Shoot everybody in Fla. can read those ballots except for the people in West Palm Beach. West Palm Beach is mostly millionaires, makes you wonder don't it? The richer you are the dumber you are??????? 
HOn30 climax...
- Thread starter shaygetz
- Start date
Here's some shots done outdoors, with a side by side comparison to a standard gauge Canadian Pacific 40' boxcar. I love the effect of the boxcar dwarfing the locomotive. The new roof also reveals my secret scratchbuilding weapon...signage from a local department store. The stuff is made of styrene and comes on various thicknesses and all free for the asking. I'll be waiting to finish it with a bell casting and water tank hatch with an upcoming trip to the LHS. Including the price of these castings I will have a total outlay of less than $20 and about 18 hours of work. It's been great fun sharing it with you all and the input has been much appreciated. It has inspired another project---a dual gauge diorama to pose my pets outdoors for pictures, the digital camara seems to favor that light much better.
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shaygetz, that Snow plow looks VERY familiar...we even used the same paint scheme!
(I used this color because it is the best paint I have for brush painting)
(I used this color because it is the best paint I have for brush painting)
Looks like a ringer to me and a well done one at that. Good Work. I beleive mine was an early Roundhouse kitbash type kit they used to offer in the 70s. Mine started life as a 35% complete basket case found in a box lot. I replaced the roof with a wood one and added detailing I found in a picture of the RGW's plow "Bull Moose". I also removed the cast on grabs on the rotor and replaced them with hand formed ones made of wire and brass ladder stock. I brush painted it with Floquil paint because they grind their pigments very fine for a nice flat laying finish. The tender deck and plow front are painted Boxcar Red, the roof Engine Black and the carbody and tender in SP Grey.
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Here is the tender. As with the plow, I carved off all cast on detail and added free standing grab irons, ladders and coupler lift bar. I also used reefer hinges and lift ring handles. The number was my wife's age at the time of completion and the railroad name comes from our initials. It was my very first kitbash and have been so pleased with it that in 12 years I have only changed
the trucks from MDC Foxes to Kadee archbars.
the trucks from MDC Foxes to Kadee archbars.
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Rubn7y
Yep, same one, except you have put s little more into your detail, very nice indeed. I Brush painted the body and tender using a pollyscale paint. This single bottle of paint goes on smoothly and perfectly opaque over everything I throw it.
The rotary portion on mine IS red, this camera is terrible when it come to light agreeances.
I did do one thing though. The 3-n-1 kit includes a wood cupola, but there is very littl detail on it. They also have a modern steel cupola, wih great detail and a deeply recessed body. Using stripwood, I turned that coupla into a steal framed wood cupola. And it looks great with all of that detail.
Yep, same one, except you have put s little more into your detail, very nice indeed. I Brush painted the body and tender using a pollyscale paint. This single bottle of paint goes on smoothly and perfectly opaque over everything I throw it.
The rotary portion on mine IS red, this camera is terrible when it come to light agreeances.
I did do one thing though. The 3-n-1 kit includes a wood cupola, but there is very littl detail on it. They also have a modern steel cupola, wih great detail and a deeply recessed body. Using stripwood, I turned that coupla into a steal framed wood cupola. And it looks great with all of that detail.
Re: Rubn7y
Isn't it great when you do something-anything- to a kit that makes it your's. Great work.
Isn't it great when you do something-anything- to a kit that makes it your's. Great work.
Ah, Shamus, good to meet you. A compliment from you is like receiving one from The Great One himself, John Allen. Your modelwork is just beautiful. As for the 9v battery, tis true it won't fit but I've found an N scale Lentz decoder will fit in the tee boiler(O, rapt joy ) Hope this finds your health on the way up. In His Grace, BC
) Hope this finds your health on the way up. In His Grace, BCBeen sitting on the sidelines in the shop waiting for it's new bell and tender water hatch as the shop crew busied itself on the Goose project. The front and rear pilots have been added, complete with link and pin couplers, the fore-runners of today's knuckle type. They were made by sandwiching two sizes of styrene, then drilling for the pin and carving it down to size. The pins come from the scrap box (old ship pins). The black spots are nut/bolt/washer castings, from one of my many flea market box lot purchases. The side frames are being modified right now to accept the new coupler arrangments. Not easily visible are the new handrails to either side of the entryway to the cab, just above the shop rat's head.
Obviously, link and pin couplers are not for the operations minded modeler. From the start, I built this to be an operat-ING model but had no desire or need for one built for operat-TIONS. That called for too many compromises, i.e. coupler clearance requirements, smoother gearing (although, for a Model Power lokey mech, it runs quite well) etc. Still waiting to go to the LHS for a bell casting and a tender water hatch. As far as painting, I'm patient, prefering to leave a model unpainted for a little while until I'm happy with the overall effect.
And folks say us HOers don't like N scale
Where else would we get those fine runnin' mechs fer our HO slim gauge 
Originally posted by Tyson Rayles
Shaygetz are you going to be using this for ops? The reason I ask is because Model Power is famous (in n-scale anyway) for lousy running mechs. I'd hate to see all that work go into something that looks great and barely runs.
Knew this was gonna come back to haunt me so I thought I'd post an update. The Model Power mechanism that this is based on was built back in the 80s in a Communist Bloc country not known for its presision manufacturing. Last night I disassembled the loco to start painting only to have to spend the rest of the night rewiring the whole mech. I was not surprized at what I had found, the mech is built onto a plastic frame and hard wired to wipers on each axle. The only metal is found in the motor itself and a few key parts in the drive train. The plus side is that it will be a piece of cake to wire a decoder in it down the road, the minus is that, should I ever want to do serious switching, I will have to build another on a more reliable chassis or install a micro motor with flywheels.
I knew what I was in for when I chose this chassis. I wanted an open porch-like cab and that cannot be attained using a more reliable switcher mech surrounded by a large chunk of lead. It does run and quite well I might add. The added weight of the superstructure has given the mechanism much needed bulk and it handily pulls its own weight (whew!) and 2-3 cars. I just wanted to warn any potential new modelers looking to take this project on to carefully consider what you want to model and base your decisions on that, knowing that compromise has its price.
