I've been struck by the comments by posters on this board and others about the Friends project to rebuild 463. There are some like Mike Rowe that indicate a solid grasp of the realities involved in rebuilding steam locomotives. Then there are others like Chris Callaway who, despite their lack of first hand experience in such matters, are severely critical of the 463 project. However, maybe Chris has a point because the 463 rebuild did take some odd turns.
Since my own familiarity is with the rebuilding of C&TS locos 484, 487, 488, and 489 I decided to see how the 463 rebuild compares to these other rebuilds, rather than comparing to some hypothetical standards.
For this exercise I went back through the Commission meeting minutes from 2002 onward and pulled out the references to the rebuilding of 489. Now, until 489 was rebuilt the C&TS was forced to operate with three or fewer locomotives, so getting 489 rebuilt was rather vital to the revenue potential of the C&TS. Certainly returning 489 to revenue service was far more important financially than 463.
Well, the rebuild of 489 took over six years from start of disassembly to return to service -- a pretty disappointing performance by anyone's standards. There were many reasons, but the chief one was the limited capacity of the C&TS (or any other tourist steam railroad for that matter) to carry out such major projects. I know the money was there because I was directly involved in raising such monies.
But we're not living in the steam era when skills, technical knowledge, and equipment were readily available. For instance, the Chama Shop, whether back in the Kyle days under John Bush, or in the more recent past, is limited to about one boiler rebuild and one running gear rebuild in an off-season, if everything goes right. That's why the Antonito Shop did the 487 rebuild back in the 2003-2004 off-season -- the Chama Shop was busy doing the rebuild of 484. That's also the basic reason that Tim, Soni, and Marty decided to do the 463 work off-premises -- the Chama Shop had its own backlog of loco work.
But take a look at what the Commission minutes say about the rebuilding of 489 and reach your own conclusions.
1. 489 was withdrawn from service before the beginning of the 2002 season because of the need to re-tube its boiler, and the Chama Shop crew commenced disassembly and preparation for ultrasound analysis.
2. 489 remained idle for the next 15 months waiting its turn to be rebuilt (work on 484, 487, and 488 took priority with both Chama and Antonito doing loco rebuilding).
3. According to the December 6, 2003, Commission meeting minutes, boiler work was now proceeding on 489 in the Chama Shop and the loco was expected to return to service by the Fall of 2004.
4. However, nothing further was done on 489 until February 2005 when, according to the February 28, 2005, Commission meeting minutes sand-blasting of 489’s boiler was scheduled to be done, and to then be followed by ultrasound analysis, but according to the April 18, 2005, minutes no work was done on 489.
5. The September 19, 2005, Commission minutes then report that the sand-blasting of 489’s boiler has indeed commenced and the boiler is ready for the ultrasound survey. However, the minutes for the October 21 and November 18, 2005, meetings report that little or no work has been done on 489.
6. Nothing happened until the July 25, 2006, meeting when the Commission approved a contract for CTSMC to have the Chama Shop restart rebuilding 489. Then at the December 18, 2006, meeting the Commission approved yet another contract for the Chama Shop to rebuild 489.
7. Work finally progresses on 489 and at the January 12, 2007, meeting Frank Turner of CTSMC reports that 489 will be ready early in the 2008 season, which would at last enable the railroad to operate at full capacity.
8. On August 22, 2008, 489 returns to service; more than six years after disassembly began.
