THE TWO FOOTERS               

Issue 14                                                                          May/June 2004

It was a busy week here at Tick Acres, preparing for the future.  As the Oil-based Economy fades away, and Rail is once again king in North America, the Standard Gauge will extend to every town.  Then, from thousands and thousands of transfer points, the Two Foot Gauge will continue on to every corner of our Nation.  Building for that future, we have constructed a loading dock on the west side of our warehouse to service both future rail and present day rubber tire vehicles.

The first step was go get Mercy to dig down to the limestone bedrock for a solid footing.  It is about 3 ft on the far end, where a few sand bags have been placed to begin forming the perimeter beam.  

A hundred sand bags later, with rebar in place, the slab is almost ready to pour.  First note that the floor level platform is edged with 3in angle iron to prevent damage from heavy equipment.  One inch bars have been welded on to extend well into the concrete.  Then note the 8in deep recessed area on the left where an hydraulic lift will be install.  The rail line will pass just behind the plywood form, and the lift will reconcile the height differences.

First we pour the perimeter beam.  

On the RR side there was no need for fancy form work to hold the tremendous pressure of wet concrete.  We just used the bulldozer:

After the beams were in, we poured the lower level then the upper:

The whole project is now under wet blankets, curing for a week.  Now we need to build flatcars to bring city products in and cattle cars to ship ranch products out.

The Veterans Memorial RR has two exciting new things to report. I've had an inmate work crew building us a station for about six weeks. It is nearly finished but it has been running me ragged being there all day everyday during the week and going for supplies and doing paperwork on the weekends. School is out this week and all the inmate crews will be moved over to building and repairing school buildings. There is still a lot to be done so I have to push them as hard as I can this week. I'll still have some labor to do myself like the galley cabinets, final electrical work, possibly the floor tile, etc. The station is modeled from a Grand Trunk station in Dryden, MI.

We have also bought and picked up a 2' gauge Crown that formerly ran at Lion Country Safari in South Florida. It's a 1972 and ran there about 20 years. It has just finished a loving 6 year restoration by a couple of pros in South Florida. It looks better than it did when it rolled out of the Crown factory in Wyona, PA. New boiler, coal or wood fired, interchangeable wood and coal stacks, lots of real polished brass. I can't wait to get it in operation. Right now, it's stored in my barn waiting construction of a passing siding and a secure storage facility. It is too tall to go into our present tunnel storage building made of two standard sea shipping containers. I've located 2 high cube containers, which we will be getting in the next couple of months to give us the secure storage we need as well as a live steam tunnel.

I'm pleased to announce that during the last weekend of March, our 8-ton Plymouth HSD (a.k.a. "Deezul") operated under it’s own power on rails for the first time in who knows how many years. Not only did it operate, but it pulled about 16 tons of train on a 2-3% grade for about a mile.

I've put together a web page with preliminary pictures and some narrative. Once all the rest of the details are done, I hope to add more pictures. http://www.doerivergorge.com/etrr/deezul.php

The loco is #7229. The folks at Williams gave me a build date of 9/28/77 and a delivery date of 4/11/78 to Peabody Coal. Would be interesting to know why it took so long to deliver from the build date, unless they took a very long time to build it. I don't have a location on Peabody, but probably somewhere in southwest VA or southern WV. I'd be interested in any info that anybody has on Peabody Coal and their RR operations.

It ended up at Berry Iron and Metal, a scrap dealer in extreme southwest VA (Chilhowie) and was there for at least 4-5 years before we found it.

Interesting thing was that the engine only had 440 hours on it. Don't know if it is the original engine, but the wheels have very little wear as well. Unfortunately the exhaust stack flapper was stuck open and the engine got wet, so the engine ended up getting pretty much a full rebuild, including a reworked head since the original was found to be cracked.

On Saturday May 1, 25 members of the B&W crew traveled to the East Broad Top Railroad to assist in track maintenance. We were assigned to replace ties on two sidings near the engine house and car shops. Upon arrival, the members immediately started to work. A team started the process of cutting ties, while other members began to remove the ties. To aid in this process, the B&W brought along their Terramite backhoe. This proved to be a great time saver.

As the work progressed, we were given an opportunity to use EBT’s air spiker. The B&W crew felt that this would be an opportunity to play out the John Henry saga. By lunchtime, about 40 ties were replaced. This break energized the "Gandy Dancers" to uphold the legend of John Henry.

The day was a great success for all involved. We were able to replace 82 ties within 7 hours.

On the weekend of September 14 2002, the friends of Depot Park ran a very special train, the #3 former Monson engine and an excursion car. We ran on the old right of way that had been re-gauged back to 2 foot after becoming the Boston and Maine Lexington branch some years after the Bedford and Billerica railroad departed.

At the end of the weekend, I was asked if I would undertake a job of installing a permanent 2 foot track in Bedford. This track was to be on the original right of way because the yard were we had ran on was to be made a parking lot for the now bike path on the old right of way. I agreed and the friends of Depot Park received a grant from 2 different groups. The work began on March 20^th.

The rail was delivered from Pennsylvania and 4x6 pressure treated ties were obtained from a local lumberyard. The ties were cut in half and stacked in piles along the row and extras stored in their bud MDC car.

Two weeks later, we started the first phase of the new section by laying 600 feet of track. Ties were set out 2 foot on center and the 38 # rail was set down and spiked. This volunteer effort has over 125 feet of fully tamped and ballasted track and another 200+ feet that needs tamping. The tie and spike size is of the B&B prototype and ballast is stone dust to satisfy the town’s requirements to be bicycle friendly.

Work continues every other weekend to complete the track. Our volunteer list has doubled since we started! For now, the track will be used for special occasions, but there is a dream of having a building with a train in it!

Please visit the friends of depot park website for more pictures of the work!

http://www.bedforddepot.org/

As many are aware, we had to send out an email request for articles for this newsletter. We have received many favorable comments on the newsletter. To maintain the quality, we need more articles from the membership.

We have had requests to list any two-foot gauge websites. If you know of any additional two-foot gauge sites, please forward them along.

The Two Footers
534 Armory Road
St. Marys, PA 15857

tpbauer@alltel.net

or

tom@thetwofooters.com

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