In January 2008 I went to the museum with the idea of getting 4 pistons out of blocks. I have freed up several stuck engines by using a hardwood dowel and pushing down on alternate pistons. My friend Al and I had found some hardwood logs about the right size to fit in the cylinders. I laid the block on the floor and put a 6.5 inch log in the cylinder and hit it with a sledge hammer. Ray helped me. Only one piston would budge. We agreed the rest would have to be pushed out on a hydraulic press. I took the pistons to Al's house to soak in solvent. After 3 or 4 days in the solvent we tried to get the rings loosened up on the pistons. We started tapping gently on the rings after a half hour it was obvious the only way to get them out to break them out with a cold chisel. It was a tough job and even cleaning the groves was tough. The good news is we had 2 good pistons.
I got prices on piston rings from several auto parts stores in my area. Prices varied from 21 to 27 dollars per ring. the 6 cylinder engine takes 24 rings. Quite a bit of money. I called Hastings Piston Ring company in Hastings Mich. I talked to a technical specialist named Dawn. Dawn gave me a special price for the museum. Ray gave me the OK to buy the rings. Al and I put the new rings on 2 of the 6 pistons.

update on the cylinder heads

The Leroi engine has 6 cylinders, with the blocks cast in pairs. There are 3 blocks and 3 heads, with over head valves. In November 2007 Ray, James, and Jerod helped me load 3 heads in the trunk of my car. I took the 3 heads home and took the valves out of the heads. There were different style valves, different springs, and different conditions from useless to excellent. This is evidence of past maintenance and limited availability of parts. One head was excellent. The seats in the head were excellent and the valves were excellent. I ground the valves, reassembled and painted it. The other 2 heads were pretty rough so I took all 3 back to the museum hoping to find 2 more excellent heads. There were no heads any better in the freight house, so again I came home with the 3 next best heads. I took the bare heads to Jeff Gardner at Gardner competition engines. Jeff is a friend of mine and agreed to grind the valve seats in the 3 heads as a contribution to the museum. THANKS JEFF. The valves are over 8 inches long and were too big for anybody's valve grinding machines. I called my friend George. George has a machine shop in his garage and builds 7.5 inch locomotives, steam, gas and electric. George put the valves in the lathe and a small grinder on he tool holder. He resurfaced the best 8 valves. Eight were needed and we used the best 8. The rest of the valves from 2 other heads are too rough to be used. As it turned out 2 of the heads from Jeff were in better shape. Out of the Whitcomb parts in the freight house we were able to rebuild 3 heads required for the engine.

The Air system

The Leroi engine has a seventh cylinder That acts as an air compressor. Because I overhauled the brake controller and installed new copper air lines to the new air gauge, I asked James if he would run air to the air tanks and see what happened. One snowy day in early March, James got the air compressor out and put 30 pounds of air in the locomotives air tanks. James found a few air leaks with his hearing and feeling with his hands. A few joints were tightened up and the system held air pretty well. We worked the brake handle. The red needle in the air guage showed air pressure in the brake cylinders. Working the clutch pedal sounded like it was doing something but the clutch cylinder seems to be stuck. The brake cylinders that move the shoes are stuck also; But it was thrilling to see something operational on the loco after 40 years of not running.