Despite lack of a spreading chestnut tree, there was activity today at the Museum’s smithy near the door to the Bay 4 machine shop. The task was to lengthen the swing links on the rear truck of engine No. 10. I believe--please correct me if I’m wrong—that the lengthening is part of a fix Jason doped out to compensate for the unwanted elevation of No. 10’s hind end caused by recently received new leaf springs for the rear truck. (The springs are shown in picture No. 1 of Brendan’s April 17th post.)
Phil Goodwin (hand on the vise) did the early cranking of the blower to get the fire going in the morning. Now Hansel Fardon is having a go at it. When revved up the blower makes an interesting up-and-down moaning sound. (At least I THINK it was the blower, not a volunteer.) A swing link is buried in the coals, and Eric Schade and J.B. Smith are waiting for it to heat up.
Eric holds a swing link on the anvil while J.B. wields the hammer. I would think that Eric would receive an awful jar if J.B. didn’t hit the part of the link directly over the anvil, but there was nary a flinch nor an “OUCH!” so I guess J.B aimed well. Either that or Eric is really tough!
Pins from the truck were carefully positioned and clamped to the grating to form a gauge. Eric and J.B. are preparing to try a swing link on the gauge, and it looks as though they’ll need to do some more forging before that one has the correct length.
