Thanks for the kind words everyone on these mini beasts! I use Winsor & Newton Artisan water mixable oils. Raw Umber and Burnt Sienna. Can be thinned with water or alcohol. I use 70% IP alcohol for the washes.
I purchased a used ConCor Kato Hudson 4-6-4 steamer via an online auction for a very inexpensive and unexpected price. The model from the photos appeared to be an early variety of the good mechanism, but lousy pad printing. Recently a Hudson I had in inventory finally burnt out, but it had special detailing, and a custom paint job, and I assigned it to donor services as a parts donkey. The "new" unit runs magnificently as expected, so right now I am working on the "Ken's upgrades" to this model. This means installing MicroTrains couplers on the tender, a flywheel, a grain of wheat light, traction tire and swapping out the shells. When done it will be smoother more powerful and a real performer, and assigned to my latest Kato NYC passenger set. Not a bad way to spend waiting out a tropical storm. lol Ken "FloridaBoy" Willaman
Wow Craig -- your weathering is just perfect and so authentic. Thanks for not spoiling your beautiful work with graffiti -- as an old skooler, I despise it.
The only way to stop taggers and graffiti on railcars.....is...having armed gaurds patrolling the stopped cars....24/7 Just sayin...
Thanks for the comps on these cars, I really do appreciate it. Overall I'm not much on the graffiti myself and in my humble opinion, if I were to add it per modeling a prototype car, I would be compelled to use acrylic paints and that just doesn't seem to be feasible for anything with any fine line and intricate detail in N-Scale. I have tried some graffiti with decals and have had mixed results. I'm not a fan of the "gel pen" technique either.
Finally took in hand one of the Class A Climax locos that I had built and decided was just to big. It originally was based on a LL SW mechanism. When the Bmann 70 tonner became available I repowered all three with those mechanisms. The original Class A was built on the SW frame since it depended on that for pick-up. With the 70 tonner I was free of that and had a much better running mechanism. So today I started laying out and gluing up the new frame of .188 X .040 styrene. First improvement is a narrower unit and also about 3 feet shorter. The new frame is a tight fit on the 70 tonner mechanism which is what I want. The pilots came next and for those I am using pilots from Bmann's 4-6-0s that have had MTs installed. The trucks previously had some Climax side frames that I had made from my own castings. 100_4675=1 by John Moore posted Aug 30, 2015 at 5:11 PM Next up is to mount a cab then I will worry about a boiler for it. After supper I went back at the styrene build up so I could locate the cab. Laminated two pieces of .080 X .125 and .020 X .125 on each side to be able to sit the cab on and start the sides. Original bi Class A behind it and you can see the cab is about 2/3rds of the size of the original. 100_4676-2 by John Moore posted Aug 30, 2015 at 7:28 PM
The car is an Intermountain Koppel Inc. cylindrical covered hopper. 65109-*. Micro scale 60-1324 white lettering for the road numbers, 60-9 Santa Fe Freight cars for the "ATSF". Other bits and pieces of decal data I had laying around. Black trim film cut to size for the patches.
Continuing to work on the rebuild of one of my Class A Climax. Fought a part of the day to get a rear headlight that would be illuminated and finally managed that. Next up was getting the trimmed down donor boiler to fit. I have to install some weight in the smoke box before finally getting around to gluing it to the new body and chassis so that is why there is a slight upward cant to the boiler. 100_4678-1 by John Moore posted Sep 1, 2015 at 4:46 PM
Except for some decals and some serious dull coating Turtle Creek Central Class A #11 is ready to rejoin the roster. The Class A on the left is from an Nn3 kit that I adapted to N while the one on the right is from scratch and is now the largest one. I managed to accomplish what I set out to do which was to get a smaller version sitting on the Bmann 70 tonner mechanism, The overall boiler, cab, and tender portion is actually a little shorter than the Nn3 body I adapted. Like my other this model is cluttered up with things laying or attached here and there. A toolbox is on the front pilot and the air compressor is hung off the rear of the water tank. A hose reel and a siphon hose is on the fireman's side running board while the tank top has some tools on the tank deck. Early testing had it hauling six fifty foot cars without breaking a sweat and it will handle 8 inch radius. 100_4680-1 by John Moore posted Sep 2, 2015 at 12:58 PM At some point I may try one more this time on the 44 tonner chassis which is a few scale feet shorter. Have just enough parts to do one more if I decide to.
John, your work is always very nice. I enjoy watching your conversions and kit bashes. My shop is busy with a few projects... B&M GP-9 #1729 by Jim Wiggin posted Sep 4, 2015 at 7:45 AM B&M #1729 is done and listed for sale on my EBay store. Paducah by Jim Wiggin posted Sep 4, 2015 at 7:57 AM This is the start to an ICG Paducah for a fellow Trainboard member. That cab pictured is not the cab I'm using. Think I found a source for the Farr Yoke style filters so this project should see some ICG orange and white soon. SD50s by Jim Wiggin posted Sep 4, 2015 at 7:57 AM Two of the four Atlas SD50's that are getting the BLMA fan treatment. Got a show in a few weeks in Decatur so I'm trying to get as much stuff painted as possible.
Love these colors. When they started just painting them white, they simply looked cheap and it did not weather well.
Because I have only two weeks before the next show, AND because I want to make some of these modules halfway presentable, I used yesterday as a 'skyboard painting' day...I had already roller brushed my mix of sky blue on the plywood skyboards. I used an existing skyboard to mark where I wanted the horizon the start...I had previously used my Sweetie's craft acrylics to paint these (Evergreen green)...so that was the first order of business-to paint the distant horizon across all of the 9' of modules... then I broke out the airbrush and mixed a 50/50 mix of acrylic white to thinner....I didn't even bother with the dual action internal mix airbrush, and just used my cheap Paasche single action external mix ($25.00 at Hobby Lobby) and airbrushed clouds...I did my best to represent distant clouds by making them small, closer to the horizon, getting larger and further 'up' on the skyboard, to represent closer clouds... I stippled the green acrylic craft paint to represent different foliage...effective for background scenery...here are pics of the skyboards reattached (they're easily attached and removed with T-nuts)...showing the effect. We love using skyboards as they help set and focus the scene when properly done.
