Category: News
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Continued Bridge Work
Mother Nature brought an arctic blast to all of Texas this past week which prompted the annual Houston Area Live Steamers Chugga Chilifest train meet activities to be curtailed. (The county even turned off the water to the park for the first portion of the meet.) Several railroaders from Central Texas opted stay warm by…
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Lift Bridge and Guard Rails
On February 16th and 17th, Stephen spent time welding up the lift bridge frame while John was installing guard rails on the trestle. (The lift bridge mechanism is part of phase 2. It is a stationary span for now.)
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Ties and Rail Added to Trestle
February 8th was another huge day on the Austin & Texas Central. Stephen and Lori had to leave for a funeral, but that didn’t stop everyone else from working on the railroad. The primary goal was to install the bridge ties and rail on the trestle and the crew really came through. Attendees: John O,…
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Prepping the Bridge Ties
This past weekend…
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Switch stands ready
The Tumbleweed and Dry Gulch Railroad found a dozen spare switch stands in inventory and has donated them to the A&TC. (Thanks Philip!)
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Recent Work Day Activities
Thanks to Tim for remembering to take photos!
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Making fish plates
Using Ken’s newly acquired rail slotting punch, Stephen made a jig to create slotted fish plates. It is a piece of scrap rail with the center web removed. Two screws in the rail head keep the rail in position in the punch. Then the raw piece of aluminum bar can be slide into the punch.…
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Laying it down
Thanks to Ben, Stephen was able to pick up another load of tie material Friday. Saturday, Stephen and Ken decided to just lay panels. Aided by Ken’s generator running two fans, they put down approximately 240′ including multiple switches. This work spanned two of the four (or more) tracks through Austin.
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Panels and Turntable
It was HOT! But, we were working. Kari arrived early and began clearing branches from the weeds around the steaming bay area. We all then spent an hour chipping branches before hitting the rails. Ken and Richard pumped out 15 panels with Linda priming washers on screws and John rebuilding a switch. Doug, Tim, and…
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In the news
Bill Laird wrote a feature piece published in the July 2023 edition of the HALS Stack Talk newsletter. With permission of the editor, the article is available here.