{"id":1126,"date":"2014-12-07T02:42:05","date_gmt":"2014-12-07T02:42:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fcwhack.com\/?page_id=1126"},"modified":"2019-04-04T21:41:07","modified_gmt":"2019-04-04T21:41:07","slug":"history-areas","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/fcwhack.com\/?page_id=1126","title":{"rendered":"History: Areas"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Areas Come to Life<\/strong><\/h1>\n

\u00a0The “Cave”<\/h2>\n

The primary shop area was referred to as the “cave” because, when we first saw it, our flashlight could not see one end from the other.\u00a0 The original plan was to put the machine shop, woodworking shop and classroom in it. When Gene joined and brought the railroad, a model shop was added.\u00a0 The cave had to be wired and lighted and walls built for the shops, which took nearly a year to complete.\u00a0 As with most “geek” groups, changes were constantly occurring so it could never be really be considered complete.<\/p>\n

The wiring was a team effort.\u00a0 Rich bought a Ramset and put up most of the junction boxes,\u00a0 Michelle and Warren ran conduit and wire and connected everything and Dan was the lighting guru.\u00a0 Over 60 four foot florescent\u00a0 lights were found on Craigs list.\u00a0 Dan went through them, consolidated parts to make working fixtures and hung them in the cave and common areas.<\/p>\n

Machining<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The first area to actually become fully usable was the machine shop. In January 2012, we got some power on the cave East Wall so that the mill and lathe could be used. It took several more weeks before they were leveled and set up to go. The major equipment in it are a lathe, CNC mill, bandsaw, and drill press. Between Rich and Warren, there were numerous small tools as well. Vic donated a good amount of material (steel, aluminum, and brass) to the shop.<\/p>\n

Room Construction<\/h3>\n

Next to be done was the construction of the classroom and model shop. Gene furnished the material for the model shop and money was raised for the classroom. We wanted a large window to view the railroad in the model shop and Joe furnished one.<\/p>\n

Work on the rooms seemed to drag on forever, but finally, with Joe and Gene leading, the walls started up. Rich did most of the wiring for the room walls and some serious head scratching as an outlet box was completely covered up by drywall. Seth arranged for us to get some flooring from Habitat for Humanity (many thanks to them) so that we could have decent wood floors in the rooms. We did expect any day to find that a forklift had crashed through our ceiling into one of the rooms, but that was finally reinforced and the rooms started to take shape. They were ready early in the Summer.<\/p>\n

Woodworking<\/h3>\n

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