Sýnir færslur með efnisorðinu Freight Cars. Sýna allar færslur
Sýnir færslur með efnisorðinu Freight Cars. Sýna allar færslur
laugardagur, 6. júní 2015
Stamping out the Shine...
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| The FGE car on the left shows the out-of-the-box shiny wheels and Accu-mate couplers. The MEC car on the right is an Atlas car that's had its truck sideframes and wheels painted Weathered Black and a new Kadee coupler installed. |
The "ready-to-run" Atlas and Accurail cars also include unpainted - very shiny - silver wheels.
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| I've found the Kadee couplers (right) are much more reliable than the Accumate couplers (left). |
Painting the trucks is the first step in weathering any car. I got extra motivated and did an initial coat of weathering on one or two cars - the yellow cars will be weathered at some point in the future.
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| I even managed to weather a few of these cars - including this Atlas B&O hopper. |
Even without the "full" weathering treatment they look a lot better!
miðvikudagur, 18. mars 2015
miðvikudagur, 14. janúar 2015
fimmtudagur, 27. nóvember 2014
Happy Thanksgiving!
We actually had our "official" Thanksgiving dinner on Tuesday night - which means today was a quiet day at home - so Christine prepared a small (but very delicious) meal (well, I made the mashed potatoes � apparently that's the one thing an Irishman CAN do right in the kitchen!!)
And to all the readers of this blog, our best wishes for a wonderful Thanksgiving.
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I spent a pleasant couple of hours sorting through and cleaning up the resin parts needed for my RCW AC&F Type 27 chemical tank car. Here's a closeup of the sheet of resin bits and pieces -
And to all the readers of this blog, our best wishes for a wonderful Thanksgiving. fimmtudagur, 20. nóvember 2014
Would the real CN Red #11 Please Stand Up?
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| All five of the Canadian National boxcars visible in this photo are the same color - CN Red #11 - aren't they? |
The one thing that survey revealed was the overwhelming majority of boxcars running through town, and therefore along the line I'm modeling, were Canadian National. I do have a fair number of CN boxcars, but figured I could always add more to the mix. I'll do a separate post at some point on the specific makeup of my CN boxcar fleet, but that's not the point of this post.
A number of years ago some knowledgeable CN experts, notably Stafford Swain, researched the colors of paint used as "standards" on the CN system. The result of this study indicated "CN Red #11" is the "standard color." You can get it from several model paint manufacturers (for the record, my preferred brand for this color is Scalecoat, but TruColor and Badger both market "CN Freight Car Red" paints.)
But having the "standard" color is nothing but a starting point - a benchmark.
Note the photo above - all of these boxcars (every one of them) was painted at some point a variation of "CN Red #11."
See how they all look alike?
miðvikudagur, 29. október 2014
Boxcar Percentages through White River Jct.
I thought this might help guide the creation of an accurate freight car fleet for the layout (by percentage of road name) so I was very interested in the results. After looking the resulting data I'm not convinced it's helpful for modeling purposes.
The sample total was 3,605 cars. There were about 60 or different reporting marks represented (basically, name a North American railroad of the time and it appeared at least once ...)
By far the most common roadname, with more than 50% of the total, was Canadian National. Since the CV was a subsidiary of the CN, that was not really all that much of a surprise.
I prepared the somewhat useless pie chart above to have an image with the blog posting - I'm afraid there's little useful data to be gleaned from it - except that if you go with a statisical approach to a modeled fleet 3/4 or so of the fleet should be made up of boxcars from the 10 railroads listed.
The table below shows the breakdown by roadname of most of the remaining 55+ reporting marks.
I noted the percentage of the total by roadname didn't come even remotely close to reflecting the national fleet, although the totals seem to reflect some regional "bias" (greater percentages of New England/Northeastern region road names, but not by much). I was especially shocked at how few NYC and PRR cars (based on the % of these roads rosters compared with the national fleet at the time) appeared in our sample data. Not sure what I learned from this exercise, except that out of a fleet of 100 boxcars fully half should be CN, with almost any other road name represented as long as you don't include too many of any one road name. The thing is, if one were to model a roster to these percentages and then compare the resulting trains to prototype photos, the result may be defendable as somewhat "authentic," but I don't think they'd look right!
miðvikudagur, 13. ágúst 2014
Steam Era Freight Cars Blog
"This blog discusses all aspects of North American freight cars of the steam era, from the dawn of railroading through 1960.
it is designed to be a place where model railroaders who seek to produce the most prototypically accurate freight cars possible can come to view information pertinent to their pursuits.
Prototype modelers are encouraged to participate in this blog. Please consider sending photos of prototypes and your efforts to model them, reviews of kits, books and other products, �articles� about your modeling efforts � with or without photos. The nature of blogging means the material can be "real time," and in-process models can be shared. These are not only welcomed, but appreciated as we all love to see a model develop over time.
Also welcome is information about upcoming prototype meets, existing steam era freight cars (including where they are located), newly discovered photo collections, upcoming events, etc.
Information for this blog is considered to be submitted gratis. Also, all submissions must include your name and contact email."
A couple of years ago I created a blog intended to highlight steam era freight car modeling. Intended in no way to replace the STMFC Yahoo! Group I figured the blog format lent itself better than an email group to showing modeling and highlighting specific projects and techniques. After all, if you've ever tried to follow a modeling project on a chat list you know seeing the photos can be a frustrating experience.
My ultimate goal is for the blog to have numerous contributors - if someone wanted to contribute only one or two items they could send it to me and I'll post it (full credit will be given to the modeler of course!)
If someone wanted to share a lot of projects/photos and the like I would give them "Author" permission and they would be able to post away without any interference - or effort - on my part!
Although Charlie Duckworth did send me several contributions, the blog has languished in the internet waste land for more than a year - although it's had close to 10,000 views I haven't posted anything new in quite a while.
There was (and has been) talk of reviving the Steam Era Freightcars website - and some of my fellow modelers were concerned this blog would be seen as competing with that effort. But frankly that seems to be stuck in limbo.
So I thought I'd mention the blog here. I'm going to start by cross posting some of the freight car posts from here just to get some new content included. If I get little or no response I reserve the right pull the plug - but I will take a month or two and see if there's any life left in the thing.
If you're interested in sharing any of your steam era freight car modeling please email it to steamfreightcar@gmail.com!
þriðjudagur, 12. ágúst 2014
Wabash 40-foot boxcar
The model depicts the Wabash's 88200-88699 12-panel welded boxcars. These cars were built in December of 1948 and were the first welded side cars purchased by the Wabash.
That in and of itself isn't really a big deal to me.
What's neat about this kit is the way the resin sides have been cast to create the distinctive rippling that occurs in sheet steel when it's been welded. The effect is subtle, but apparent. And it's almost impossible to duplicate on an injection plastic kit unless the effect has been cut into the tooling. I remember seeing this effect on an N scale resin PRR boxcar years ago but, as far as I know, this is a first for a commercially available HO scale kit.
In addition the kit features custom etched brass details, etched running boards, decals, and trucks. Everything but couplers.
I've ordered mine - go to the Yarmouth Models website if you want to get one of these, or one of the other kits he has available, for your railroad.
And tell Pierre I sent you!
fimmtudagur, 17. júlí 2014
Naperville Door Prize 2: Chicago Burlington & Quincy FM-11/11A Flatcar, 2000 Prototype Modelers Seminar Kit
Time for another Naperville Door Prize Project. In 2000 Sunshine Models surprised attendees not with a conversion kit (like the MoPac box shown here) but with the basic components for an entire CB&Q flat car.  |
A request for prototype photos on the Steam Era Freight Car list led to this one from Rob Adams - the instructions didn't include a prototype picture, so the project was stalled until I could find one: |
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The door prize includes the basic parts needed to build the car - I'll need to supply the various detail parts. |
I build most of my freight cars to run on the layout, not to enter a contest. This means I leave off the parts and underbody details that (1) interfere with operation or (2) can't be seen profile with the car sitting on the track. I might ignore Rule 2 sometimes, but never break, or bend Rule 1. Flatcars are tricky since you have to get enough weight to get them to track reliably. You could weight a flat car by adding a heavy load, but it�s nice to have an empty car that tracks reliably.
I remove these pieces (in this case the 26 stake pocket castings on this car) by cutting about 3 or 4 stake pockets out from the main sheet. Then I gently rub the piece of sandpaper (in this case I'm using a sanding stick, since it's what I could find. Move the part in a gentle circular motion until the resin flash gets extremely thin � and you�ll find the pieces will pop right out!
sunnudagur, 13. júlí 2014
Another car for the fleet
The car was on the infamous "to do" shelf awaiting decals. I ended up decaling the car at the same time I decaled the SSW box and another of the Sunshine door prize cars (a CB&Q flat).
I was going for a newly painted older car with just a couple of revenue trips since it emerged from the paint shop, but I might add just a little more weathering to the car next time I have a few cars on the modeling desk for weathering.
In the meantime it's ready for a revenue assignment.
föstudagur, 11. júlí 2014
Sunshine Models Cotton Belt 40-foot double-sheathed boxcar
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| Can a freight car be cursed? I think this one might be! |
Ever have one of those projects that fights you all the way? The car in question is a Sunshine kit (#52.8) for a St Louis Southwestern (Cotton Belt) 31000-33499 series 8'-6" IH double sheathed 40-foot boxcar. I started building it back in October 2001. I remember that since it was my �hotel room� project while I was in Colorado and my family was back in Wisconsin. I remember the underframe didn�t quite fit and took a fair amount of sanding to get it to seat in place inside the bottom. I also remember struggling to get the roof to go on straight and level, and correcting the rather pronounced warp in one of the sides. Getting the basic �box� assembled square and straight was a challenge. But I did it, and put the car in the box and didn�t touch it again for several years. Somewhere along the line I learned the Sunshine directions didn�t give a lot specifics on the brake component arrangement � and I ended up redoing the brake rigging on the car back in 2005 or so, only to put it back in the box again.
I finally put the finishing touches on it last fall.
Hey, you can't rush these things you know....
The instructions are very general on the color, and the "Essential Freight Car" RMC article on these cars shows author Ted Culotta's model in a fairly light, almost oxide color. I asked on the Steam Era Freight Car list for some guidance on what color to paint the thing. I got several replies stating the car should be more of a "brownish" boxcar red.
Confident in the color, things were still going uphill. I carefully mixed the paint, tested how it was spraying through my airbrush on a piece of scrap styrene. �Everything looks good� I thought. I placed the car in the spraybooth, aimed the airbrush at the center of the car, pulled the trigger...and�.put a big splotch of paint spatter right in the middle of the side and along one side of the roof.
Perhaps I was out of practice (it's been a few years since I used an airbrush on anything other than track) and made what is frankly a rookie mistake. I managed to wash off most of the splattered paint, and carefully sanded any �ridges� smooth before I resprayed the car with Scalecoat Boxcar Red.
Just as I was about the decal the thing I received a note from Richard Hendrickson with a prototype photo reminding me the ends of these cars would have been black during my 1954 era. So out came the masking tape � applied in small pieces around the details � before the ends were airbrushed flat black.
Decaling was anticlimatic (thank goodness!). I added the kit decals and included some reweigh "patches" from Sunshine decals, along with a few chalk marks, also from Sunshine decals.
This one is finally on the railroad. Maybe it was just a series of accidents and coincidences that took me over a decade to finish one model.
Or, just maybe, this thing is cursed?
laugardagur, 5. júlí 2014
Naperville Door Prize Project: 1 Missouri Pacific 1942 ACF 40-foot boxcar (2005 Naperville Gift)
One of the neat things about the Naperville Prototype Modelers meet were the "door prizes" provided every year by Sunshine Models (the company that founded and sponsored the meet).
Most of these consisted of a small sheet of resin parts (doors, ends, sills, sides, etc . . . ), a short instruction sheet, and decals if appropriate to convert a "stock" plastic kit into a different prototype. Most were boxcars, although there was a couple of hopper car conversions and even a complete CB&Q flatcar. In other years, it was a load of some type. One year we even got a set of coupler boxes and draft gear.
I started building some of these when before we moved into this house, and put them aside when I started building the layout. Now, with the layout up and running I've been getting these "half done" projects off the "in progress" shelf and onto the layout.
Missouri Pacific 1942 ACF 40-foot boxcar
2005 Naperville Gift
Here's some views of the car after I finished construction and before painting.
While not really "weathering" I added a painted over reweigh date that fits the era of my model railroad - often these patches didn't match the color of the car - they were also usually rolled on with little regard for making them square or too neat. I also added some chalk marks - these were done with Sunshine decals.
This one has been on the "in progress" shelf for a while. You might recall I had an issue with the clear acrylic finish (Testors) I used on this model - it dried streaky and white. I overcame that by applying a coat of Future floor polish. I blogged about that in this post. I followed that up this past week with some Tru-Color Flat finish.
The car is ready for final weathering. But that will have to wait until next week.
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