PRR A5 in N Scale

[chicken45]

I no longer have money or an airbrush so the Bachmann tender it is.
I also have no job or other source of income.
I had to up my bid on the Atlas 0-4-0 so I have to see if I have any surplus items in my fleet to sell so that I can buy an L1 cab.
The 0-4-0 will leave me with $2 to my name.
 

Finding and buying the Bachmann tender for $10 at Bedford is what got this project back to the forefront of my mind.


In the diagram the tender looks longer than the engine itself


In the photo it looks to be a bit shorter than the engine, so going by eye, the Bachmann tender would work.



-Cody F.

You can outsource this painting project to me. You pay shipping. I have never had much luck with painting by hand. But try it and see if it works for you. It may be less apparent on an N scale dirty steam engine than it would on something long and smooth. Plus, you'll be working with flats which are much more forgiving. Or, I hear Tamiya rattle cans are pretty amazing.

[CR6707]

Not sure if you would be interested, but you could use an 0-6-0 shell from minitrix.  its plastic, had a belpair firebox and not sure how close the cab would be.  you would definately have to splice it.  You can get the 0-6-0 shells and K4 minitrix shell castings from Jeff at PRR-parts.com. 

Scott

[eric220]

Not sure if you would be interested, but you could use an 0-6-0 shell from minitrix.  its plastic, had a belpair firebox and not sure how close the cab would be.  you would definately have to splice it.  You can get the 0-6-0 shells and K4 minitrix shell castings from Jeff at PRR-parts.com. 

Hate to contradict, but the Minitrix B6 shell is definitely not plastic.  It's metal, and not inconsequential to cut.  Not impossible, but not as simple as cutting plastic.

[Kiasutha]

Hate to contradict, but the Minitrix B6 shell is definitely not plastic.  It's metal, and not inconsequential to cut.  Not impossible, but not as simple as cutting plastic.

+1
I've several from the earliest on, and they're all metal.
The tenders are plastic, but not the loco shell.

[VonRyan]

You can outsource this painting project to me. You pay shipping. I have never had much luck with painting by hand. But try it and see if it works for you. It may be less apparent on an N scale dirty steam engine than it would on something long and smooth. Plus, you'll be working with flats which are much more forgiving. Or, I hear Tamiya rattle cans are pretty amazing.

I'll have to look to see if my LHS has the Tamiya rattle cans.
I have had good success spraying a few detail odds and ends with cheap black spraypaint, so it shouldn't be too bad.


I had to bid on another (and luckily cheaper) 0-4-0 cause I hit my max on the one I was bidding on.
So it's another six days till I might win the fuel for the fire.



-Cody F.

[PGE_Modeller]

Cody,

Violating "Rule #1" with regard to engineering drawings and scaling from the diagram, I get a distance of 39" from the rear edge of the firebox to the rear wall of the cab.  Adding that to other specified dimensions, the overall length of the locomotive is 26'-6" from pilot beam to rear wall of the cab.  The diagram gives an overall length of the tender as 26'-3", or about the same length as the locomotive.  For comparison, the Trix tender measures 26'-10" over end beams.  The truck centres, however, are only 13'-1" compared to 14'-8" on the diagram.

As others have said, the Trix tender sounds like the best bet.

Cheers,

[nkalanaga]

For a basic black, I've used almost all of the model spray paints, as well as Krylon.  Krylon black tends to go on too thick, and sometimes attacks the plastic.  Testors didn't bother the plastic, but actually looked thicker.  Floquil's 1970s/80s cans clogged so easily I gave up.  The others all seemed to work fine.  So, in my opinion, if you can't find Tamiya spray black, Pactra, Model Master, Scalecoat II, etc will all give equally good results.

[Kiasutha]

Cody,

Violating "Rule #1" with regard to engineering drawings and scaling from the diagram, I get a distance of 39" from the rear edge of the firebox to the rear wall of the cab.  Adding that to other specified dimensions, the overall length of the locomotive is 26'-6" from pilot beam to rear wall of the cab.  The diagram gives an overall length of the tender as 26'-3", or about the same length as the locomotive.  For comparison, the Trix tender measures 26'-10" over end beams.  The truck centres, however, are only 13'-1" compared to 14'-8" on the diagram.

As others have said, the Trix tender sounds like the best bet.

Cheers,

To me, the "tender as big as the loco" was always one of the distinctive features of these.
One of the "stand-outs" on the tender is the wide spacing of the trucks.
MiniTrix got that a bit short, probably at least in part to stay well clear of the coupler box, but my old ruler tells me the B'mann truck spacing is only 11'- helping it look very wrong for the PRR tender to me.

[Lemosteam]

Cody, you may want to join the N-Scale PRR Yahoo Group if you haven't already.  Jon Vincent's A5 turned out really nice! 

Details and pics are here:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PRR-n_scale/photos/album/1152390462/pic/list

Courtesy of Jon's Yahoo A5 image gallery:

[VonRyan]

Well, I might just be getting a Minitrix tender afterall. A close friend has a trove of all kinds of N Scale bits and pieces, including tenders.
He couldn't find one last night, but he said he still has some looking to do before it's written off as a loss.

Cody, you may want to join the N-Scale PRR Yahoo Group if you haven't already.  Jon Vincent's A5 turned out really nice! 

Details and pics are here:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PRR-n_scale/photos/album/1152390462/pic/list

Courtesy of Jon's Yahoo A5 image gallery:

Certainly a good looking A5!

I'll definitely be referencing those photos as I go ahead with my build.

For some reason I cannot seem to send a request to join the group. I just get a red error thing at the bottom of the window, and after a few tries I get a "Capatcha Overlimit"



-Cody F.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

That's a really nice model, but the boiler seems a bit "light" compared to the A5s.

[VonRyan]

That's a really nice model, but the boiler seems a bit "light" compared to the A5s.

I can see what you're saying and I have to agree with it somewhat, but I intend to put up with it since to correct it would be a much larger investment.


-Cody F.

[CR6707]

The minitrix K4 and the 0-6-0 shells from PRR-Parts.com are plastic.  They are resin moldings from the original.  If you go to his website and contact him via email he will give you pricing.

[Dave V]

A5s had a very limited distribution...  Most seem to have been found in Philly with a few in Altoona and a handful of others.

The tiny tender assured that it rarely moved around the system; I suspect it deadheaded if ever it did.

[VonRyan]

A5s had a very limited distribution...  Most seem to have been found in Philly with a few in Altoona and a handful of others.

The tiny tender assured that it rarely moved around the system; I suspect it deadheaded if ever it did.

That works. I intend for it to be a switching engine, only doing some back-and-forth when it makes a debut on an N-Trak layout, and it'll be the main power long with my NW2 and Atlas S2 if I get my HCD layout built, which probably won't happen...


-Cody F.