New Door Frames Arrive

During the initial body work on the Towering Pine Pullman sleeper, it was found that corrosion had not slept over the years as the vestibule door frames were rusted beyond repair.  Dean Parrot  became very concerned when the original door frames were removed and found to be severely rusted.  Dean became even more alarmed when trying to find someone to form new frames that were originally formed with a custom die that no longer exist.  "There are five bends in the frames and every fabricator we talked to about getting new ones said they could do two and three bends, but not all five," according to Parrot.

The good news is that Commercial Sheet Metal of Bowling Green came up with an innovative approach in fabricating the new frames.  One of the new frames is pictured above on the left along side one of the old frames that was used as a pattern. The new frames were constructed by fabricating two separate pieces, one with two bends and the other formed with three bends, then the two pieces were welded together.  The result is a door frame that has the appearance of a one piece frame and frankly looks better than the original door frame! Our Pullman may end up with the best looking door frames of any Pullman around.  A masterful job by all the folks at Commercial Sheet Metal.