Re: CRRM Update: 318 is moved into the roundhouse.

318 was very worn out. The running gear was so sloppy that the spring hangers above the first driver had worn 4 nice hole into the first course of the boiler reducing the shell thickness to as little as 1/16 of an inch.The insurance inspector had us fillet weld the damaged area. With that damage I really do not think that it had another trip to Ouray in her

During the brief time that we operated her at the CRRM we were never really successful in getting her to equalize. One reason was the the L4 spring was 2 inches shorter than the rest. That was replaced, but only helped a little

The boiler was inspected as OK but no one ever noticed that bottom five rows of stay hole in the firebox side sheets had eroded away from around the stay bolts. On the last day that we ran her she started to crack from bolt hole to bolt hole.

She was a easy to operate little locomotive. We fixed a lot of her problems before we ran her, and quite a bit has been done since. I do agree with John that a static display is her current future. If I had a shoe box of 20 dollar bills to donate, I would be inclined to dump it into the 223

Dirk Ramsey