On Saturday, July 26, volunteers Dwight, Colin, Chris, Bryan and Paul picked up where we left off last week working on the stuck injector on Engine 103. Due to the persistent work last week, it didn’t take very long to get the injector to start breaking loose. Like the saying goes, don’t force it, get a bigger hammer, and that is what solved the issue. A little alcohol and a few smart taps with a couple-pound hammer got things working. Now don’t think we were just shade-tree mechanics doing this, we were following instructions in the 567 Engine repair manual! So now it was time to start this monster, and the new batteries rolled her right up. Of course everything has to checked after such a long down time, and things looked pretty good.

We took a lunch break to let the engine warm up, and after lunch we made sure the locomotive would move and operate correctly. Everything was fine after about another hour of exercise. Also, during the time spent working on the injector, Dwight was busy installing a new power supply for the in-cab radio. Some other small work was completed on the locomotive before we shut it down, and due to the heat – it reached 102 F – the crew called it a day and retreated to the air-conditioned break room!

Overall a good day as we restored Engine 103 to operation. The Museum once again has three operating 70+ year old GP7s!

If you don’t see the pictures that I was able to capture, go to our Blog Page.

– Paul