Weekend Update 1/1/23

[nickelplate759]

Finished NKP baggage-mail 832.

This was sold as a kit by the NKPHTS - an undecorated MT baggage-mail + custom decals.

Paint is Tru-Color Pullman green with Tamiya semi-gloss clearcoat.


I still need to replace the trucks with the correct Pullman 242 trucks from @Lemosteam  (Keystone Customs).  Fortunately the poor photo obscure the truck details.

[dem34]

Lots of little things like populating some of my slapped together modules with with stuff to make them a little more interesting, but during NYE while waiting for festivities I got a worm in my head that said. "Boxcab Electric" and that has occupied the rest of my long weekend. Took 20 minutes to make a generic shell that clips to a Kato Pocket Steeplecab, and uses its stock Pantograph. Then spent a few hours the next morning cadding up a detailed version. But I still suck at Resin Printing so might out shop that to someone competent.

[Jim Starbuck]

I installed the new Loksound Atlas legacy decoder in my Shapeways FM shell over an Atlas VO1000 chassis.
It uses an 8x12 Soberton speaker in a homemade styrene enclosure and also has an Iowa Scaled Engineering powerkeeper.

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Jim

[Jesse6669]

Happy New Year everyone!  Over the past couple weeks of holiday stuff I did find time to wrap up the design and make a test print today of a 1:300/3mm gauge EBT (later WP&Y) 3-bay hopper.  This came out better than expected.   Friction bearing (Andrews I believe) trucks were done.  Brake staff/wheel to be added, as well as magnet adapters to hold it to the rail, and I will be doing EBT as well as White Pass & Yukon decals.

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[bbunge]

Something whimsical.  A junk box I picked up a while ago had a undecorated tank car that wouldn't sell on flea-bay.  On a whim, I gave it some black paint and printed up Sour patch and Swedish fish logos onto glossy photo paper, peeled the top layer of the photo paper off, sanded the back smooth and glued them to the car.  The decals are out of a scrap bin.   

Ran this on the Bantrak layout this past week, set up in the North Car Shop at the B&O museum.  Several people picked it out from the rest of the train, both kids and parents.  This is the Sour patch side; the fish is on the other side. 

[chuck geiger]

HNY and some reasonable amount of work on shed and layout over the holiday vacation. Moving on Jan 14th to Yuma!!!!!!!

[peteski]

Something whimsical.  A junk box I picked up a while ago had a undecorated tank car that wouldn't sell on flea-bay.  On a whim, I gave it some black paint and printed up Sour patch and Swedish fish logos onto glossy photo paper, peeled the top layer of the photo paper off, sanded the back smooth and glued them to the car.  The decals are out of a scrap bin.   

Ran this on the Bantrak layout this past week, set up in the North Car Shop at the B&O museum.  Several people picked it out from the rest of the train, both kids and parents.  This is the Sour patch side; the fish is on the other side. 

Nice!  I like this kind of whimsical.

[DirtyD79]

Something whimsical.  A junk box I picked up a while ago had a undecorated tank car that wouldn't sell on flea-bay.  On a whim, I gave it some black paint and printed up Sour patch and Swedish fish logos onto glossy photo paper, peeled the top layer of the photo paper off, sanded the back smooth and glued them to the car.  The decals are out of a scrap bin.   

Ran this on the Bantrak layout this past week, set up in the North Car Shop at the B&O museum.  Several people picked it out from the rest of the train, both kids and parents.  This is the Sour patch side; the fish is on the other side. 

I like it. Maybe it's the nostalgia talking but I actually like some of the old promotional schemes companies like tyco, life-like, model power, etc. did on their train cars back in the day.

[johnb]

John,

Nice "vintage" B&W shot! Is that a Oriental Limited 2-8-0 or a Key? IF OL, any tips on how you mounted a coupler to the pilot?
Thanks in advance....

thanks Mike, the coupler was mounted when I bought it

[Ed Kapuscinski]

After some tweaking to get the Kato window glass to fit properly I spent some time getting the GP60I ready for paint by getting all typical detail parts installed. While Conrail locomotives usually didn't have sunshades I added them to this model to as a representation of NS adding them at one point.

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While I was at it I went to work detailing my next GP60B as well. Nothing special was done to this model, just the typical detail parts.

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I'm looking forward to seeing how these look in CR blue.

It's soooo wrong, but soooo right!

[Sokramiketes]

I did do that car, but for some reason can't find pictures of it from before I sold it. The correct names for that car are 420 Mount Evans and 421 Centennial; originally assigned to the Rocky Mountain Rocket and built in 1939. I don't know about the interior arrangement but the exterior window placement is the same as the CB&Q Budd car.

Golden Banquet was built in 1947 for the Golden State and had a "Golden State" letterboard most of its life until the train was cancelled in 1968. So depending on what period of time you want to represent, you can pick the right diner for your timeframe.

I’ve got your back, @Wutter

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[peteski]

I bought this Arnold loco coupe of years back (and let it sit on a shelf), and this weekend I finally decided to see what needs to be done to install a sound decoder.  The motor (standard Kato clone motor) is in the tender (with drive shaft going to the loco), so there isn't much space in the tender.  Since (as it is typical) the loco was grossly over-lubricated, I decided to also give it a full cleaning and a tune-up.



Can I get it back together without any leftover parts?    Yes, I did!

The entire loco is diecast metal.  I contemplated installing a smaller motor in the loco, but that is not realistic.  What I came up was to replace the stock motor in the tender with a smaller (round) coreless motor.  It will be narrower than the stock motor. That way I'll be able to install a decoder on one side of the new motor, then on the other side I'll have  room for a bank of caps.  The speaker with enclosure will go over the motor, inside the "oil tank" on top of the tender.

Fun stuff!

[Dwight in Toronto]

Hey Peteski - beautiful loco!   I’m sure you have your sound install fully mapped out.   No matter - just wanted to mention that I’ve done three steam locos using ESU’s 58731 board, the most recent of which went into a Dapol Hall class British steamer where the motor was in the tender … a tender that may be slightly smaller/more confined than the one you have there.  Just a thought for your consideration. 

[Cajonpassfan]

Fun stuff!

Hey, Peteski, that's my line!

That's quite a project, I'd love to see how you make the electronics fit. I don't suppose there's anyway to put a small speaker in the loco?
Fun stuff indeed!
Otto

[peteski]

Thanks guys!  The loco is pretty much a sold hunk of metal, with just enough room carved out in the boiler for the pickup assembly for the drivers.  The cab is the only hollow area, but the driveshaft goes right through it.  I'll just put all the electronics in the tender, and I'm not really worried about how to install the coreless motor.

Of course now that I know how this loco is built, it will probably take me few more years to return to it and install the decoder.  That's how things seem to work with me.