is shown here working on the coupler release mechanism on our 117 year old Rockdale, Sandow & Southern combine. Note the missing coupler knuckle that Harold made a new casting pattern for.
Report
The "Report" is the official publication of the Pacific Southwest Railway Museum Association Inc. and is the
historic record of the progress of the organization The intent is to publish quarterly until a steady funding source can be found to put it out more often. The production of this issue is funded by the editors Larry & Tanya Rose and Life Member No One, Herb Kehr who donated generously this month Send articles, comments, fan mail or brickbats to our La Mesa Depot address.
4695 Nebo Drive, La Mesa, CA 91941 or e-mail railrose@aol.com
Unsigned articles are by the editorial staff Signed articles are by the opinion of the writer only. Photo credits are noted on each picture and the staff encourages everyone to take their camera with them whenever they go anywhere near the museum or any railroad. We are always looking for good photos of railroad subjects, preferably with people in them.
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