November 2016 Work Planning

[James Patten]

Actually the rail stockpile in the parking lot should eventually find its way to stockpiles elsewhere, so that we can get that corner of the parking lot back.

[Joe Fox]

The plan on swapping out the short switch stand for a tall one is for photo purposes. A taller one will look more prototypical of a main line switch rather than a yard switch.

[Wayne Laepple]

Wouldn't it be better if the rail stockpile in the parking lot found its way into track somewhere rather than into another stockpile?

[John McNamara]

Brush cutting needs to be done as well, this is critical for the Jan events. If needed I hope to try to gather a small crew in early December to do some brush cutting.

Please stay well away from the Sheepscot to Alna Center telephone line! We'll need it for Victorian Christmas. I'm sure you're saying, "Don't worry: I know where it is," and may be slightly insulted that I bring it up. However, the telephone line seems to move around a bit and commit suicide by moving into the path of even the most well-intentioned brush cutter.

[Ira Schreiber]

Wayne brings up a very good point. If we move the pile anywhere, TOM is the only logical location.

[Joe Fox]

Ok John. Luckily all the brush is dead so I think most if not all in that area can be handled with a string trimmer instead of a tri blade.

[Paul Uhland]

Re avoiding buried cable damage...
How about pounding in, carefully, flagged marker laths as close to the phone line as possible, maybe every fifty feet?
Using a telephone line locater toner would really help.

[Mike Fox]

Paul, 99% of our phone line is currently above ground.

The pile in the parkinglot os fine where it is. It is all the other debris we should be eliminating

[James Patten]

Work done on Saturday November 19:

* Car barn: Stewart painted some of the west wall.
* Joint bars: Fred, myself, Jay and Steve went to Alna Center north and picked up some of the joint bars along the west woodline, put them on the yellow car, and brought them south, storing them behind the garage.
* Wood at ToM: We also picked up a load of wood at ToM that Fred had left, and brought it back to Sheepscot.
* Boxcar 67: Zack has started on the roof assembly.
* Rail: After lunch 6 of us went north to Albee's Field where we cleaned up the rail on the ground, and stored it on the pile.  After that we were tired so we did not pick up any of the ties scattered about that location.
* Archives: Linda asked me to get her all the old membership reports that I have stored in the closet, so that she could go through them looking for archival donation slips.  I brought them all down and gave them to her.  Later she was testing out the new printer on some photographs.

[Bill Baskerville]

 Now that the turntable has a lock on it is there a default position that we lock it, like we do the switches on the mainline?

[Jason M Lamontagne]

My opinion is no- as we don't want to establish a habit of expecting it to be somewhere or assuming it's locked.  Instead- planning a rule to stop 15' from edge of table, as if it's an end of track.  The stop confirms control of movement, and allows position and lock to be confirmed.

See ya
Jason

[Joe Fox]

I like that idea. Many railroads with tables have a rule in place to stop short, check locking devices, etc before proceeding.

[James Patten]

planning a rule to stop 15' from edge of table, as if it's an end of track.

Well...it IS an end of track - especially if the turntable rails aren't lined up with yours!

[Ira Schreiber]

Good point, James and it is not even a switch!

[Carl G. Soderstrom]

I remember a post about dire consequences for anyone putting a scratch on #9.
Putting the engine in the pit would put a BIG scratch on it.

Is there a consideration of putting a flag or mark at 15 feet?