Lake Shore Live Steamers.com

Located at

Penitentiary Glen
8668 Kirtland-Chardon Rd
Kirtland, Ohio 44094

Ron Trenhaile removed the grating at the ash pit dump and was shoveling out the wet ashes from the metal container embedded below the rails. You can see the sloping side that was provided so a shovel could reach in all the corners.

At Drudgery, Steve Zaken was cleaning out the leaves and debri from the ends of the drainage culverts using rakes and shovels. Ken Brooks worked on removing the damaged rail from the ties so they could be reused at another location.

Judson Elliott was applying oil to the various switch throws to keep them lubricated and prevent them from binding up. Paul Emch was doing some weed wacking around the tranfer table and the small turntable.

The project for the track crew today will be to repair this grade wall alongside of the Willis Car Barn. The existing railroad tie has rotted out pretty badly on the underside and collapsed, needing to be replaced.

Ron was using a leaf blower to remove debri from the yard tracks in the area where a tree service took down a old tree that was dying. Ken was picking up pieces of the tree limbs that were too large for the blower to handle.

Since the base tie was also rotten, Paul and Ken tried to pry the tie up out of the ground to replace it also. They are making progress and you can see how badly deteriorated the bottom tie is.

Once the tie was pried from it's encasement in the dirt and stone we moved it to the adjacent track and leveled out the dirt. Some tree roots were encountered and chopped off, probably from the tree that was removed.

We carried the replacement ties with our tie lifter tongs from the railroad car and set them in place. A view from the end as Dick Clark, our trackmaster, looks over the work done.

Ken got a wheelborrow of ballast and he and Ron spread it on both sides of the newly placed ties after they were spiked together. A second wheelborrow of ballast was needed to backfill around the ties.

The repaired grade wall, the block on the tie is a rubber block with a slot cut across that we use for a wheel chock for the rr cars. At the station Ken Vendlinger had been cutting the grass and was using the small mower to cut around the fence posts.