N Scale Rocky Mountaineer - original consist

[screeh]

The theater gels look great Craig, and thanks for stepping out how you did it - time to hunt down some gels for my cars!

[craigolio1]

The theater gels look great Craig, and thanks for stepping out how you did it - time to hunt down some gels for my cars!

No problem. They were @CNR5529 idea.

[craigolio1]

Today I worked on prep for the lighting.

I made pickups by soldering two pieces of .008” phosphor bronze bent at right angles.



Then I made hollow booster pins out of styrene tubing. The ends were flared with a soldering iron to hold the trucks in place.



The trucks were then assembled with care to ensure the insulated wheel sets are on opposite sides when the trucks are oriented the correct direction.



It’s not shown in the photo but the wires are bent around the axles now which makes them want to stay closer to center so they can’t turn and accidentally touch opposite wheels.

The hole in the booster of the car is filled so that the pin slides in with just a little friction. This allows the truck to turn easily. Just enough of the pin protrudes from the floor that I’ll be able to attach a clip to it so they don’t fall out. They won’t anyway once I have wires attached but I’ll put the clips on anyway during final assembly.



For the lighting I drilled into the ends of the car and glued small bits of brass tubing in the holes. They were messily (hey I tried my best) painted silver. I’ll touch up the blue later. I then prepped fibre optics for the lenses. One car will be lit. The other a dummy. One end of each finer were belled with a soldering iron, and then painted red with Tamiya clear red.



Once dry they were inserted and glued into the brass tubes.



Here’s what the car looks like assembled.



It looks to me like it rides high. I had to shim the trucks with .020” styrene spacers otherwise the low riding Rapido trucks just sat with the side frames flat in contact with the floor.

In this photo you can realy see it. The bottom of the sides while be in line horizontally with the daynighter next to it.



To fix this I’d need to cut the floor and then file the bolster down to lower the car. In that case the ability to turn would be limited by the side frames possibly contacting the body side when turning which would considerably limit my turning radius. I’m May experiment with this later but for now they’ll just ride high.

Craig

[craigolio1]

I decided to lower the cars. It was really bugging me.

I cut the floor out to give the trucks the room they needed and removed the shims I had put in to prevent the trucks touching the floor.



Wouldn’t you know that was the perfect amount!



I also added a layer of .040” styrene to the floor to keep everything flat as the White Strong Flexible Shapeways product is quite bendy.



I’ll have to do some painting again.



Next up was electronics.

I built a constant lighting circuit a-La-Peteski….

See page two of this thread…

https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=29654.15

One supply wire goes to each truck pick up, and a red LED is soldered to the assembly. Here it is on track power.



I then bundled the fibre optics together with some magnet wire and glued them together with a drop of CA.



To interface with the LED I glued a bit of styrene tubing over the end of the fibres.



I proceeded to fit the circuit and LED to the tube. As I did this the tube broke away. Turns out that CA liquifies fibre optics. So don’t use CA!

Thank fully enough fibre was left that I didn’t have to replace them. I slipped a new tube over the end, heated the fibre ends to polish them, and this time held the tube in place with a drop of Canopy Glue.

The LED is connected to the tube with a piece of heat shrink tubing which conveniently holds everything in alignment and doesn’t bleed light.



I resoldered new pick up wires and then gave it a test. Success!!



Finally I added 1.5oz of weight to each car and then couplers.



The cars are now ready to roll. All that’s left now is some paint touch ups and a decal repair.



Craig

[craigolio1]

Some paint touch ups around the markers got done last night.





And some of the consist was assembled. A few of the cars are stock Rapido’s and so reassembly was quick.





I like that they painted to roofs the same blue as the sides instead of leaving them the original black.

The baggage dorm still needs work. The roof wouldn’t fit. It has something to do with how I laminated the styrene sides on. I didn’t have the patience for it last night. So I’ll revisit that another day.

Also I noticed that for some reason there is some red bleeding through the white on the loco.





 It was a BCR loco. The body was cast in red plastic but I stripped it right down so there shouldn’t have been any affect on the new paint. I tried to hand paint it again in white but I don’t like the result so I’ll strip this and start over. Too bad.

Craig

[nscalbitz]

...I tried to hand paint it again in white but I don’t like the result so I’ll strip this and start over. Too bad.

Craig

Far be it from me to advise a whiz of your talent- however, being a perfectionist isn't always right.
These little nuances and discolourations can be weathering effects- the simple rust/dust/ detritus that affects everything in nature.
Also doesn't matter its not even- humans can't see both sides or ends at the same time- such differences are little things that can enhance believability or realism.
 FWIW, lovely work!
-d

[craigolio1]

Far be it from me to advise a whiz of your talent- however, being a perfectionist isn't always right.
These little nuances and discolourations can be weathering effects- the simple rust/dust/ detritus that affects everything in nature.
Also doesn't matter its not even- humans can't see both sides or ends at the same time- such differences are little things that can enhance believability or realism.
 FWIW, lovely work!
-d

I do very much appreciate your input. What bugs me the most is that my brain thinks the side of the cab is pink! I’ve certainly left well enough alone MANY times.  But in this case I have to fix it.

Craig.

[craigolio1]

The B36-7 spent almost a week in IPA and it removed a lot of the paint. But I needed to finish it off in non-acetone nail polish remover, which took about ten minutes. I’ve decided hat this is my go-to paint stripper from now on.



With the model stripped again I decided to address something that had bugged me. Originally I had drilled a hole in the roof behind the head light for a beacon which I had planned to light. However you can see that on the prototype the beacon is on a plate partially overhanging the headlight.



I chose to try to do this instead. I also chose not to light the beacon on my model as I’ve never found any evidence that it was used. I have a feeling that it was just a left over from the ‘70’s Santa Fe era where I believe beacons were mandatory for a bit?

The beacon I’m using is an orange light casting from an AMT/Ertle 1/25 scale Kenworth kit.



I found some etched fret material which looked to be about the right width, and filed some round corners on it.



I then fit this over the headlight.





I also filled the hole I had drilled with some styrene rod.

After this thr loco was ready for primer. On the previous paint attempt I had used Rustoleum white primer, Vallejo white, and Tamiya blue. This time I’ve decided to use Tamiya grey primer, and Tamiya white and blue.

The primer coat went on nicely.



As did the white.



Once this sets up I’ll be ready to mask and shoot the blue.

Craig

[Dwight in Toronto]

Ahh yes - that deplorable, endlessly nagging feeling when you just know that something is just not “good enough”!   The only thing to do is bite that bullet, and nip it in the bud. 

The re-do is looking good so far.

[craigolio1]

Thanks!  I went to mask it today and see that I went light with the white in the battery boxes on one side so I’ll have to shoot white again. D’oh.

[craigolio1]

Welp. Shooting the battery boxes again resulted in some serious orange peel. And then when I really inspected the rest of the cab I saw that it was less than desirable too!

So back into the stripper. But just the front part of the loco.



I used the same Tamiya grey primer. Previously I had decanted taniya white from a rattle can cause I had some so why not. This time I opted to use Tamiya white from a jar.

The result was much better this time.



I also decided to make a better mask tape cutting template. The corners were very hard to cut and I was t as happy with the outcome as I wanted to be. I made this template by filing a piece of brass shim stock which had been cut to fit.



Hopefully I’ll have a chance to shoot the blue the next few days.

Craig.

[Sokramiketes]

@craigolio1 Do you have a recommendation on which material to purchase through Shapeways for these?  I'm guessing the best is to suck it up and get the finest detail?

I'm not headed down a Rocky Mountaineer path, but after riding the Alaska Railroad I find myself needing to model their version of the ultradome.  So this thread is of great use!

[craigolio1]

@craigolio1 Do you have a recommendation on which material to purchase through Shapeways for these?  I'm guessing the best is to suck it up and get the finest detail?

I'm not headed down a Rocky Mountaineer path, but after riding the Alaska Railroad I find myself needing to model their version of the ultradome.  So this thread is of great use!

Were I to order them again I would go with the highest detail material possible. They also have a clear material now which I would be tempted to try because of the top windows. Although it would have to be a REALLY high quality print for it to resemble window glass. I doubt it would look as good as I would want it to.

Craig

[craigolio1]

Ugh. It’s been rather trying with this loco. I ultimately ended up striping and starting over FOUR TIMES.

When I did the blue I rushed it and masked too low on the cab one time.



I also failed to check the tape seals and had some over spray issues and ended up ruining the white trying to fix it.






After this last debacle I did a complete reset. I wasn’t happy with any part of the paint.



Switching to bottled white paint resulted in my having to learn a new thinning ratio…. I read some car modelling forums and settled on about a 50/50 mixture with Tamiya thinner and ended doing more than ten VERY light coats of paint. In between I used a hair drier to speed things up. The result was the smoothest finish I’ve achieved yet with Tamiya white.

 
I had also switched primers. I went to Mr Surfacer 500 and that made a big difference too.  It went on smoother than the Tamiya primer…. Which I didn’t think was possible… but someone on a car model forum swore by it so I gave it a go.

When it came time to mask I wasn’t pleased with the template I made or the seal of the frog tape I was using for the larger masks. The template was too small for me to hold in place while cutting. I had a roll of .006” stainless shim stock and decided to cut a large piece. About 3” x 6”. Originally I made my brass template with both rounded edges on it so I could cut a single mask for the cab and battery boxes. This was a bad idea as I wasn’t able to file both corners exactly the same and the two parts got painted separately anyway. So with the big stainless mask I only filed one corner and then flipped it this way and that to cut four masks.



For tape I re-stocked on the best tape I know… Tamiya. The biggest I could find was 18mm which was plenty large enough.

I was very careful with the masking this time triple checking the seals and coverage.



When I shot the blue again I did very light mists again. And after the first I allowed it to dry a bit longer to seal the tape edge. The result was some really nice separation lines. Unfortunately one little spot on the cab and at the back had a touch of bleeding even still. But it will be an easy fix. But this time I won’t try with a brush. I’ll re mask and shoot multiple painful coats of white to match and blend with the first. Almost there!







At this point I’m pleased enough with the paint and will move on to decals…. Again…. after the white touch ups.

It’s been a pain getting here but it’s worth it.

Craig

[Dwight in Toronto]

Nice to see that you’re back at it!