Big Steam 3: Big Steamier
Just got back from Train Festival in Owosso. Probably too tired to go into heavy detail on it, but a quick recap of the day, in bullet-list format:
* 1225 cracked a flue/boiler tube while being moved after the night photo session on Thursday night, and the debris took a couple more with it. As a result, she was rendered inoperable for the weekend. (It's not serious, it's an easy fix, but it'll take a week of work to do, and they just didn't have time to get it fixed during the event.) As a result, she wasn't able to pull her scheduled excursion to Alma today, with near-identical sister Nickel Plate 765 being tapped to pinch-hit for her. It's unfortunate, but it's the sort of thing that happens with steam locomotives. Everyone involved simply feels fortunate that, unlike when Union Pacific 844 coughed up a flue in Sacramento in 1999, nobody was injured this time.
* My almost-five-year-old nephew, Benjamin, went with us to see it, as may be the only opportunity he ever has to see big steam, and he's old enough to remember it for the rest of his life. Happily, there were hundreds of children his age at the show; those indoctrinated into steam today will be the ones keeping the fires lit in the future.
* The day opened by watching 765 depart on the day's long excursion. Ben and Mom were on the downwind side of the tracks, and, of course, got the sooty rain to introduce him to steam. We did forget to tell his mother that he should have been wearing grey or black...
* 765 put on a great show leaving, too, managing to find every slick spot on the rails and getting at least three full revolutions slipping before regaining her footing each time.
* Spent 90 minutes in line waiting for a cab tour of Southern Pacific "Daylight" 4449 before getting in; fortunately, people were understanding of my taking Ben on sidetrips around 4449 and 1225 to show him how they worked and help deal with a five-year-old's attention span. Mom also took him through the Ann Arbor caboose that was on display while we were in line. Once we got into the cab, he was quite suitably impressed by the view of the fire (she was simmering at about 150 pounds, compared to her normal 275 pounds), and we also got a photo of him sitting in the engineer's seat, with permission.
* We also got a photo op of him and me sitting on the pilot deck of 1225, since we decided that waiting two and a half hours(!) to get into *her* cab for five minutes wasn't worth it.
* Benjamin greatly enjoyed riding the 7-1/2"-gauge live steam railroad that was being used as a "people mover" from one end of the event grounds to the other--a good idea, since it's pretty spread out, about a mile and a half long. Meanwhile, I discovered that I had absolutely no trouble operating an SD40-2 in a locomotive simulator that was on display at the event, though eventually destined for crew training on Montana Rail Link, except that I hadn't been told that I was in a 50 mph zone and ended up peaking at 56.2 mph!
* After that, while Benjamin and Mom were taking the miniature train for the second, third, and fourth times, I went browsing through the exceedingly dangerous vendor tent, VERY glad that I had left my credit card at home, because I could have easily run up a five-figure bill in there! With Mom's money, we got Ben an engineer's cap and a 4449 pin to put on it; I got myself a 4449 "Daylight" logo pin to put on Dad's old engineer's cap, alongside the other pins symbolizing places that hat's been.
* Little River Railroad 110 was pulling 45-minute out-and-back excursions every hour on the hour, but we decided to forgo those for financial reasons, as at $18 per adult and $15 per child, it would just cost too darned much.
* Instead, we ventured deeper into the grounds, where Flagg Coal Company 75 was shuttling back and forth along one of the yard tracks with the sold-out-in-May "You Run The Locomotive" program. Two other 0-4-0Ts, Little River Railroad 1 and Vicose Company 6 were also present and in steam, regularly whistle-saluting each other.
* The big attraction at the back of the festival grounds, though, was The Leviathan, a brand-new reproduction of Central Pacific Railway #63, a locomotive identical to the Jupiter, their representative at the Golden Spike ceremony in 1869. Leviathan's so new that there were questions as to whether she would be finished in time to come to Train Festival, but she's completely finished and absolutely beautiful, regularly pulling forward onto the Steam Railroading Institute's turntable to be turned 360 degrees as a demonstration, then backing back onto the same track as before.
* An unannounced, special bonus attraction was that the SRI also had their locomotive shop open to the public, letting people see their two small diesel shop switchers, 4449's auxiliary water tender, and what *may* be Gettysburg Railway 1278, an ex-Canadian Pacific 4-6-2 that suffered, due to crew error, a crown sheet failure in 1995 which was prevented from progressing into a full-on boiler explosion solely by it being unusual among North American steamers in having fusible plugs in the firebox. Last I'd heard, she had been sold and was awaiting repairs on the Ohio Central, but it appeared to be a light Pacific, albeit completely stripped to a bare frame and boiler core (no tubes, no firebox, no valve gear, no cab), the cab was stored on the inaccessible far side of the turntable, and the tender was up on blocks (literally) behind the engine shop, so she does seem right for it.
* By this time, Benjamin was starting to seriously run down (as were the rest of us!), so we started heading back towards the car, first stopping to enjoy the model railroad displays. A local HO club had brought their modular layout, and there was a large O-gauge three-rail layout that got plenty of attention, too, but the real stars of the show were somewhat less precisely-to-scale models--the local O-gauge live steam club, and the Michigan Lego club's Lego train display that featured to-scale reproductions of many downtown Detroit buildings, including the famous Michigan Central station. It also included a large number of amusing easter eggs to find. The ones I saw were: a train station that was apparently "on fire," based on the number of ladder trucks with flashing lights in front; Batman (in the Batmobile), Robin, and Batgirl (both on motorcycles) chasing the Riddler, Two-Face, and the Joker through the streets; an Air Tractor AT-301 cropduster over a cornfield; a dragon on top of a skyscraper; an Imperial Stormtrooper taking a photo of two others posing by a Great Lakes bulk freighter, while Luke Skywalker attempts to save R2D2 from a street sweeper that's sucking him up; and a skeleton, two eskimos, and Spongebob and Squidward on a beach.
* Our original plan to go out and catch one of 765's photo runbys was killed by the rainstorms early in the day that slowed our progress through the festival; instead, we made one last stop before heading home, a visit to the cab of a former Southern Railway FP7 diesel locomotive that had made the trip up from the Eastern Carolina Railway Museum for the show.
I'd say that they easily exceeded the expected attendance of 20,000 today, and there was a brisk business going at the souvenir tents, too, so hopefully, this will raise more than enough money to pay for 1225's 10-year FRA-mandated boiler inspection. (Ironically, if that was Gettysburg 1278 in pieces in the shop, it was her crown sheet failure that resulted in the mandatory every-ten-years inspection, as they'd found that she'd suffered from a great deal of deferred maintenance that would have helped prevent the accident...)
* 1225 cracked a flue/boiler tube while being moved after the night photo session on Thursday night, and the debris took a couple more with it. As a result, she was rendered inoperable for the weekend. (It's not serious, it's an easy fix, but it'll take a week of work to do, and they just didn't have time to get it fixed during the event.) As a result, she wasn't able to pull her scheduled excursion to Alma today, with near-identical sister Nickel Plate 765 being tapped to pinch-hit for her. It's unfortunate, but it's the sort of thing that happens with steam locomotives. Everyone involved simply feels fortunate that, unlike when Union Pacific 844 coughed up a flue in Sacramento in 1999, nobody was injured this time.
* My almost-five-year-old nephew, Benjamin, went with us to see it, as may be the only opportunity he ever has to see big steam, and he's old enough to remember it for the rest of his life. Happily, there were hundreds of children his age at the show; those indoctrinated into steam today will be the ones keeping the fires lit in the future.
* The day opened by watching 765 depart on the day's long excursion. Ben and Mom were on the downwind side of the tracks, and, of course, got the sooty rain to introduce him to steam. We did forget to tell his mother that he should have been wearing grey or black...
* 765 put on a great show leaving, too, managing to find every slick spot on the rails and getting at least three full revolutions slipping before regaining her footing each time.
* Spent 90 minutes in line waiting for a cab tour of Southern Pacific "Daylight" 4449 before getting in; fortunately, people were understanding of my taking Ben on sidetrips around 4449 and 1225 to show him how they worked and help deal with a five-year-old's attention span. Mom also took him through the Ann Arbor caboose that was on display while we were in line. Once we got into the cab, he was quite suitably impressed by the view of the fire (she was simmering at about 150 pounds, compared to her normal 275 pounds), and we also got a photo of him sitting in the engineer's seat, with permission.
* We also got a photo op of him and me sitting on the pilot deck of 1225, since we decided that waiting two and a half hours(!) to get into *her* cab for five minutes wasn't worth it.
* Benjamin greatly enjoyed riding the 7-1/2"-gauge live steam railroad that was being used as a "people mover" from one end of the event grounds to the other--a good idea, since it's pretty spread out, about a mile and a half long. Meanwhile, I discovered that I had absolutely no trouble operating an SD40-2 in a locomotive simulator that was on display at the event, though eventually destined for crew training on Montana Rail Link, except that I hadn't been told that I was in a 50 mph zone and ended up peaking at 56.2 mph!
* After that, while Benjamin and Mom were taking the miniature train for the second, third, and fourth times, I went browsing through the exceedingly dangerous vendor tent, VERY glad that I had left my credit card at home, because I could have easily run up a five-figure bill in there! With Mom's money, we got Ben an engineer's cap and a 4449 pin to put on it; I got myself a 4449 "Daylight" logo pin to put on Dad's old engineer's cap, alongside the other pins symbolizing places that hat's been.
* Little River Railroad 110 was pulling 45-minute out-and-back excursions every hour on the hour, but we decided to forgo those for financial reasons, as at $18 per adult and $15 per child, it would just cost too darned much.
* Instead, we ventured deeper into the grounds, where Flagg Coal Company 75 was shuttling back and forth along one of the yard tracks with the sold-out-in-May "You Run The Locomotive" program. Two other 0-4-0Ts, Little River Railroad 1 and Vicose Company 6 were also present and in steam, regularly whistle-saluting each other.
* The big attraction at the back of the festival grounds, though, was The Leviathan, a brand-new reproduction of Central Pacific Railway #63, a locomotive identical to the Jupiter, their representative at the Golden Spike ceremony in 1869. Leviathan's so new that there were questions as to whether she would be finished in time to come to Train Festival, but she's completely finished and absolutely beautiful, regularly pulling forward onto the Steam Railroading Institute's turntable to be turned 360 degrees as a demonstration, then backing back onto the same track as before.
* An unannounced, special bonus attraction was that the SRI also had their locomotive shop open to the public, letting people see their two small diesel shop switchers, 4449's auxiliary water tender, and what *may* be Gettysburg Railway 1278, an ex-Canadian Pacific 4-6-2 that suffered, due to crew error, a crown sheet failure in 1995 which was prevented from progressing into a full-on boiler explosion solely by it being unusual among North American steamers in having fusible plugs in the firebox. Last I'd heard, she had been sold and was awaiting repairs on the Ohio Central, but it appeared to be a light Pacific, albeit completely stripped to a bare frame and boiler core (no tubes, no firebox, no valve gear, no cab), the cab was stored on the inaccessible far side of the turntable, and the tender was up on blocks (literally) behind the engine shop, so she does seem right for it.
* By this time, Benjamin was starting to seriously run down (as were the rest of us!), so we started heading back towards the car, first stopping to enjoy the model railroad displays. A local HO club had brought their modular layout, and there was a large O-gauge three-rail layout that got plenty of attention, too, but the real stars of the show were somewhat less precisely-to-scale models--the local O-gauge live steam club, and the Michigan Lego club's Lego train display that featured to-scale reproductions of many downtown Detroit buildings, including the famous Michigan Central station. It also included a large number of amusing easter eggs to find. The ones I saw were: a train station that was apparently "on fire," based on the number of ladder trucks with flashing lights in front; Batman (in the Batmobile), Robin, and Batgirl (both on motorcycles) chasing the Riddler, Two-Face, and the Joker through the streets; an Air Tractor AT-301 cropduster over a cornfield; a dragon on top of a skyscraper; an Imperial Stormtrooper taking a photo of two others posing by a Great Lakes bulk freighter, while Luke Skywalker attempts to save R2D2 from a street sweeper that's sucking him up; and a skeleton, two eskimos, and Spongebob and Squidward on a beach.
* Our original plan to go out and catch one of 765's photo runbys was killed by the rainstorms early in the day that slowed our progress through the festival; instead, we made one last stop before heading home, a visit to the cab of a former Southern Railway FP7 diesel locomotive that had made the trip up from the Eastern Carolina Railway Museum for the show.
I'd say that they easily exceeded the expected attendance of 20,000 today, and there was a brisk business going at the souvenir tents, too, so hopefully, this will raise more than enough money to pay for 1225's 10-year FRA-mandated boiler inspection. (Ironically, if that was Gettysburg 1278 in pieces in the shop, it was her crown sheet failure that resulted in the mandatory every-ten-years inspection, as they'd found that she'd suffered from a great deal of deferred maintenance that would have helped prevent the accident...)