It took several months of scraping and wirebrushing the boiler to
prepare for paint. Most of the parts that could be removed from
the boiler were sandblasted. Only the boiler and the engine frame
were not sandblasted. My shop was a mess after all the
cleaning. 2 gallons of IH red with hardener was used. The
boiler was painted with POR-15 black velvet high temp paint.
Craig Dobbins did all of the boiler work. He made several trips
to Iowa Falls to do the work. He put a new smoke box bottom in,
built up the flue sheet, installed a soft plug patch, and added two
washout plugs. 11 new rivets were installed in the
smokebox. He also welded up a crack in the rear flue sheet and
installed a couple of flues. Roy Pressley and Gary Flack assisted
Craig with the work.
September, 2006
Jerred and I spent many long nights from mid August to mid September
reassembling the engine. Weekends were pretty busy with steam
shows, but Jerred and Eric Bremer put flues in the second weekend of
August. They discovered a crack on the rear flue sheet and Craig
Dobbins and Gary Flack came up and welded that up. The goal
was to have the Rumely done the second weekend in September so we had
time to get it to the Heritage Park steam show in Forest City,
IA. We were pretty tired of working on it by the time we were
done and I don't want to know how many miles Jerred put on driving from
Hanlontown to Iowa Falls (about 75 miles) every night.
9/8/2006
After pulling it outside on Friday night we filled it with water and
discovered some massage flue leaks inside the firebox. It was too
dark to do anything about it and we were too big to fit in the firebox
so we went to bed very nervous, since we had already sent out
invitations to the steaming up party on Sunday.
On Staturday morning we put together every 1/2" extension that my
neighbor and I own and send Scott in the firebox to put the tube roller
in the tubes. Then he would hook up the extensions and we could
roll the flues from the outside. We managed to get the leaks to
stop by the time the water in the firebox was up to Scotts
ankles. Jerred then went home to work on other equipment to
prepare for the Heritage Park show and I finished detailing the
engine. I even pinstriped it Saturday afternoon.
9/10/2006
It wouldn't be right to not steam it up in Iowa Falls before taking it
to Forest City. We had a party for friends and family to watch it
run for the first time in probably 40 years. Unfortunately it
poured rain all day. Most of the guests stayed dry in the
shop. Only a few of us were completely soaked by the end of the
day. We added a corn valve to the engine so we could steam
sweetcorn for the party. After 10 months of hard work, it was
complete!
First Match
Jerred and Jim after the fire is started.
First time the throttle is pulled - it runs!
Every enjoyed burgers and steamed sweetcorn.
9/13/2006
Jerred is loading it up on the trailer for the trip home to Forest
City. The nice part about this size of engine is that it does fit
on a gooseneck trailer and can be pulled with a pickup. I will
miss having it in my shop, but having the extra room back is nice.
9/17/2006 The engine performed very well at Heritage Park. Only a
few minor repairs were needed during the show. We used it to thresh,
shred corn, and it was used for a spark show and for steam for a
sweetcorn and balona feed. It will never look the same as it
before first steam up, but what fun is it if you can't get them dirty?
