Professional Painting Machines

[Peter Amling]

Hi all,

I've been doing lots of research on particular passenger trains I would like to model, such as the C&EI Whippoorwill. However, I quickly run into the problem of them never having been produced in N scale. I'm OK using stand in cars as long as they are close. However applying that particular paint scheme would be quite challenging for me. Rather than try to paint and decal all those cars by hand, I'm looking for a more technical solution. Is there a machine or device I can purchase which would be able to apply paint to these cars in a uniform manner? Or is there a company that offers this type of service that will give the cars a professional paint job? I'm primarily looking at passenger equipment at the moment. Any advice would be helpful.

[peteski]

You are probably thinking of something like direct-to-substrate UV-curable ink jet printer like MTL or other companies use to decorate the entire sides of a model.  The cost of those is usually way out of reach for an average modeler.  Plus you would have to learn how to design the artwork, and the printing supplies are also not cheap.

As far as I know, we  (the individual modelers) still use paint, airbush, masking tape, and waterslide decals to custom decorate models.

If you don't feel you're up to the task, there should still be some custom painters out there who can be hired to decorate your models.

You could even approach model companies (like MTL or Atlas) to produce special run of cars for you, but that will be quite costly, and usually only a singe type of car and decoration. Plus they usually use only the cars they make.

The other alternative would be to lobby a company that produces unique train sets (like https://lowellsmith.net/) to produce the specific train you're looking for.  Maybe he will be interested.

[nickelplate759]

That's a pretty train!

Assuming you have the motive power (Intermountain has offered this scheme on F3's), the cars are just solid blue with gold stripes.   You could use decals for the lettering and stripes, which might have to be custom printed as I'm not aware of anyone offering these.  The stripes are straight and could be masked pretty easily.
Paint is available from Tru Color.

If you want to do one of the E7s then things get a lot more challenging.

[Peter Amling]

Thanks @peteski. I kinda figured it would be out of reach for the average modeler. I do feel if one of us were to obtain such a machine the possibilities for models is endless, though you make some excellent points that there is still the matter of designing the artwork and that learning curve. I'll reach out to MTL or Atlas or Lowell and see if headway can be made there.

Thanks @nickelplate759 It is a really pretty train. Thanks for reminding me that IM made the F3s a couple years ago. I plan to use those on a different train, the Georgian, which they pulled into Chicago. My goal is to have an E7 for the Whippoorwill (or Meadlowlark) as that looks like the regularly assigned power.

I'm also hoping to model the Westerner or the Nickel Plate Limited. But finding consist information for those trains has been difficult so far.

[Sokramiketes]

Thanks @peteski. I kinda figured it would be out of reach for the average modeler. I do feel if one of us were to obtain such a machine the possibilities for models is endless, though you make some excellent points that there is still the matter of designing the artwork and that learning curve. I'll reach out to MTL or Atlas or Lowell and see if headway can be made there.

Thanks @nickelplate759 It is a really pretty train. Thanks for reminding me that IM made the F3s a couple years ago. I plan to use those on a different train, the Georgian, which they pulled into Chicago. My goal is to have an E7 for the Whippoorwill (or Meadlowlark) as that looks like the regularly assigned power.

I'm also hoping to model the Westerner or the Nickel Plate Limited. But finding consist information for those trains has been difficult so far.

Will be neat to see you model some of the secondary trains into Chicago, a worthy effort for sure.

The Nickel Plate Limited is a good option, and modelable.  Centralia did NKP coaches, if you can find them.  And the train also carried two 10-6 sleepers out of (and into) Chicago.  Then you need a Club-Diner-Lounge which is a fun car to build.  I did a heavyweight club kitbashed from RR heavyweight sides many years ago.  That turned into a rendition of train 7/8. 

[nickelplate759]

If you can't find the Centralia coaches (or even if you can),  the old MRC/Rowa (later sold by Con-Cor) coaches & 10-6 sleepers can be easily repainted for NKP, and decals are available from K4 Decals.     It's an easy paint job to do.

Microsale also offers NKP passenger decals, but for some reason most of the lettering is oversize.

[thomasjmdavis]

The Whippoorwill cars are/were available as sides from Laser Horizons, and sides for the observation from Union Station Products.  Both Union Station and Brass car sides have some 56 or 60 seat cars (NP or GN, I forget which) which are very close to the Whippoorwill coaches, give or take a small window.  Even the ancient Con-Cor smooth side coaches are pretty close- again, some window variations.  Caveat- I've built cars from sides, but never a boat tail obs.  I am going to bet that getting the sides wrapped around and shaped for the tail is quite a challenge.

Decals for the cars are (or were) available from the C&EI historical society- they still listed them in both N and HO last I looked, but you should check with them before ordering.  The decals are well done, but the sheets are set up with lettering/striping for one Whippoorwill and one Meadowlark car. So, if you do the whole Whippoorwill, you end up with several extra Meadowlark sets, even if you also model the Meadowlark, since the Whippoorwill was the longer train.

The challenge is painting the E7s- no decals in N that I'm aware of, and I haven't seen any for that scheme in HO for 30 years.  If doing the original E7 scheme, it might (???) be possible to utilize some of the passenger decals for some of the striping.  That scheme did not last long on the Es, but then, the Whippoorwill did not last long either.