BrownStone Chinooks: October 2017

A year of Oregon weather took a heavy toll on Vineman. He shrunk 3' in height and was rapidly becoming one with the perennial flower bed. Only his hat, wired to the top of his rebar "spine" and to his head was keeping vineoporsis from shrinking him further.

Down to the grape plants, whose vines have become one with the blackberries, weeds, morning glory vines, fence and Icemageddon downed oak branches.
Base ball complete.

Work supervisors. The balls did actually take a few trips down the hill when nudged by curious Chinooks.

Base and middle balls.

The top of Vineman's rebar "spine" is 5'5" - which used to go to the top of his head. Some modifications will be needed before I can permanently affix his head and hat.

Just in time for Haloween, 6'5" Vineman is resurrected...

with a ghostly presence.

Booooooooooo

October 16, the morning after the concert was another Caboose Move. (See July 28 Blog for the first Caboose move. Both have been donated to historical museums for restoration and exhibiting.) I was not expecting to be up and running at 0700 which is when the crane arrived. We had gotten home late. My head swimming with Buffet songs made it difficult to fall asleep.
The crane company guys assured me they would be unloading in Salem by noon. Groggy headed, I rushed to feed the dogs and Dave then grabbed my camera, a warm coat and hat, noise reducing headphones, a thermos of coffee and breakfast bar and settled into my Kubota for the show.
Track, caboose, crane, and Kubota lined up on an early, cold morning.

First the stabilizers were placed and later after realizing the recent rains had softened the ground, placed on pads.

The crane towered above the trees. All but the upper sections remained in the shadows the entire day.

Finally situated, the crane itself was lifted with the stabilizing arms, leveled and suspended.

Then the counter-weights were lifted off a truck and placed on the crane. When it was ready to move out of the way, it was discovered the truck that brought the counter-weights and pads could not make it past the pads placed under the crane outriggers. Solution: lift the rear of the truck with the crane and move it over.

Next came huge steel beams to be placed under the caboose and attached to the bridal. The truck with the beams couldn't make the swing onto our road so everyone had to hike out 1/2 mile to manually transfer them to another truck.

Something was deemed to be in the way so a cutting torch was brought out to remove the offending pieces under the caboose. The photo doesn't show the flying sparks.

The heavy cross-beams were lifted to the caboose one at a time to be pushed, prodded and otherwise manually encouraged to fit under the caboose.

More torch work.

By now it was close to 1100.

Tools used to remove RR spikes from the ties and rails. In exchange for a bucket of excess spikes to be used a a fund-raiser for the kids who will be renovating the caboose, the museum representative, pulled all the remaining spikes for me. I have my eye on the rail to be used to reinforce the retaining walls in the garden.

The first beam was raised and a tiddly-wink of wooden beams was constructed to support it. This tedious job required lifting, placing and building until each end of the two beams was in the air and level. The crane would lift one end of a beam. A block would be placed. The chain from the crane would be attached to the other side of the beam and repeat.

By now I was getting really hungry for lunch and full of coffee. I hiked down to the house to remedy my distress. When I returned, the crew was joking about the "noon in Salem unloading" schedule and how only a few brought food. Unfortunately I didn't have any sandwich makings in the house.
One side of one beam up...

now into the blackberries to do the other.

Finally about 1300 the Caboose was ready for flight.

Well almost. She was set down again to place some more shims.

Airborne.

Thirty-three tons of track travel history flying through the air...

to be ushered to her now home aboard a 100', low-boy trailer.

Only half-way there. Once again the wooden beams had to be placed under the caboose so the steel cross-beams could be removed.

Tiddly-wink beam construction take one...

Whoops the top beams needed to be perpendicular to the caboose body.

Start over - this had to be done on all four corners.

Finally they were able to lower the caboose to remove the steel cross-beams.

Whoops, 33 ton of caboose on a trailer with 3" free-board reduced the free-board to zero. Even with the airbags inflated, they were high centered and going no-where.

Around here with my projects, I just bring in a bigger hammer or another tractor depending on how stuck I am. These guys bring in huge semi-trucks. The caboose ladened trailer was pushed and pulled down to the house.

Finally in the sunshine, part of the crew moved and anchored the steel cross-beams and readied the caboose for the road. There was a problem. 100' of trailer plus a semi truck body was longer than the space they had to turn it around. I had asked them at the start why they didn't back the trailer up and extend it when they got up to the crane. "Someone else measured the turn-around spot." (Probably the same someone who told them not to bother bringing lunch).

Meanwhile up at the crane, the caboose "trucks" were lifted and placed on a second, shorter, higher trailer.

These "trucks" have always intrigued me because they are made out of oak and not steel like modern RR trucks.

"Yup" there isn't enough room to turn around."

I did offer to remove a post (the same one I have nailed with the motorhome) but they said they "enjoyed the challenge". The trailer was special. The wheels could be remotely driven independent of the semi truck.

They still had to jocky inch-by-inch back-and-forth to get by the post and tree behind it but with the trailer operator walking behind to drive the trailer wheels, they were on their way...

at about 1600. Vine waving good-bye as the caboose moved along the pond...

and up he first hill - again high centering and eventually removing all the jagged, soccer-ball size, embedded, rocks that have nearly tipped my dog rig for years-...

she moved through the woods...

and around all the tight corners...

and flattening the center hump of the drive with her.

The turn onto the road proved impossible. Fortunately there is a neighbor's drive directly across the road.

The caboose was again driven back-and-forth, inch-by-inch of gain on the turn with each trip up-and-down the drive.

At one point it looked as if the neighbor might get a caboose for their yard.

In the end, they did loose the center hump in their drive and a few tree branches and gain some new drainage ruts beside their drive.

Meanwhile - and it was about 45 minutes of "while" - the truck with the caboose "trucks" sat waiting to leave. They actually had to eventually lead the way since they needed to be unloaded first. No biggy now. The projected noon unloading would be the next day and everyone was working on over-time by now.

Alas, the turn was made. If you look closely, the trailer wheels and semi wheels are parallel to each other. The trailer is actually moving sideways onto the road.