Folks, we are planning a workday on Sunday the 14th of June. Work continues on 565. We are right now getting the front pilot cleaned up and ready for re-installation. Also we are trying to re-assmble the brake system so we can safely move the engine around to the main shop. I'm looking for someone with welding skills to start welding some cracks we found. Send me a PM if interested.

Thanks, Steve.

Out of curiosity for those of us who don't have every locomotive's number, class, railroad and location memorized in our heads care to tell us what and where the 565 project is? Is this a cosmetic restoration or are you trying to get her back in steam.

Adam

Sorry Adam. She is Delaware, Lackawanna & Western 565 currently at Steamtown. This is only a cosmetic restoration.

Thanks.

Adam,
This is what 565 looks like as she did in the Lackawanna days. She and a Camel Back in St. Lou. MO. are the only two steam locmotives of the Lackawanna left.


Len.

How great would it be to have this loco running on home rails again. Too bad the restoration is cosmetic only. What kind of work would it take to make her fully operational again? How bad of shape is she? When was her last operating day?
Just imagine a Lackawanna steam engine running in this day and age making AT LEAST local yard shuttle trips at Steamtown.
How bad is she?

Report from the NPS regarding 565's condition.

"Condition: Locomotive No. 565 is in terrible condition, missing its road number plate, builder's plate, air pump, and many small parts. It has apparently been converted from a coal burner to an oil burner. Mechanically it is a very tired, worn-out engine, not suitable for restoration to operable condition. It is probably suitable only for static exhibit as a museum engine."

Full report can be found here
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/onli ... /shs2f.htm

That's a shame! What a gorgeous engine she was. I remember seeing pictures of her when she was on the BRW and she looked great then! Let's all hope that the cosmetic restoration goes well and she'll come out looking that great again...like we all know she will.
Thanks for the info update Mike!
Still a shame she won't turn a wheel ever again...

Hey SteveRG, give us some time we will have her looking good at least. She may not run again but she will be the center piece of the collection with help from my crew, Mike, Bruce, and the whole shop crew at Steamtown.

Steve.

So, if I understand this, because a locomotive is missing 2 plates (number & builders) and air compressor and the catch-all "many" small parts, it isn't suitable to restore? I wonder if the group in New Zealand who dug up that old Rogers so many years ago would have been stopped and thrown the locomotive back into the water because it was missing "many" small parts?

In 2009, just like in years past, "many" small parts are made on a daily basis. Injectors, brand new not just NOS, replica plates, air compressors, driving boxes, cylinder castings/fabrications, new boilers, frame sections, driving wheels, even replica whistles, can be purchased newly made. Somehow, if there was a determined effort, with the money needed, I believe the 565 would be able to be rehabilitated to operation. Imagine the possibility of the 565 doubleheading with the 952 out of Scranton with Boonton coaches behind them?

Yeah, right. What was I thinking?

Rob
Builders Plate, PA

Back around 1960 (in the Jurassic Era of steam tourist lines), DL&W 565 was steamed a few times by the group that was forming the Black River & Western; I think 565 was actually owned by Bill Whitehead, one of the BR&W's founders. The group was trying to get the CNJ's Chester Branch (which crossed the Black River, hence the name, which has stuck ever since), and 565 apparently made at least one "semi-authorized" trip on the branch.

By 1965, the BR&W was on the PRR's Flemington Branch, and GW #60 had arrived and was being put into service. 565 was parked and on display at Ringoes; it went to Whippany in 1969 and eventually to Tony Citro's restaurant for display. It certainly has been through quite a trail of owners since leaving the D&MM.

OK, here's the question-- what was the reason 565 was not operated at the BR&W in Ringoes? I'd suspect it had some "problems" that needed attention, as did most ex-shortline locos of that vintage. And, I'd bet that #60 was in pretty good shape when it arrrived in New Jersey-- the GWRy had a reputation for decent or better maintenance. So, there must have been some underlying problem with 565. Maybe it was just "wore out" and #60 was much better. Or, could it have been --- gasp! --- "politics"? Or "personalities"?

Someone out there must know. Perhaps a certain "young commodities broker"...who was a fireman on the BR&W back in that Jurassic era ? Or maybe EDM?

Howard P.
Rustoleum Green, NJ

I would love to come up and help work on her but my work sked has me tied up until late October. When she's all done, gonna bring Dad for his first visit and take a ton of pix.
Thanks and I look forward to her gleaming in all her DLW glory...
Steverg

Steve RG.,
The locomotive will stil be in the main locomotive shop till October, I'm sure. there's a lot to do to her to get her back in shape, I was talking by phone today with Steamtown's Head guy Pat McKnight. and theres a lot to be done. So Bring your Dad up and she'll be there. By then we hope to have her looking more like an 2-6-0 radder then a 0-6-0. lol.
I had a nice long chat with Mr. McKnight today getting filled in on a lot of information. So I can't wait till the 14th. when I'll be able to lean a hand.

Len.

I believe, and this is only my hazey recollections from almost a decade ago, that the 565 would probably need an entirely new boiler, plus a lot of other components. If memoery serves it was a lap seem boiler at that?

I've heard stories that the 565 was pretty well shot when the BR&W got it and I'm sure the time since hasn't been kind. It wasn't moved indoors until the early 90's when Steamtown finished the roundhouse. There was an aborted restoration attempt in the 1980's as well. My guess is that the condition of the locomotive was a large part of the reason the 565 was never steamed again.

The Historic Resource Study written by Gordon Chapell (often copied and pasted here) was a good work, but should not be taken as bible, particularly where the current mechanical condition of the pieces is concerned.

Of course the Rahway Valley 15 has strong ties to Scranton as well. It was rebuilt under contract in the DL&W Scranton erecting shops back in the day. That engine, which ran at Steamtown in Vermont, would be my personal pick of a smaller unit were ever restored.

In any case, again, my hat goes off to Steve and his pose for taking the bull by the horns and making something happen.

Dave

Howard hit the nail on the head with respect to 565 at Ringoes. I also remember being told that 565 was a worn out and tired shortline engine. Former GW 60 was said to have been purchased, brought east and put into service for less that it would have cost to put 565 back into operating condition. Just a matter of simple economics.

I was just a young brakie at the time, not really involved in the power, but I do remember that the rear set of tires were very thin, typical of many a shortline engine, on a railroad that was just making it. The 60 came from an operation that was just the opposite, although still a shortline. Similar to the Cuban sugar operations, but with a difference, the GW had money. The locomotives were used only part of the year, then shopped in preperation for the next season. Not so for the 565.

I suspect that when the 148 came along, even it needed less work (read money-) than the 565. It left Black River soon after 148 arrived or went into service. Something like forty years ago, sorry I can't offer more insight-

Two interesting thing just hit me, writing this, although not entirely germain to this discussion. Both 60 and 148 came from sugar companies, and 565 and 148 were to have gone to the first Adirondack. And then BR&Ws first two diesels were both numbered 400-

E. D. Moxley
Worse and Worser, NJ

Well hopefully in a few years 565 will be once more a nice looking locomotive with its nice shiny coat of black paint and white walls tires with Lackawanna on its tender gleaming in the sun light of the Lackawanna country side of Scranton, PA. Although not under steam, but on show for the world. For they can see what a Lackawanna Steam locomotive looked like in the day when steam was king!

Len.