Week 220

Sunday, October 14, 2018 thru Saturday, October 20, 2018

Sunday, October 14, 2018

No Train Activity Today

Monday, October 15, 2018

Train Day!
With Rob Fair 6-8pm 2 hrs.
1 hour Lake Street City Viaduct
1 hour Clinton St. Extension

Rob Fair prepares to install the east platform of the city viaduct.

Putting the bridge in place and making sure everything lines up to the supports.

Shoe glue application.

Now clamp everything and wait for it to set overnight.

Move to another project.
We'll be extending Clinton St. to the south.

Attach the supports.

Three sections to support the outer 2x4.

Outer 2x4 in place.

We also noticed we forgot to have a support along the wall.
So we put the 1x2 filler to accomplish that task.
Next week we'll add one more 1x4 and then plexiglass and then the trim.

The project will be complete when we finish the additional supports that will fit against the plexiglass.

Lake Street view from the east looking west.

A bird's eye view of the city viaduct construction.

Lake Street view from the west looking east.

Tuesday, October 16, 2018

This morning I went down to the train room to remove the clamps.
Here is the AFTER photo.

Lake Street looking west.

Wednesday, October 17, 2018

Train Day
with Carlos Baez (.25) Jordan Osborn (1.5) and Ed Nelson (1)

Carlos Baez and Jordan Osborn.

Carlos came for a quick update and left for other responsibilities.

Length: 00:00:14 sec.

I like this view from the East Power District through the Central Control Tower to the South Power District.
Yes, that's Jordan Osborn at the controls.

Ed Nelson was on track inspection duty tonight.

This is another nice view this time from the South Power District through Central Control Tower and then the East Power District. Ed Nelson in the foreground and Jordan Osborn in the background.

We had something very strange happen tonight.
Our DCC locomotives ran smooth tonight.
However, our DC locomotives would ALL stall at various times around the layout.
The locomotives we ran were the CNW twin C44-9, UP GP50 #53, Kato F40PH Metra, and Amtrak.
I may try calling Digitrax tomorrow if I have time to ask about this strange behavior.

Thursday, October 18, 2018

I stopped by B&G Trainworld today on my way to see Bernice Moeller one of our homebound members.
Here's what I purchased...

This is the decoder for the AC6000 UP locomotive.
Cost: $32
Category: Locomotive Power

The Intermountain 36" wheel sets weren't insulated so I purchased these insulated ones instead.
Cost: $11:98
Category: Rolling Stock

and the Lake Street Lights installed but not wired yet.

Four on the Clinton Street side.

Four on the Canal Street side.
Cost: $22.50
Category: Lake Street Construction

Tax: $5.65
Category: Train Ops.

Total: $72.13

Friday, October 19, 2018

In prep. work for Monday's Train Day with Rob Fair I needed to purchase some material.
I stopped by Lowe's...

Here's the receipt.

Total Cost: $9.53

And here's the goods delivered.
3 pieces of quality pine 1x4s.

Rob Fair and I will install these as extensions to Clinton and Canal streets in downtown Chicago.

Eventually we'll install plexiglass to protect the "EL" track extension above Lake Street to the west.
Before we put that on, we need to prepare the extension for the plexiglass installation.
First things first and next things next, until the final touches can happen.

Saturday, October 20, 2018

I'll be the engineer at Kuipers Farmview RR all day today.
I'll be pretty exhausted by the time I get home, so probably no basement train activity today.
Here's how my day began...

The Steam Engine warming up in the tunnel.
Hard to see the smoke coming out, but it really was coming out.

One the third trip around we had an excess buildup of grease on the wheels which caused them to spin.
Will (kneeling) and Joe Kuipers came running to help get the train back up and running again.

We ran about 7 more trains today before we called it due to terrible weather conditions.
See video below:

And this is how my day ended 5.1 hours into the day.

Length: 00:00:11 sec.