It was purchased from Florida but the former owners had purchased it from Colorado. We are working on it's restoration and you can follow along here on it's progress and get an idea of what is involved with this type of project. It's an enormous amount of work on a locomotive that has been around for 73 years and not always kept up in the best conditions.
The following images show the state it was in when we got it home. It has been heavily modified with different steam domes, a wooden cab, a fancier cowcatcher/pilot and a rather ugly smokestack. I don't mind the style of the smokestack but compared to the very nice workmanship on the domes and and cab, the stack is pretty crappy and I took it off almost right away. The headlight and whistle were also changed out. It had been modified while in Florida to run on air so a lot of the plumbing is no longer steam rated and needs replaced. It did not come with a tender, most likely it had rusted out at some point. You can see a glimpse of the passenger cars, which it had all 3 and we also got most of the loop of track plus some other rail to use.
The frame and drivers and workings were all incredibly dirty and rusty.
The front truck and cylinders and a drive rod, before cleanup and refurbishing.
Front truck cleaned up with new bearings.
Needs Photo
One set of drivers and axle, sandblasted clean.
This is after the boiler was wire brushed clean. It is marked for Ultra sounding.
A view inside the firebox showing the tubes looking in fairly good shape and everything marked for ultra sounding. We would prefer that the tubes were only rolled and not welded in but... The ultra sound test showed some minor thinning in a couple of spots but nothing that would make it unsafe.
Hydro testing the boiler.
Pressured up to 180 lbs and no issues so we are good to go with using it for awhile yet.
With the boiler proving to be in usable shape, other work could begin on worn parts of the locomotive. The above image shows the beginning work of recreating a hanger bearing housing that was badly damaged and had some older repair work on it.
*New photos added 1/28/21*
The front saddle sandblasted clean
The front saddle now painted
Frame sandblasted clean of rust
Frame freshly painted. In this view you can see where the front and back plates had been removed. We have since restored both the footplate and the front plate to the frame.
The eccentrics cleaned and refurbished
Inside the Smokebox. The Y pipe seen here was quite deteriorated and rusty and broke while trying to remove.
This is the new setup inside the Smokebox. It was modified due to not being able to bend pipe into a Y and due to the position of the holes it needed to attach to. Maybe not quite as neat looking but should be efficient. Also noticeable here is the front plate that the "Cow Catcher" or Pilot attaches to that was cut off the frame and replaced with a wooden block. We have restored the plate back.
The painted boiler which has now been set on the chassis. Another view of the front plate that has been re-joined to the chassis as it would have been originally.
Yet another image of the painted boiler. In this image you can also see the Diamond stack that we decided to restore and use. It actually has some intricate workings inside to help deflect cinders which will be helpful as we intend to run it on wood to start with if not full time. It still needs painted but it has been straightened and reshaped here and is looking much better than when we brought the locomotive home.
Here is the insulation cover on. Be aware that the original was made of asbestos. Remove and dispose of carefully.
Another image of the boiler with it's insulation and some plumbing beginning to be installed. Pretty much all the plumbing had to be replaced. It was being run on air for many years and the steam rated plumbing was mostly gone.
New photos added 6/22/21
In an effort to not make this page take too long to load, the Cab restoration photos can be found here: Cab Restoration