I will be kit bashing the above model for static display.It would also be a great addition to a layout as an engine being worked on or as a museum piece in a park.:tb-smile:
Wow John-what a cool old blast from the past! Those were very nice kits, even by today's standards. In the early 1980's we kitbashed these kits into operating locos using LGB mechanisms. While we didn't make General replicas, the parts allowed us to make some neat old narrow gauge locos...there were no US prototypes available then..except for the old Kalamazoo 4-4-0 which was also "fixed up" with parts from these old kits. Great stuff! Woodie
.This is the locomotives cab.Lots of good detail to work with here. Although I don't recall any film scenes involving the cab I will build it anyway for interest sake. A lot of what you see here will be replaced with wood and brass fittings.What these models provide for me is a good starting point and reference .The model manufacturer went to a lot of trouble to research all this stuff so it saves me a lot of time.Any inaccuracies I chalk up to artistic license and let it go at that.In my world all things are possible !
Ah yes I remember those kits. Woodie and I both bashed a couple of 0-4-4 Forney type locos using the 0-4-0 LGB mechanism (his looked better than mine). However, I don't have any pics (prints) that I can put my hands on.
John-those locos were built by me and Mopman before the advent of photography! Really, if I had any photos they would be yellowed out and funky. All we have is memories. The real General is still around, I believe it is in Chattanoga now. If I were to have one of these old kits today, I might try to make it run-plastic wheels and all-with radio control. That could be more BS than I care to get into, but it might be possible. As I remember, the jobs we did were pretty delicate and would not stand up to much handling. They ran like LGB locos should and did the job, however. Have fun with the kit. Woodie
Woodie, I know I "had" some pics from the GATS that we did at the convention center (you remember Jimmy Mac) but I just can't lay my hands on them. You know after a couple of moves, crap gets lost.
. This is the Bachmann 1/22 scale old west passenger coach.The figure is 1/24 scale.The interior will be completely removed and replaced with wood,only the shell will be used. The exterior will also be replaced with wood. I think that I will first build the opening scene from the movie which consists of half a passenger car with a shack built on the end.It is very run down and heavily weathered.The other passenger car will be turned into a luxury coach with all the Victorian trimmings.
.The first step was to take it all apart and remove all the lighting fixtures.I have been very glad to find that this passenger car is built to 1/22.5 scale which is close enough for me to work with without having to change too much of the overall size.When I am finished very little of the plastic will be visible as I plan to use a lot of strip wood ,coffee stir stiks,tongue depressors and veneer and whatever else I can think off.I will next have to decide on just how much of this shell I will have to cut away.From one side it will look completely normal but from the movie set side it will be fake. 1/24scale also opens up a whole new world of furniture ,parts and fitting supplies that are adaptable from other genres of modeling.My motto when making dioramas is "buy what I can and built what I must".I like to put lots of detail in my stuff so this may take years to complete the whole diorama.In the ten years that I have been building dioramas for the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa in 1/16th scale,I have so far completed only three and a half dioramas(the half is the one that I am completing now) and I work at this stuff just about every day. I am really looking forward to learning about railroading as it is completely new to me.
The real General is in the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History, located in Kennesaw (formerly Big Shanty), Georgia... The place where the locomotive was hijacked by the Andrews Raiders. If you'd like detail pictures of her, let me know what you'd like and I'll get the pictures the next time I visit the museum. The museum's website is here. Ed
Thank you Ed,that is very kind of you to offer the pics.I really haven't got into it yet so I really don't know exactly what I need at this point.Any pics would be great.Maybe a pic of the cab and the controls,you never can get too much info.Cheers! John.:tb-biggrin:
.As you know this diorama has two completely different sides to it. One side will be for outdoor shots of what looks like a real passenger car.The other side will be a movie set. In this pic you can see the beginnings of the set side.The smaller of the two openings is the door used in the opening scene, but film was taken from inside of the car or on another set altogether.The other larger opening may only be temporary until I figure out how much of the passenger car(if any)was here.In the movie I cant recollect anything here at all just the shack built over top.The shack seems to take up about half of the scene.It is supposed to be a real early station that is for cattle and passengers,long before a more permanent structure could be built and it consists of anything that happened to be handy while they were pushing the railroad through the area. I have never seen a real film set so I will be using my imagination on how the various shots were taken. This sure is a lot of fun to do as all the reference I need(except the set itself) is right there in the movie which I can view frame by frame whenever I want to
