Photo Fun 5/12/2019 Mother's Day

[TBird1958]

Happy Mother's Day. 

 Here's another simple upgrade of an Athearn NACC tank car, this is actually a North American built car and likely the prototype ( I haven't dug into it too deeply), I added some cut bars and the trainline/hoses at the ends plus a little weathering. The build date is '72 so it's only showing 2-3 years of wear.





 Here's a recent shot of a P.O.S.


      

[fr8kar]

Those are some great tanks!

While I wait for some 3D printed parts to arrive I got out my fleet of grocery semi trucks and got some work done. I added wheels, motor/transmission parts and installed drive shafts. I also picked up a couple more Trainworx trailers to go with them. The two ribside trailers are Athearn Fruehaufs. The Fords have 12 and 17 foot fluted droms with curb doors while the GMC has a 12 foot riveted drom with doors on both sides.

These don't exactly have a prototype, but are heavily inspired by Safeway's 60s and 70s fleet with an 80s twist following the design of Gais Northwest Bakery semi trucks. We had Safeway around here up until the mid 80s and I always liked their color scheme. I hated to see them go.

Anyway, still a ways to go before these are called done, but at least they're on wheels now.

[simulatortrain]

Very nice tanks! I've really been on the fence about picking up one of those Athearn beer cans. As far as I can tell, all but the NATX or AESX cars are stand-ins for other builders, and I just don't need any more corn syrup cars, especially Staley ones! They are nice, though. Any tips on building the Publicker car? I recently found one of those kits for a little bit of nothing.

While on the subject of tanks, Ryan, have you printed your ACF tank underframe?

I don't recall whether I've posted any of my 3 TTDX cars at this stage, but I've got the deck stuff painted and the unnecessary lettering removed in preparation for new decals. The only detail work left to do is building the bridge plates. I've also got to track down a couple dozen vehicles to load my eventual 8 cars with:



Tender steps for the frame I posted last week, also printed on my Photon:



And finally I put together a couple of my printed cable reels. I've got a huge stack of parts for a bunch more of them:





I'm not sure which direction they should go in the gon. I'm sure I've seen either direction on the prototype. Either way, my plan is just to glue blocking in the cars so I can run them empty, either as if they're in assigned service or somebody was too lazy to clean the car.

My next few printing projects should be draft gear for the Atlas 60' box and better Atlas S2 cabs. For S2s, I elected to start with older yellow box units. The Master upgrades just didn't go far enough in correcting issues to justify the additional cost, as far as I'm concerned.

[csxt8400]

Nice stuff, guys. Been experimenting with gauche and other acrylics lately. Some good and some left to be desired. This ICG car is coming along nicely, still details to add around the outlets, paint the hatches white, and add some fine rust dots/streaks as well.

[TBird1958]

May 12, 2019 13:02:04 GMT -8 simulatortrain said:

Very nice tanks! I've really been on the fence about picking up one of those Athearn beer cans. As far as I can tell, all but the NATX or AESX cars are stand-ins for other builders, and I just don't need any more corn syrup cars, especially Staley ones! They are nice, though. Any tips on building the Publicker car? I recently found one of those kits for a little bit of nothing.

While on the subject of tanks, Ryan, have you printed your ACF tank underframe?

I don't recall whether I've posted any of my 3 TTDX cars at this stage, but I've got the deck stuff painted and the unnecessary lettering removed in preparation for new decals. The only detail work left to do is building the bridge plates. I've also got to track down a couple dozen vehicles to load my eventual 8 cars with:



Tender steps for the frame I posted last week, also printed on my Photon:



And finally I put together a couple of my printed cable reels. I've got a huge stack of parts for a bunch more of them:





I'm not sure which direction they should go in the gon. I'm sure I've seen either direction on the prototype. Either way, my plan is just to glue blocking in the cars so I can run them empty, either as if they're in assigned service or somebody was too lazy to clean the car.

My next few printing projects should be draft gear for the Atlas 60' box and better Atlas S2 cabs. For S2s, I elected to start with older yellow box units. The Master upgrades just didn't go far enough in correcting issues to justify the additional cost, as far as I'm concerned.

Thanks!

 Regarding the Publicker car I tried to substitute other material (styrene, metal) as much as possible. It's really a dog of a kit, the metal is really soft (likely high lead content, ummmm.......yummy!) and difficult to work with. I used Athearn stanchions to support the rod that runs between the stub sills. I haven't put it away since I built it, for fear of a terminal case of boxrot should I actually try to store it. Good luck! 

[Artur]

Custom built C44-9WL

[12bridge]

Spent most of the week working on my ash containers.   These were regular 20' containers that had the roofs cut open.   I guess there was a shortage of open top containers in the early 1990s.   The tarps were made using Vantage Modeling Solutions Paper Shaper system.   The tiedowns are .008" wire, and the tiedown rail is .012" wire.  

Only 37 or so more to go.  






LIRR P164 - A factory painted (something I am not used to working with) Athearn MP15, that I redetailed to closer match LIRR's fleet, with marker lights, HEP modifications, etc.   This was my first Loksound V5 installation. 


A pair of CNW GP7R's ready for decaling.  The one has my new 3D printed GP7R detail set on it.  


1st of 3 identical MMRR 24's I am building - and cant wait to be done with!  

[ChessieFan1978]

Mother's Day = Family Day, well Family Lines!


Family Lines by Matthew Fisher, on Flickr

[fr8kar]

May 12, 2019 13:02:04 GMT -8 simulatortrain said:

While on the subject of tanks, Ryan, have you printed your ACF tank underframe?

First of all, nice work! The spools look great, as do the tender steps. What vehicles are you planning to put on the flats?

I have printed the BN fuel tender/19k gallon frame, but not the 20k gallon frame. I modified the tank barrels first then drew the frame to fit. Easier to get an exact fit to the model that way. The frames worked out pretty good, but I still need to iron out the process of making handrails, handrail standoffs and corner handholds for the tanks. I haven't touched either model in a long time.

[ChessieFan1978]

TBird1958 what color paint do you use on your wheels?

[dti406]

Good morning from cloudy, cool and rainy Northeat Ohio! (Sounds like a broken record)

Managed to get a couple of cars done this week and progress on another.



Buffalo Creek Railroad was a joint venture of the Erie and Lehigh Valley to servce the grain elevators and flour milling factories in Buffalo, New York. They had over 1,00 boxcars for shipping flour bags across the country. Car is an Atlas ACF 40' Boxcar kit with a 7' Door, painted with Scalecoat II Boxcar Red and Black Paints, then lettered with Smokebox Graphics decals.



Proto 2000 52'6" Greenville Gondola kit, the DT&I purchased 100 of these cars in 1943 and in the 60's sent many of them to the Ann Arbor for transporting steel coils, this is one of the cars retained by the DT&I with the change from Boxcar Red to Black paint on the car, Scalecoat II Paint used and lettered with Herald King decals.



Finished the PS3 Open Hopper kit, will be painting and decaling the car in the future.

Thanks for looking!

Rick Jesionowski

[simulatortrain]

May 12, 2019 17:30:37 GMT -8 fr8kar said:

May 12, 2019 13:02:04 GMT -8 simulatortrain said:

While on the subject of tanks, Ryan, have you printed your ACF tank underframe?

First of all, nice work! The spools look great, as do the tender steps. What vehicles are you planning to put on the flats?

I have printed the BN fuel tender/19k gallon frame, but not the 20k gallon frame. I modified the tank barrels first then drew the frame to fit. Easier to get an exact fit to the model that way. The frames worked out pretty good, but I still need to iron out the process of making handrails, handrail standoffs and corner handholds for the tanks. I haven't touched either model in a long time.

Thanks!  I'm pretty sure I've seen pics of your fuel tender, but was just curious about the 20k.  It's one I've kept in the back of my mind if I ever need another tank project for a rainy day.

The flats will have a mix of M577 command posts and M35A2 trucks- hopefully more trucks as they take up more room.  Depending which part of the WM I model, Letterkenny Army Depot will either be on-line or nearby, so I'm trying to stick with vehicles I know they rebuilt close to my era.  This is true of the M577s and the M42s I've shown here before (those are for a different set of cars), although the trucks are mainly meant as a nod to my dad doing those during Desert Storm.