Larry Goldsby and his 7.5" gauge Live Steam C&O T-1 at Turkeyville on October 23, 2021 скачать в хорошем качестве

Larry Goldsby and his 7.5" gauge Live Steam C&O T-1 at Turkeyville on October 23, 2021

Larry Goldsby visits the Mid Michigan Railroad Club at Cornwell's Turkeyville, in Marshall, MI on October 23, 2021. The whole day, from start to finish, was plagued with delays and minor issues, making for a very late start on getting steam up on the big locomotive. Tom Bee joined Larry on the trip. After leaving Larry's house, they got bogged down in University of Michigan Football Game day traffic, en route to the railroad. Once arriving, the choice of unloading at the new drive-thru unloading area may have been a dubious one, as it took considerable effort to get the locomotive & tender extricated from the trailer and situated on the track, (though the other unloading area would take nearly as much trouble, possibly more) it then had to be towed about 1/8 mile to the steaming bays. On the way, the first derailment occurred due to a missing guard rail and steam locomotive and the riding car ahead of it both picked the frog and derailed. The locomotive's pilot truck and the first three drivers went on the ground. Ultimately, we were able to coax it back on the track by pushing/pulling/tugging it backwards in combination with using Larry's specially built lifting device. Coming through the yard, there was a questionable joint where the was a kink, but concerns proved unfounded. The locomotive was shoved onto the turntable and delivered to the steaming bays for preparation to fire up. Poor planning for which kits and tool boxes to bring over from the truck & trailer added to the delays, particularly in getting water and boiler chemical into the boiler so the fire could be lit. Once everything was in order, the locomotive had no problems steaming. Pressure came up smoothly and all of its mechanical needs and preparations were taken care of to facilitate its operation. After the locomotive was ready to move, Larry brought the locomotive out on to the mainline, where some other club members brought the cars we had assembled to pull. Since Larry was wanting to get pictures and video of his locomotive operating, I was given first crack at operating this massive live steam locomotive. My only other comparable experience was operating Bill Dobbs' 2.5" scale K-36 #483 [coal fired, at the time] a number of years earlier at Train Mountain. This was only my 2nd time operating an oil burning live steam locomotive, and I was definitely feeling out of my element, with the first being Larry's C&O 4-6-4 Hudson, #315, over a dozen years earlier. I set out around the railroad and all was smooth and good up until I tipped over the summit of the hill and the fire went out. I hadn't touched it yet, so Larry had apparently set it too low. Because I was unfamiliar with the details of firing this locomotive, I handed it back over to Larry after only traversing about 1/3 of the track (just past the tunnel). He relit the fire (torch was very low on fuel) after I was unable to relight it. Larry heads off with the train and I'm riding on the tender behind him, filming. We come to the grade crossing near the containers and the drive-thru unloading area and he throws the switch to go from the outer main to the inner main and... DERAILMENT because the points didn't move all of the way over! Only 30 minutes after we started... stopped because of a switch that has been problematic for years and still hasn't been addressed. Rerailing the locomotive this time took LOTS of teamwork and some creative thinking coupled with a determination to make it happen quick. Total time to rerail the locomotive this time was about a half hour. As an aside, another issue we encountered while rerailing the locomotive this time, the fire went out again! This time, the torch would & couldn't relight because it was out of fuel. Fortunately Pat had his little torch handy he uses for lighting his cigars. While it wouldn't be able to reach far enough into the locomotive to relight the fire directly, it did let me light a pair of twigs covered in diesel fuel that were long enough. A single twig didn't have enough thermal mass to light the diesel fuel, so it would put the fire out on the twig! But a pair of twigs burning together worked! I later joked that Pat had the spare key for Larry's Texas! Once we were back on the track, we took off again. As we came down the hill that ducks under the two trestles, I was reminded of my frequent derailments in the area with my equipment, including my ten wheeler, when we derailed for a 3rd time, this time at the bottom of the hill. I was determined to make this as brief of an experience as possible. So I jumped in and worked to get the locomotive back on the track in a mere THREE minutes, 1/10th of the time the previous derailment had just taken. Fortunately and by the grace of God, this was the last serious issue we had for the day. See the video for the rest of the details.