CERA at 75 - A Dinner and Program, with a Booklet

On Saturday September 21, Central Electric Railfans’ Association celebrated its 75th Anniversary at the Chicago Marriott O'Hare. The event began with a cocktail hour where many friendships were renewed.

 
Dinner followed at 7:00. Everyone at my table was happy with the meal and the service. After the dinner the program began with Ray DeGroote as the Master of Ceremonies. He presented Myles Jarrow, Member #23, with a Founder’s Award plaque for his many years of service to CERA. Then a surprised Ray DeGroote received an award for his own years of service to CERA.

Next on the agenda was a short PowerPoint presentation by David Sadowski.  The Ghosts of Fantrips Past featured photos of CERA fantrips through the years, spotlighting the North Shore Line.

Problems with turning out the room lights and resolving computer glitches were an ironic throwback to years ago when ‘Big Bertha,’ CERA’s ancient slide projector, used to jam. But after a short delay the feature program began. To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Chicago North Shore & Milwaukee Railroad's closure, Walter Keevil compiled and edited the 8mm and 16 mm movies of several CERA members into a DVD.  Many of these superb films were being shown to an audience for the first time.

While watching the slides and movies, I relived many of my own memories of the North Shore. The audience saluted each of the evening’s events with hearty applause.

At the conclusion of the program, every attendee received a copy of Trolley Sparks Special #1: A 75-year Retrospective.  This soft-cover book was edited by CERA Member John Marton.

 

The contents of the booklet include:

·         a brief history of CERA; 

·         a list and, where possible, a photo of all the Directors of CERA; 

·         a dialog about members, meetings, and special events; 

·         a list of fantrips; 

·         a list of publications; and 

·         comments concerning the future of CERA.

Sprinkled throughout the book are photos and reproductions of fantrip and special event flyers, reproductions of Bulletin covers, fantrip ticket stubs, car drawings, maps, and receipts. The first 75 members of CERA are listed. Unfortunately most of them are no longer with us.

Although photo reproduction is not of the best quality, this book features a wealth of history about CERA. You can check to see whether your own bookshelf has a complete set of CERA Bulletins. And, did you know that CERA sponsored over 200 fantrips? After looking at the photos of CERA Directors, I found myself saying, "I didn't know he was a Director!"

Next will be the Fox River Trolley Museum Inspection Trip.

Cheers,

Ed 

  
Thanks goes to Eric Bronsky who edited this post.

CERA at 75 - The IRM Inspection Trip

The 75th Anniversary of the Central Electric Railfans' Association (CERA) was celebrated over September 20, 21, and 22; 2013. Everyone who reads this blog has benefited from CERA. They published many books and booklets on traction topics plus has operated many fan trips during the 75 years CERA has been in operation.

This is not a review of the books, fan trips, or the individuals involved in the 75 years. To celebrate its 75 years 4 separate events were held. I attended 3 of the 4 events.

On Friday September 20 an Inspection Trip of the Kenoska Streetcar Society http://www.kenoshastreetcarsociety.org/ was organized. I was unable to attend as I was out of town on this day in the opposite direct of Kenoska from Chicago.

On Saturday, September 21, an Inspection Trip of the Illinois Railway Museum (IRM) http://www.irm.org/ was organized. (Also see the blog written by Randy Hicks http://hickscarworks.blogspot.com/2013/09/cera-75th-anniversary-visit.html ) The day was beautiful!

For the CERA members IRM had train sets of CA&E, CRT, CNS&M, and CSS&SB cars in the IRM collection to ride. The cars of each Insull company were in trains. Also for the CERA members IRR 65 and one of the CSL cars were running. It was IRR 65 which was the start of IRM.

CWT 144 was originally out for viewing but was placed back in the barn. It was not available for rides since the trolley loop was blocked by the Nebraska Zepher most of the day.

Here are some of the many photos taken by me. (After reviewing all of my photos taken I realized the photos were taken from the eyes of a model builder. Not all of the available equipment was photographed. Plus the photos taken were mainly of details of the cars.)

The IRM volunteer with CRT 1024 above is Tim Peters. He is rebuilding the car back to its condition circa 1910. He gave me a personal guided tour of the car showing and explaining what had been done along with what still needs to be done to finish the car. It's work like this done by volunteers which make IRM the great Museum it is!

Finally, when the word "volunteer" and "railfan" are defined; this photo explains it all!

This is Dan Buck who along with his brother Chris are volunteers at IRM and members of CERA. Dan and Chris operate the steel and wood CA&E cars at the Museum. They regularly attend the monthly CERA meetings and events.


Next is the dinner!

Cheers,
Ed

Cleaning-Up the Work Bench and Planning Ahead

September 2013 is a time of change for this blog. It's not that nothing is going on, but rather a time to clean-up in more ways than one after the last project.

This month is also clean-up the house to get rid of old cans of paint, old electronic equipment, and other items. We have as much as 35+ years of old paint cans stored in the basement along with 20 or so years of electronics. Our Village has special days for the citizens to turn in these items for disposal.

On a better note, there's the celebration of C.E.R.A.'s 75 years as an organization dedicated to traction. Over the years C.E.R.A. has sponsored many fan trips, monthly meetings with guest speakers,  and published many excellent books on the subject of Traction.

C.E.R.A. has a series of events planned for the weekend of September 20- 22. Check their web site for more information.  http://www.cera-chicago.org/celebration.php

 Along with the prior mentioned clean-up, there are 3 minor projects to update existing models started. They need to be finished before the next major project starts. I can attest the next project is a major one.

As the 3 minor projects are finished, photos of the results will appear in this blog. To paraphrase a famous saying; so many things to do, so little time to do them!

One of the minor projects involved a Pittman LVT "freight motor" (also called a box motor, express car or motor, or merchandise dispatch car). Over the years, the Pittman LVT "freight motor" may have been one of most ubiquitious kits available in O scale. Even today the kit appears on EBay every now and then.

My Pittman was built as per instructions decades years ago. The only exception was the roof. The kit comes with the very flat, round LVT roof. A Walthers wooden roof was substituted which has a wide clerestory section. The finished model was painted orange.

Several years ago when a photo of the AE&FRE #1 express motor was found, the model was repainted orange and lettered for the AE&FRE. At that time the only decals available were gold. The car was orange with gold numbers and logo. The gold didn't show up very well against the orange.

Today, decals are easy to print on a home computer. Black logos were made and applied. The car's numbers were changed to black.

When my Pittman express motor was originally made into AE&FRE #1, the model was altered to look more like the prototype. Although the photo of AE&FRE #1 was not the best, I could see the windows in the side of the car, the belt rail, and the pilots on the trucks of the car. Almost everything else was an educated guess.

Grandt Line windows were used to alter my model. Grandt Line makes a number of different windows in styrene. If you use a Grandt Line window, the hole for the window can be rough cut to size. The plastic window will fit into the opening and hide the unevenness of the window opening. 

A belt rail made from 2 pieces of styrene was added to both sides. One piece was ACC'ed on its side while a second piece of styrene was laid flat and adjacent to the 1st one. Again ACC was used for glue. 

My AE&FRE #1  may not be exactly like the prototype, but it bears a close resemblance to it.

A giant word of warning about reworking an old model. What may seem like an extremely straight forward project, may be loaded with pitfalls. Watch out for everything from colors of paint, to the finish on the model, to the original glue used, etc. The original wiring of the model may be a snake looking for a place to bite!

First talk over you plans with a more experienced modeler for advice. Sometimes there are no problems, but the next time everything falls apart!

I have other old models which need up-dating. As originally built, interiors and lighting were not installed. Some also need minor parts replaced which have broken. These old models are another story.

Cheers,
Ed

AEFRE 49 - #8 Epilogue

Instead of being an epilogue, perhaps this post should be called "Finishing the Model Part 2". In a rush to finish the prior post which "concluded" the building of the 49, a few items were overlooked. The model was painted Floquil Box Car Red. Testors has completely dropped the railroad line of paints (colors). However, if you check the other paint products still produced by Testors you may find a comparable color.

To be sure of the color, individuals who may have either seen the 49 and/or have color photos of the prototype were asked, "What was the color?"  Walter Keevil responded with a "frame grab" taken from a 1944 Art Cox film. The color looks more red than my model. Perhaps the correct color for the 49 is barn red. Also note the unusual pattern to the siding.

Walter Keevil Collection

The lettering on my model is a decal made by Paul Mayer of Shoreline Decals.

As the post on building the 49 started to gain momentum, Joseph Hazinski of the Fox Valley Railway Museum sent me his drawings of the 49. After making them up with corrections, I sent them back to him.

This photo has Joseph's markings pointing out major items regarding the building of the 49.  He points out many pieces of information regarding the building of the 49. I added one piece of information.

The red markings are the original ones. The green markings were done at a later date. I made my addition in blue.

The one item I left off the model were the small electrical boxes or outlets next to the headlight mounting on the cab. If you look at the photo above it can be seen to the right of the headlight mounting. The electrical outlet is pointed down to prevent rain and other junk from getting into it.

After discovering a Kadee coupler could not be mounted, my next choice was a Clouser brass working coupler now avaialable from Protocraft, www.protocraft.com  However, the Clouser coupler will not mate with a Kadee. This sent me looking at the PSC catalogs for a lost wax brass coupler which worked and would be appropriate for the model.

If you recall from the introduction of this model to the blog, the idea of building a model of the 49 started when the late John Cloos asked me how to figure out the color of a prototype trolley from a black and white photo. John was hoping to make a 1/24 scale model. After the conversation he emailed the photo of the model as it was built in this blog as 1/48 scale model.

 

John Cloos Collection

My 1/48 scale model of 49. It runs very smooth and can pull a freight car or 2!

I hope John is satisfied with my model. 


Cheers,
Ed
  

AEFRE 49 - #7 Finishing the Model

There are a number of cast details which can be used on this model. The vast majority of them were made for the non-traction part of the hobby. To scratch build a model, traction or otherwise, the builder needs to know what is available in the way of parts and castings. The builder cannot rely on traction vendors alone.

Grandt Line has their product line on the web for viewing. Recently they phased out many of their brass castings in favor of plastic castings. Precision Scale Co. (PSC) has only a few of their vast product line available for viewing on the web. The builder has to purchase PSC's catalogs to see the product line.

There are other vendors - The Irish Tracklayer,  The Back Shop products available from Brian Wiseman, and more.

Although this is the finishing phase, there are still more details to add. We'll start at one end of the decking and move to the center of the model. Some details need to be added to both ends. Take a look at a photo of the end of the deck. What do you see in the photo that is absent from the model?

OOPS! - When I received the cab from Jim Osborn, all of the windows were closed. The operator of the 49 almost always opened at least one of the 2 center windows on the west side of the cab. I opened one of the windows by removing the sash with a file. This has to be done before painting the model.

On the decking, in front of the sand box, near the end of the deck are 2 hand holds. The hand hold is not continuous across the deck. When standing on the foot board the trainman needs something to hold onto. The coupler rod should not be held onto.

The coupler (Actually it should be called the uncoupler.) rod is "suspended" out from the deck. Room has to be provided for the trainman to grab the rod "handle" and rotate it 90 degrees or more to lift the uncoupling pin.

The hand holds are Des Plains Hobby O Scale America castings. The coupler rod holders are flattened PSC castings. The coupler rod is 0.020" brass rod which has been bent to shape. Don't forget the piece of rod sticking out to support the chain to pull the uncoupling rod.

For the era my model is in, the retriever was installed on a piece of lumber attached to the sand box. The photo above is the west view of the locomotive, therefore the 3-chime whistle is mounted above the door. The headlights can be installed. Notice the 2 upright post near the cab. These are there to help anyone mounting the loco from the ground using the step attached to the frame.

Truss rods and a turnbuckle on each rod need to be installed. Be sure they clear the trucks.

This is another west view. The model is painted and lettered. The grab irons attached to the cab are 0.020" brass wire. A Grandt Line step made from Delrin plastic. Delrin is incompatible with styrene, that is, common plastic glue will not work with the two plastics. 

Make a larger hole in the styrene frame than required for the Delrin studs on the back of the casting. Use ACC to glue the step to the sideframe.

The brake hose was ACC'ed to the round styrene tubing installed for it next to the coupler box. The brake hose brass castings are fragile. Use a pliers designed to bend brass or other material into a round shape to bend the brake hose out of the way.

I don't use the brake hose castings with the pliable plastic tubing for the air hose. Too many times the plastic hose has come off the brass casting and become lost.

A controller, brake valve, and air gauge were installed. For the air gauge to have a nice round face, white decal was punched with a leather punch to produce a round piece of decal. The round piece of decal was place on the face of the air gauge after the black paint died.

The stand alone grab irons are brass tubing with a Q-Car casting installed on top. At the bottom of the rod are 1/64" eyelets.

You may have noticed on the photos of the side of the cab and in the photo above, the rain gutter and drain over the center windows. This is a piece of  brass tubing with the top filed off to open up the center of the tube. The drain at the right was soldered on before the tubing was filed open.

Clear styrene 0.010" thick was used for glazing. MV lenses were installed in the headlights using clear bathtub caulk for glue.

Install the trucks. But before that, I "painted" the trucks with brass blackener. This is a chemical reaction in which the brass turns a black to dark green color. (I taught high school chemistry so I know exactly what happens to the copper and zinc which compose the brass.)   After the trucks dried, some weathered back paint was applied in various locations. 

An Arttista "mtorman" was installed in the cab. He has his arm over the window opening. There is only 1 wire to connect to the center post of the cab under the deck. 

The last item to be installed is the coupler. The PSC set of castings include the coupler with 2 additional castings - the knuckle and the coupler pin. Place the knuckle into the casting and fix with the brass rod provided. Only used solder at the top and/or bottom of the coupler body to hold the brass wire in place. Do NOT use ACC! The ACC might seep into the "works" and prevent the knuckle from moving.

The coupler pin has to move freely up and down. It is installed form the bottom of the coupler. It should be able to open the knuckle when pulled/pushed up. I used a piece of soft brass to make a long loop between the eye on the top of the coupler rod and the lift bar of the coupler rod.

When the coupler rod is pulled up the coupler knuckle "pops" open. The coupler is compatible with Kadee couplers. However, I do not intend to switch cars with the 49. It is able to run on a layout pulling 1-2 freight cars.

The drawing mentioned in the last post which showed how the whistle was made will be included in the next post. Additional photos will be included.

Cheers,
Ed

AEFRE 49 - #6C Detailing the Model.

Next to a headlight bracket, on one end of the cab, is 49's unique 3-chime whistle. It has 3 "pipes" attached to the base pipe to give the 3 chimes .

I

Part of a Joseph Hazinski photo. The entire photo will be posted as work on the 49 is being finish.

From the photo, the size of each whistle can be determined. The following is my engineering drawing for the whistle.

To solder the 3 pieces of brass rod to the base pipe, a form was made by gluing 3 small pieces of strip wood to a wooden base. The pieces of brass rod were soldered using 6% silver solder.

When the solder cools, remove the brass from the wooden form and clean with a file. The individual whistles may need to be straightened. Be careful so the bending does not dislodge the brass rod at the soldering point. 

When you are satisfied with your work, cut the 3 pieces of brass rod on an angle. File the top of each pipe flat. The pipe to which the whistles are soldered can be bent back as to into the cab.

My 3-chime whistle needs some final filing and additional cleaning.

Place your 3-chime whistle aside. it will be mounted later.

The one piece end beam platform step is next. My engineering drawing included the brackets to be bent to hold the pieces of wood (styrene) to the end beam. All 4 brackets are bent to the same design.

After the 4 brass brackets were bent to shape and size, the 4 foot boards were cut from styrene. The foot boards can be prepared like the decking with scribing. The foot boards are lightly rounded at the corners.Two of the foot boards will be mounted (ACC'ed) horizontally and the remained 2 boards mounted (ACC'ed) vertically.

Styrene strips ACC'ed to narrow pieces of brass have a tendency to come loose. The floor boards on the model will be subjected to abuse in handling. Small #8 straight pins were installed through the brass and styrene strips. 

Always drill larger holes than the diameter the straight pins when using ACC. This allows the ACC to "fill" the area between the pin and the material into which the pin is inserted. The area in the larger hole increases the ACC's ability of to move in between the styrene and pin to give a better grip. 

The straight pins were cut and filed smooth after the ACC cured.

The foot boards mounted to the end beam.

Straight pins were used to attach the foot board brackets to the end beam. Be careful not to drill through the decking.

From here on, until the trucks are installed on the model, when the model is placed upright; the model MUST be placed on something higher than the foot boards hang down. Placing weight on the model without supporting the foot board brackets can be disastrous.

The finishing phase is about to start. Inspect the model for any problem, material hanging loose, loose styrene, erroneous fingerprints, etc. Make any repairs now. Once the finishing phase starts, you'll be more interested in finishing the model than fixing problems.


Cheers,
Ed

AEFRE 49 - #6B Detailing the Model

One detail which sets the 49 apart is the high headlight mounting on each cab end. Over the years the headlight(s) was mounted either high on the cab end and/or on the snow plow mechanism. On my model the headlight will be mounted on the cab end. Refer to photos publish previously in this blog.

This is my engineering drawing of the headlight bracket. It contains some dimensions. Other dimensions will have to calculated by the builder.

Flat brass was bent to represent the left, upper, and right sides of the bracket as seen above. Remember each headlight bracket requires 2 pieces. That's why 4 pieces of brass bent to shape. 

As a modeling note - always make the same parts of something being scratch built at the same time. If there is any chance what is being scratch built being lost or damaged, make enough of the parts to build an additional item. Trying to scratch build a part years after it was originally made may be an impossibility. 

Of course, storing the additional part can be a problem. Perhaps after 49 is completed, the topic of storing, inventorying, etc. a model will be covered.

Next the part of the bracket which holds up the headlight up is soldered in place using 6% silver solder. This gives stronger joints. Do not file any of the excess solder away.  It's the solder which holds the parts together! The photo shows the 2 brackets for 1 complete headlight bracket.

The next process is soldering the cross piece, which will hold the headlight in place, between the 2 brackets . Let's step back from the headlight making to cover the choice of headlight and why it will not have a bulb and is not lighted.

For the headlight Q-Car B-140 brass suburban headlight casting was chosen.. After examining the photos of 49, this casting seemed to be the best. The headlight on 49 hangs on a bar between 2 brackets. The back of the suburban headlight has a single mounting hook.

The headlight will not be lighted since 49 ran during the day when the sun was out almost exclusively. The headlight was probably lighted during storms, snow removal, fog, and poor weather in general. The AE&FRE was a short line railway not crossing state lines. It didn't have to have lighted headlight during daylight hours. It wasn't until the early 1950's when the State of Illinois passed a law, did all railroads (ways) have to have a lighted headlight on all trains.

The following is a series of photos which show how the 2 brackets were blocked in place to get a square soldering job. 

Using a piece of wood having the exact distance dimension required between the 2 brackets, the brackets were clamped to the wood using clothes pins. Notice how the clothes pins were altered. BTW - The spring clothes pins come in 2 sizes. I use both sizes depending upon how much tension is required and the size of the job.

The headlight is NOT soldered or glued to the bracket. The brackets are shown before they are cleaned up. File away excess solder but not all of it. It's best to use a round file except at the ends or sides of the brackets. The headlight casting is attached to show how the headlight hooks onto the cross piece.

To finish up the brackets, pieces of styrene are ACC'ed in place. Notice the cutout on the top piece of styrene for the headlight clip.The pieces of styrene may be a little over size. The vertical piece of styrene will be glued to the cab. The more surface area, the better the attachment.

The Q-Car headlight casting comes with a hole for a light bulb to be inserted. My model will have a MV Models lens installed.To block the hole and provide backing for something to fill in the back of the casting, a piece of styrene was glued into the inside back of the casting. Both headlights were done at the same time.

    Once the glue holding the styrene has cured, Squadron body putty was inserted into the hole. When Squadron body putty is used in a deep hole, the body putty contracts as the volatile solvents evaporate. One than one layer of body putty may need to be applied. Once the body putty has completely dried, the area can be filed smooth and level.

After looking at the photo, I realized the back of the casting has not been finished. This is the casting as the body putty is drying.

The MV lens will be added after the model is painted. The headlight brackets will be mounted to the cab later after additional detail parts are completed.

It looks like an additional post will be required for more details.

Cheers,

Ed

PS - If the spacing between paragraphs and photos seems to be uneven, I haven't worked out how to get the spacing right.