"The fulfillment of a ten year dream".


How they ever figured out that "rat's nest" of wires is beyond me.

Going to be @ East Ely.

OK I'll bite

Which channel (History?) and when was/will it be on.

By my count this is the third item, one was a safe, the other a brake tester and now the Wig Wag.

Bob H

It's pretty straight forward, once you figure out what all the components are. AND, I bet that there was a schematic wiring diagram inside the cases.

BTW, those are neat wig-wags. I'm glad they got them running.

It was on the History Channel last night. Just happened upon it while channel surfing.

There was a Gunite pumper restored for the NN also.

And a vintage vacuum cleaner...and a Fairmont speeder..

OK, so here is the question. Most of the items they have done on the show have been rather expensive. By my guess the four items cost $45,000 (assuming they really paid). While all of them have been neat they certainly would all be considered peripheral to the main mission of the museum (at least to me).

Do these appearances help raise money for the museum? I am assuming that is the real goal?

Additional airings of "Mixed Signals" are scheduled on the History Channel on:

April 23, 2013 - 10:30-11:00AM ET
April 23, 2013 - 04:30-05:00PM ET

Related question, how does the NN get funding for all of the promotion it does. Even if you ignore the TV stuff (who knows what they actually paid, and whether there was any compensation for the show), consider the full page back cover ads on various railfan magazines.

As anyone who has inquired knows, a full page color ad on the back cover of Trains or Railfan is an expensive proposition. It's been years since I've seen their rate sheet, but I do recall being impressed by the number.

So, they obviously have some serious funding. They're also most likely not pulling in as many folks as Strasburg or CSRM.

Once you make it all the way to Ely, you'll discover that the tickets are... $27. Not exactly in the same league as the Rocky Mountaineer where tickets start at roughly $1K and go up (sometimes WAY up) from there. Obviously with those kind of fares you can justify spendy ads. But at $27 per passenger? Going to take a lot of riders to recoup that ad in Trains... Granted, the special events they promo cost more, but they're still reasonably priced.

Do they get help from the State of Nevada tourism board or some other assistance? If they do, good for them, and maybe they can tell others how to get funding.

.

Saw this on TV a while back. Rick's American Restorations has done a few items over the years for Nevada Northern. Good show. ^_^

I've wondered that myself, Bob -

I watch the show - it's "fun", but I always wonder if some of us are getting
a fair deal on our donations after seeing just how much they charge for
certain restorations.

"What is it? It's a taxi meter I picked up for $20. Oh, well, I'm thinking 15
hours and paint, maybe 3 guys - $1,200."

"What's that? It's a chair. OK, I see, maybe 12 hours, paint and 2 guys -
$800.00".

Some of the stuff being repaired looks like it could be built from scratch
for half the cost.

Maybe that's just they way it is everywhere...

The perk (saving grace?) would be compensation from the Discovery Channel
and some advertising.

/Mitch
(Owner of several Nevada Northern coins and one brick, which I'll credit the
organization for it's very creative incentives in addition to simple good will).

That's usually how it works when it comes to restorations. It's almost always cheaper to build something new than restore it, but then it wouldn't have the history behind it.

On another note, I keep waiting for the day NN comes to Rick to ask about his team assisting in a locomotive restoration. The items they get restored keep getting bigger and bigger. It's only a matter of time.

I have to say the quality of their restoration work is high considering they are what we used to call shade tree mechanics, more than likely self taught, which to my way of thinking, there's no beating learning by doing rather than out of a book. I used to tell employees that I can teach you everything but common sense, and the ones who had it, did very well.

As a side observation:
And when you do such work in the "desert," it tends to stay intact longer than it does in, say, Washington, Vermont, or North Carolina.

(This remark prompted by my ability to read paint markings 70+ years old on an Arizona bridge...)

As a potential addition to your list of the worst climates for preservation, the rainforest climate of the Pacific Northwest in general comes to mind, beyond Washington State itself.
Several years ago I went to a certain museum and the unprotected wooden rolling stock was turning into rotted mush. A intense challenge to keep this stuff from self destruction, even tarped, the humidity levels are a killer.