Spring into Action

I worked out of phase with the NY56 Nike Volunteers this weekend; they gave the tours today but I went down to work on the twins yesterday.... and what a day it was!! We have accomplished some serious dis-assembly on Pollux:

The front of the missile has been broken down and can be photo-archived, stripped and repaired and made ready for refinishing.

I also had a request for help passed on by Tom Hoffman of National Park Service from gentleman down in Texas  who is also in the midst of an Ajax restoration. The unit he's working on is lacking a good nose cone. I did a lot of photographing and measuring for him and wish him all the best.

I also had a great surprise. These missiles have arming windows, yet I have not seen a display model that has not been paited over. On Castor one had been taken off and the arming circuitry that would normally be visible had been removed. On Pollux, the circuit boards (for lack of a better term) are still in place.

That's one of the details I am looking forward to having on these birds. Instead of the windows having been painted over a number of times, I am working at making them transparent again.

Well that wrapped up the day at the Hook. I left the A&S building looking forward to the next round. Currently we have one long and one short and a pile of parts that will be ready to spend some individualized work on.



Til next time.... Blazing Skies!!

The Spring start - redux

It was good to get back to work. With the Spring Schedule we started the Nike Site Tours on April 14th. The weather was summer-like and the people were enjoying all the sights at Sandy Hook. I met Bill Jackson early at the Lighthouse Keepers House and found that we were going to be really light on tour guides. Bill was just getting back into fighting shape after a bout of upper respiratory troubles so I chose to forgo the restoration to assist with tour guide duty. It was great; and seeing Tony and Bill after a long winter break made it all the better. We had a good crowd (including a large Boy Scout Troop) and picked up a couple of new tour guide candidates. It served as a great reminder as to why I am doing this restoration. There's something about standing in the IFC (Integrated Fire Control - i.e. Radar Area) talking about missiles but not having good displays for the folks to see.

Then following that first weekend I went to a presentation at the Wyckoff, NJ Historical Society on NY/93-94, the Nike Site in Franklin Lakes. This was a great presentation given by Jack Gouldsward and Richard Levine.  What made this even more special to me is that Franklin Lakes is my old Nike Site - Delta Battery, 7th Battalion, 112th Artillery.

By the time I went back to the Hook this past Saturday I was really looking forward to spending time with the "Twins". I was running a little late because I had to get my car ready. Onyx has 202,000 miles on her and over the winter I put a new front end on her but this was her Shakedown Cruise. She purred the whole way. Bill Jackson was already manning the gate with one of the new guides, Paul. While talking to them, Rose Ann and Jacob came up and Tony T. pulled in behind me.  I asked if they wanted me to stay and they told me to "get to work" so I went to the Launching Area and started.

I know that I haven't finished dis-assembly yet but this was one of those days that I needed some "visual progress". Castor probably has the worst deterioration so I chose to test a repair material.

The first pass looks promising, though the curing time was longer than I expected. It prevented me from getting a second pass on to have a bit more of my hoped for visual progress. Oh well, some days you take what you can get.

The fuel cylinders present an odd amalgam of problems. They range from extreme rust to extreme corrosion. I suspect that I will revisit my refinishing choices after removing all the coating materials.

Due to the condition of this group, I believe that they are as broken down as they are going to get for this project. As long as I can get a uniform surface preparation, this section will be refinished in its present assembled form.

I finished the day on Pollux. after grinding the joints clean I removed the nose cone first and then the forward warhead pod (there were 3 HE warheads on this bird) and the forward steering mechanism.

I left with a good feeling. I had begun the repairs (admittedly in a very small way) and made some very good headway into the balance of the disassembly. This last part was made happier by the fact that I did not have to break or drill anything to get this apart.

Saint Patrick's Day

Part of the success of a project like this is to keep hammering away at it. It seems like there are always a dozen more reasons for not going down to the Hook than there are for. This weekend was no different. I had a St. Patrick's Day party to go to for which we were responsible for bringing a Shepard's Pie. Sandy was opening the Pro Desk at the Depot so we agreed to meet back at the house when she got off at 3. So I made my way down to Sandy Hook and when I got there had a great meeting with Jennifer Wolff, the Supervisory Park Ranger. Took her to the A&S Building and went through what progress had been made, what tasks were due in the short term and things that the Park Service could do to help the progress. I brought Ranger Wolff back to her station and spent the rest of my day cleaning and putting stuff back in order then taking the garbage to the dumpster. The place looked good when I left and It will be easier to start in on the next visit. "Til next time..... Blazing Skies!!

Winter disassembly blues

It was a very windy day at the Hook Saturday. I was down early and got to the task of getting back into the project. This consists of unlocking the tool cages turning on the lights (the ones that work) polishing off the last of the Dunkin Donuts coffee and picking a place to resume. This week's goal was to remove the last of the small forward fins and antenna pods. These were the ones on both missiles with stripped out heads which also outlasted the drill bits I had started this project with.

Armed with 20 more drill bits and an attitude I went at it.

Part of what keeps me going is being able to visualize what my goal is for the twins. All the Ajax missiles I have been up close and personal with were inert display models - and most painted so many times that they begin to look fake. I have challenged myself to strip these units of the "working" parts, paint them all individually and then assemble them so the access hatches appear accessible, the fuel ports appear ready to accept fuel... you know? I don't want the fins to be painted in place, I want them to look like they *could* work. Maybe these birds will never fly again but they should give the visitors a glimpse of what these machines truly were.

Where was I, ah yes, after the fins and antennae were removed I moved on to the booster fins that I removed last time. Long story short, the pins do not budge. My next try will be to get the assembly to a machine shop with a heavy duty press and see if we can press the fin pin out of the aluminum support assembly.

By the way if any of you out there have been down this road (or just have a better idea), feel free to comment.

I finished the day removing pieces of fairing. These are soft aluminum and my initial attempts to use and impact screwdriver to remove the screws only deformed the panels so I am drilling out the screws and will need to create a whole new set of stand-offs to re-attach them. That brings with it a different can of worms since I currently do not have 220 volt power to heliarc with. That is tied into the need to get a real compressor to media blast..... but I digress.

Here's what it was looking like when I finished this trip:

'til next time, Blazing Skies!

Start to Fin - ish

Woke up to a snow squall Saturday and Sandy was opening at the Depot so I drove down to the Hook to get in some quality time with the twins. Two weeks ago I removed the last of the main fins from the missiles that left the small front fins (which had stripped hex-head cap screws) and the booster main fins - which just wouldn't let go. I opened up the sheet-metal last trip so this time I was going to remove the fins with their attaching hardware. 

Opening up the skin (the missile's and mine in a moment of brain-fade) allowed me moderate access to the rocket nozzle and the attachment points. Wedging a prybar in after removing the bolts and studs I was able to move the fin.

That's the point in time that I realized that since the fins each went through a hole in the sheet-metal, I would need to remove the fins with their corresponding metal fairing. The panel cutter makes that easy enough - the trick will be the welding all those pieces back into a full, round fairing again <sigh>. Hey, at least it comes apart, right? I found another three bolts too! Large locator pegs at the leading edge of the fin.

In the end, I had the three fins from the one booster removed and stood up against the rear overhead door soaking in Kroil. Hopefully the main pins will pull out of the brackets without too much grief. We'll see.

I finished the day by drilling out the last pair of front fins from that missile and calling it a day. As you can see, the project is moving along. Once all the dis-assembly is done I can begin to work on the repairs and bodywork. There was a level of concern among the guys that these were really in rough shape and, make no mistake, they were. I am to a point now that I can say that I believe that I am through the ugliest of it. I am learning the mechanics of the assembly and now actually know what I am in for. The rest is like a bad wreck that is not totaled. There's a *lot* more to be done, but it is repair work and assembly. It's still gonna be quite a ride <grin>.

'til next time... Blazing Skies!!

Specialty Tools

Well Sunday at the Hook was interesting to say the least. My last trip there with Bill Jackson left us with one main fin to be removed. We had removed the bolts we could, drilled out the rest and *still* couldn't budge it. Sandy took pity on me and covered the puppy classes I was supposed to take Quincy to Sunday morning so I headed south. I was anxious to get down to the project. I brought an air chisel with assorted bits for the fin and I'd gotten a panel cutter to work on the booster. After setting up and wailing on the fin for over 30 minutes (and feeling half deaf having forgotten my ear protectors) I finally gave up on the chisel. I mean this damn thing would not budge! I heaved, I tugged, I pushed and nothing happened. With all the other main fins off there was no way to work around this thing. I was getting really frustrated and more than a little angry. That's when I started looking around for "something different" and I found it:

Yeah, that's it - a 40 pound gas cylinder. The ring at the top and the ring at the bottom allow you to lift this thing horizontally in a clean and jerk motion and then bring it down as hard as I could on the fin. It took three shots with a lot of bellowing but I got the fin off!!! Interestingly the Park Rangers stopped by just afterwards and asked what all the "noise" was. I was just grinning like an idiot and said I was just  removing a fin.

The next task made use of the new panel cutter. Similar to the last main fin, we had removed all the attaching hardware to the booster fins but thay too would not budge. These are held in with a single central pin but I could not determine how to get them loose. Working on a seam that I ground down last trip I used the panel cutter to open the area around the fins:

You can get a great view of the booster's rocket motor venturi. Anyway, there are three brackets which I will attempt to remove (gingerly at first <g>). At this point, I soaked all fasteners down with Kroil and started to wind down the day's work.

Here's another view of the brackets:

It wasn't too cold on Sunday (you know, a balmy 40 degrees with an onshore breeze) but I had gotten a radiant propane heater and I wanted to have it assembled in the event that the next trip were really cold. Hey, it's winter and it's bound to happen at the worst possible time, right? So I got this unit from Home Depot:

The canopy is movable so I can direct the heat to the work area. It may not be as comfortable as Mario and Dominick have it out at Floyd Bennett but it's what I've got. They have an Ajax out there that they are restoring.  <Hi guys!> 

All in all not a bad day. Til the next time, Blazing Skies!

Starting 2012 with a little help from my friends

With the holidays behind us and Spring coming up fast it was time to get back to the twin Ajax missiles. Sandy Hook in January is a fiercely beautiful place. There were white-caps on the bay spraying up on the road and the wind was whipping around. Spending time banging on old missiles in an unheated building can lose some of its allure in the Winter months. However, I had the privilege of having Bill Jackson lending a hand. For those of you who do not not know him, Bill is the President of the Fort Hancock Nike Site Volunteer Association. He is a hellava tour guide and one of the primary driving forces of the Nike Site. He is also a great guy to have working with you on any project - and with things like this restoration there is a wide variety of unusual stuff that continually crops up. We changed lightbulbs, drilled out frozen bolts and chuckled about seeing our breath in the A&S building.

All in all it was a very productive day. We are down to the last Main Fin on the second Ajax. All the bolts  (which were frozen) were drilled out and the doggone thing still wouldn't let go (and by God we tried)! Ripped up a bunch of drill bits. Uncle Sam sure used great bolts! Next trip I'll be taking an air-chisel to it. We setup a secure area for the tool storage and developed a working plan for the removal of the booster fins.  A few more workdays like this and we will be ready to start some of the smaller component refinishing. I like to call it "Visual Progress". It doesn't so much move the project ahead (though it all adds up) as much as it gives you a sense of project direction, and more than a little satisfaction at seeing some parts nearing completion. It helps me to visualize where this is all going.

'Til next time.... Blazing Skies!