Lake Shore Live Steamers.com

Located at

Penitentiary Glen
8668 Kirtland-Chardon Rd
Kirtland, Ohio 44094

It's 7:50am and Dave Foster arrives at the track with the new car lift he brought by trailer from Sandusky. John Koontz, Dave Foster, George Metts, Frank Foti, Ken Brooks, Rick Nagy and the photographer Bill Deptowicz had assembled to wait for the crane.

The crane from Jim Hall Tree Service moving into position behind the Parks service building to prepare for the lift. The flatbed mounted boom can extend to a length of 60 feet and you can see the operator stands behind the outrigger.

Dave the operator is extending the boom and raising it as Dave prepares the lifting straps on our new car lift. With the hook over the center of the new car lift Dave connects the lifting straps to it.

The initial lift to see how balanced the load is with the motor, oil reservoir and hydraulic cyclinder on one side of the unit. Everything checks out O.K. and the crane lifts our car lift over the Park service building.

The boom had been extended 58 feet and the lift easily clears the roof of the building. As Dave the operator continues to swing the car lift beyond the roof and slowly lowers it our crew watches the progress.

Slowly the lift approaches the drop zone over the rails of inverted 3" angles we are using for lift guide rails. The lift needed to be rotated to be in the correct position and soon the guys will be able to grab on and rotate it.

Ken and Dave took hold of the car lift to guide it on the rails after turning the lift 180 degrees as it was lowered. With Rick helping they push the car lift into position over the rails as it was slowly lowered.

With the one side on the guide rails Ken and Rick guide the wheels into position on the other side of the lift. After slackening the cable the lifting straps were disconnected from the hook and Dave signals the operator to take it away.

The crew is checking the clearance between the end of the 13 foot long rails on the lift and the end of the concrete slab of the storage building and it clears. George Metts started wiring the on/off switch to the hydraulic pump unit as Ken watches.

Dave installing one of the four lift extension pieces that will join the lift rail to the storage track rails. Lost one of the bolts that mount the motor during transit so Ken was replacing it as George watched.

Ken bolting on the outward bound extension pieces to the lift. Ken holding a box of crimp-ons as George looks for the right size.

Back at the station Edith Hacker was hauling the left over pumpkins out into the woods for the animals to eat. John Koontz was using his backpack blower to remove the leaves off the track by the station.

Jerry Bell and Joe Banzer look over the cylinder that had a leak so we removed it and found a pipe plug used for drainage was leaking. After fixing the plug the unit was re-installed by bolting it back into position.

The track crew started extending the ends of the yard rail to a point that the lift extentions would meet and here Dick is cutting off the rail. Track #1, #4 and #5 have been extended and Tom Reder, Dick and Lew Fowler are working on track #2 extention.

With the five tracks extended all that remains is to position them with the storage car barn rails, level and ballast them but that's it for today. Ted Nyland, Don Speidel and Roy Harris were adding the finishing touches to the tie beam wall they had worked on all afternoon.

Edith loading the wheelborrow with stone to dress off the area around the new tie wall. Roy using his chain saw to cut one of the railroad ties to size and the dinner bell is ringing and it will be getting dark after dinner.