New Moderator

[willjordan]

Hi, Folks!
I'm Will Jordan and I'm the new moderator of this forum. Marty had a lot to do and asked for help and I volunteered.

My live steam experience is railroad oriented and has involved a fair amount of activity in two scales, 1.5" and 12". My railroad interests focus on logging and construction equipment.

In 12" scale, I've operated 2-6-6-2 logging mallets and a steam locomotive crane along with all of the monkey wrenching that comes with volunteering at an operating railroad museum. That was all years ago in Snoqualmie, WA, at what was then the Puget Sound Railway Historical Society. I've recently started volunteering at Railtown 1897 at Jamestown, CA.

In 1.5" scale, I was at the BC Society of Model Engineers for a number of years and am now in the Napa, CA area where I belong to the Sacramento Valley Live Steamers and am involved in forming the Santa Rosa Live Steamers.

My major project is a 90T Mikado in 1.5" scale. Lee Frechette is my partner in this endeavour and we are currently working in my shop about 1 evening a week.

I'm learning machining at home and have started a couple of small projects just to prevent ruining the larger, more expensive pieces of the Mikado. I finished all of the machining on a PMI hand pump and assembled it last night after a number of evenings of work. I bought a pair of matching PMI wobblers and gave one to my grandson for Christmas. We'll work on those together.

I've got wheel castings from Railroad Warehouse and Mountain Car that I'm working on turning with a couple of projects in mind. I'll be building a handcar -- grandson motivated -- and have been gathering parts for a small electric box cab.

Other projects include side dump ballast cars, various pieces of logging equipment, and a couple of riding cars. Of these, only one of the ballast cars has any real work done.

My long term dream project is a steam shovel. I have plans for an engine to base the swing and crowd engines on, but only general sketches of the overall plan. I do, however, know the location of a preserved prototype.

I'm a rookie machinist, but grew up on a farm and seem to have a good aptitude for all manner of tool use.

My take on being a moderator is to intervene as little as possible. I don't think that you will see much difference with me moderating the forum. I enjoy seeing posts from suppliers introducing new products when those suppliers are regular contributors to the forum. I also enjoy hearing about new products from satisfied users. And a posting reviewing or comparing like products is welcome as well. But I a person's first post is an advertisement, I'm apt to remove it from the general forum and let the poster know that there is a swap and sell forum that we can share with the machinists.

With respect to off-topic drifts, I treat this place a bit like a workplace lunchroom or a donut shop. A certain amount of off-topic discussion lets us know each other better, adds to our sense of community. But I do not have an unlimited tolerance for "did so - did not" ping pong or discussion of truck brands in a thread dedicated to safety and railroad speed limits. On the other hand, a separate thread on towing vehicles may well be in order. I know I have some questions here myself.

If you find a post that especially bothers you, drop me a private message here or email me at will@willjordan.com . I'll check it out and get back to you. I try to check the board a couple of times each day.

Of course with a crew as great as all of you, being moderator shouldn't be much work [img]/ubb/images/graemlins/wink.gif"%20alt="[/img]

[Al_Messer]

Good show!! Welcome aboard!!

[ng262_262]

Will,

Great to have a person with your background and experience as our new moderator!

Brian Marriott

[Patrik]

Hi!

I think your gonna be a great moderator

[Tel]

We'll all try & behave Will (well - most of us will [img]/ubb/images/graemlins/grin.gif"%20alt="[/img])

[UnkaJesse]

TEL, watch that phrase "most of us", I think we left that guy on the old board along with Mr. "Anonymous". Meanwhile, "back at the fort", I have been watching a neat movie on the "Flying Scotsman" running in jolly olde England. Nice lookin' lokie and privately owned no less!! Just wish they would put on a decent sounding whistle! Wot aboot the whistles in Oz? Were they the screechy kind also? Yer fergot ter answer me aboot that query a while back.

Unka Jesse

[Tel]

Shoot Unc! I got a photo of the Flyin' Scotsman with someone you know standin' on the footplate - I'll have ter hunt back through me shoe boxes to find it for ya. Taken at Broadmeadow (near Newcastle) station Easter 1988 when it was over here for the bi-centennial.

[UnkaJesse]

TEL, yer could post it onter the board an let all the other blokes see it too. We kin sorta overlook the funny looking bloke on the foot plate while we drool over the beauty of that lokie. I wish it had visited near Troy on its trip to the US of A. Mebbie I coulda taken a personal gander at it meself. The "Flying Scotsman" video is good, but it spends too much time showing all the people along the station platforms and other views from the coaches instead of the lokie. I learned a long time ago that one cannot photograph a train by riding on it even with the photo run-bys they always have. I and a friend or two always chased the trains and either photoed them as we raced alongside or else got ahead and waited at a crossing. It is entirely possible that I may have taken a few 35mm pics while driving along a busy highway, but I will never admit it.

Unka Jesse