A busy summer day at the museum

This Saturday proved to be a very busy day at the museum. A variety of projects were underway. First, our Rochester, Lockport & Buffalo interurban waiting room took a trip from its resting place for several years in our Industry yard to our parking lot where it will be receiving a new roof. When we acquired this small building, one of our members, George Knab, built a custom steel frame for it and mounted the building on the frame. With a two-wheeled axle added to one end, the building basically has its own built in trailer.

The RL&B waiting room enters the parking lot of the R&GV Railroad Museum with our Trojan loader providing the motive power.

A better look at the building and the axle end of the trailer.

The RL&B is positioned next to our NYC crossing shanty which is also getting attention. The crossing shanty has already received new structural skirting, new primer and a new roof. Eventually we hope to place these buildings in proper locations along our demonstration railroad.

Next, a few of our Young Railfans were out helping us on this day. The project at hand was the prep and painting of one of our bumpers which we recently reinstalled in our Industry yard. At the same time, one of our track car trailers was also getting some new paint. Under the supervision of Dale Hartnett, our Young Railfans work to prep our newly installed track bumper on Track #3 in the Industry yard.

While two of our other Young Railfans headed off to other projects, one of them stayed behind to paint the bumper. He did a really great job of painting it!

Dale Hartnett paints one of our passenger trailer cars.

Finally some of our other railroad equipment was also getting some attention. Our Fairmont tie extractor was getting some repairs while the battery box on Eastman Kodak Company #6 was outfitted with new wood and its new batteries. Norm Shaddick tends to our Fairmont tie extractor which was also having some hydraulic valve work done.

Success! New paint, new wood, and new batteries leave just the hook up of the batteries by our electrical department, which they may have accomplished Saturday afternoon. What a difference.

Memorial Day work around the museum

Memorial Day weekend still brought a pretty good crowd of volunteers to the museum and finally a Saturday without rain and with sunshine. Recently, a new set of eight, 8-volt batteries were purchased through the generous donations of our members for one of our two 80-tonners, ex-Eastman Kodak Company #6. Of course when dealing with something that does not get changed very often, usually the job turns out to be harder than it sounds. First, there are 8 large batteries with all of their connections to deal with. Then there is the box under the locomotive where the batteries sit. Since it has been many years since the batteries were out of EK6, the battery box was in need of a good cleaning and repaint as some spots had grown a pretty good coat of rust. Some of that work was undertaken today is shown in the pics below.

We are also planning on moving our Rochester, Lockport & Buffalo Railway interurban waiting room out of the Industry yard in the coming weeks. We are going to be relocating it to our parking lot where it will eventually receive a new roof. To facilitate this, the RG&E 1941 45-tonner and MDT 14053 ice reefer had to be moved. 1941 was able to move the reefer car out of the way. Pics of it before and after the move are shown here.

Finally, a pic of the installation in progress of the trolley substation at the New York Museum of Transportation is shown below. The AC to DC rectifier and some of the other electrical installation is shown.

The battery box of EK#6 is shown before final clean-up (wire wheeling) and priming.

The battery box with the first coat of primer applied. Eventually, the box will hold 8 batteries used to start the locomotives.

This gives a little better look at the location of the box. EK#6 is dedicated to the former manager of the R&GV Railroad Museum, Rand Warner.

RG&E 1941 prior to the move north. Seen in the picture to the right is the RL&B waiting room that will be moved out of the yard. The building was secured to a steel frame many years back which can act like a trailer which makes moving this small building very easy.

Another view of 1941 after the move. The track in the foreground is the main track that leads to the NYMT.

In late 2003, a joint project between the R&GVRRM and the NYMT was started to install a substation in the NYMT to allow the museums to be able to turn 480 volt A/C 3-phase power into the 600 volts DC needed to power our trolleys. The work included the building of a special substation room inside the NYMT and is now seeing the electrical installation including the AC to DC rectifier shown here (with the Danger High Voltage sign on it). More work needs to be done, but we hope some trolley operations may take place some time later this year.

Trackwork time at R&GVRRM

With the better weather finally here (although we wish it would stop raining!), it was time to undertake some trackwork in the Industry yard including tie replacement and the re-installation of the bumper on the end of track #3 in the yard. And while that was going on, a little restoration was also taking place on the cab of R&GE 1941. The control stand was getting some cosmetic attention. Sadly, I had to head home at 1PM and missed the spring startup of Fairbanks-Morse USA 1843 which roared backed to life for another operating season at the Rochester & Genesee Valley Railroad Museum so there are no pics of that.

Rochester Chapter NRHS President, Jeremy Tuke, takes a cut at preparing a new rail needed for the installation of the bumper on track #3 in the Industry yard.

Almost through...

At the other end of track #3, several ties were being replaced. Here four of the museum volunteers insert a new tie.

Since a fair amount of the ballast around the museum was recovered from old railroad right-of-ways, it includes a fair amount of dirt and stone. To be able to recover the stone to be re-used while removing the dirt, this ballast screener was put together by one of our volunteers. The dirt goes through and the ballast heads into the bucket!

The two new ties are in place and ballast is being tamped into place.

Some new paint, a rebuilt cab heater and brake system, and a new seat waiting to be uncovered are the start of the restoration of the cab of the museum's 45-tonner,
Rochester Gas & Electric #1941.