Video of combined El Capitan-Super Chief

[Sokramiketes]

In a fit of inspiration last night, I did some work to the El Cap cars.  And now that plain still photos are so boring, Jamie took some video of my combined El Capitan-Super Chief this afternoon:

Power is an Athearn FP45/F45 combo.  The F45's had steam lines run through so they could be used in passenger service.  What they didn't have was boilers to create steam, and the boiler in a single FP45 wasn't enough for a long train.  Santa Fe did convert baggage cars to steam generators (Walther's car will be a good start) but since I haven't built one yet, two F7 B's were pressed into service to provide steam as well as tractive effort as was typical, especially for Early Amtrak.

First baggage is from the Super Chief set, but the second baggage is from the new El Cap release.  To change it up a bit I removed the skirting, carving around the steps to leave them intact.  Some of these Budd cars kept their skirts till the end, some lost them all, and there's even a photo in the Color Guide of one that lost only a section of it's skirting.

On the El Cap cars, window shades made a big difference. I used to use paper to create the shades, but it's such a pain on the Kato glass, with the depressed pockets behind each window, that I wanted a faster method.  I masked off for the shades this time and brush painted a mix of antique white and CSX blue to give the appearance of shades through mildly tinted glass.  Much faster, and much better appearance in the end.  Note that the large windows in the Hi-level coaches had two shades each, split at the center divider.  

The Super Chief section I had mostly done before.  See if you can spot the light up Turquoise Room medallion in the dome in one clip.  What I did do last night was to move the drumhead and associated lighting kit to my Budd 10-6 sleeper at the end of the train.  The door snapped right out of the Hi-Level step-down coach, so I did a little carving and moved it to the 10-6 which itself was modified from an original Budd Kato release and painted with Alclad.  

Enjoy!

[Heath]

I love that layout ,are you guy's going to be at Harper in March again?

[sirenwerks]

Any videos of Geep powered patrols or FP7s, even C&NW GP30-led hot shots? The layout looks gorgeous in all of the videos you've knocked out lately, but you guys have done too nice a'work in representing Wisconsin to really pull off GEVOs & ATSF passenger trains  ;D. I'd love to see some more of the stuff the modules were intended for, more of what's been hitting the mags.

[skytop35]

Bryan,

Sorry, I got to the layout too late with my box of Milwaukee motive power  ;D

[kiwi_al]

Well Mike that was really nice but you kept the bit that really matters out of all the camera shots - the step down from the El Capitan cars to the Super Chief cars. I ran the video frame by frame to see if you had put in a step down car and guess what - I didn't see one cause your video skipped that bit in each pan. So did you get an extra car or are you waiting for the spare parts to become available from Kato?

And no I don't have an El Capitan set so I am a bit envious ;D ;D ;D . It does look really nice by the way

[Sokramiketes]

Well Mike that was really nice but you kept the bit that really matters out of all the camera shots - the step down from the El Capitan cars to the Super Chief cars. I ran the video frame by frame to see if you had put in a step down car and guess what - I didn't see one cause your video skipped that bit in each pan. So did you get an extra car or are you waiting for the spare parts to become available from Kato?

And no I don't have an El Capitan set so I am a bit envious ;D ;D ;D . It does look really nice by the way

The transition car with the bump on the roof was just a baggage-dormitory car.  It didn't actually have steps in it.  So only one was run at the front of the El Cap.  The first and last Hi-level coaches in the Kato set are "step-down" coaches.  You can tell because the diaphragm is low on one end and high on the other.  The step-down coach is correctly positioned at the end of the El Cap section, it's just missing the end door right now because I moved it to the 10-6 at the end of the train for the drumhead it has molded in.  I'm hoping Kato does offer those parts separately, because the drumhead is perfect.

[Sokramiketes]

Any videos of Geep powered patrols or FP7s, even C&NW GP30-led hot shots? The layout looks gorgeous in all of the videos you've knocked out lately, but you guys have done too nice a'work in representing Wisconsin to really pull off GEVOs & ATSF passenger trains  ;D. I'd love to see some more of the stuff the modules were intended for, more of what's been hitting the mags.

You do have a good point, the shiny object syndrome will wear off the El Cap in a week or so and we can get back to regularly scheduled programming!

[asarge]

Nice work Mike. Jamie's love for the Banjo makes you wonder if he's really form down in our neck of the woods!

[kiwi_al]

Well Mike that was really nice but you kept the bit that really matters out of all the camera shots - the step down from the El Capitan cars to the Super Chief cars. I ran the video frame by frame to see if you had put in a step down car and guess what - I didn't see one cause your video skipped that bit in each pan. So did you get an extra car or are you waiting for the spare parts to become available from Kato?

And no I don't have an El Capitan set so I am a bit envious ;D ;D ;D . It does look really nice by the way

The transition car with the bump on the roof was just a baggage-dormitory car.  It didn't actually have steps in it.  So only one was run at the front of the El Cap.  The first and last Hi-level coaches in the Kato set are "step-down" coaches.  You can tell because the diaphragm is low on one end and high on the other.  The step-down coach is correctly positioned at the end of the El Cap section, it's just missing the end door right now because I moved it to the 10-6 at the end of the train for the drumhead it has molded in.  I'm hoping Kato does offer those parts separately, because the drumhead is perfect.

Ahhhhh tricksie Americans!!! ;D ;D
I'll have to save my pennies for a bit more, I didn't realise the step down cars were the coaches - I'm going blind and silly in my old age  : ;D

[Sokramiketes]

Nice work Mike. Jamie's love for the Banjo makes you wonder if he's really form down in our neck of the woods!

I think all car guys have a little bit of redneck in them.

[lashedup]

Hey, I just used the least cheesy music that came with Apple's iMovie software. I have another source for video music that I'll have to tap into next since I'm out of soundtrack music.

Since the layout will be setup for another week we'll get some Milwaukee Road, CNW and CB&Q stuff on film.

-jamie

[randgust]

Very nice Mike - I really like the windowshade treatment, and the sunset lighting on the video, yeah..... you flashed me back quite nicely there and I thank you!

[Ed Kapuscinski]

That's gorgeous, but they look too "sanitary". I guess now's the time to dirty them up a bit.

[randgust]

Not for Santa Fe you wouldn't.  Amtrak post '71, yes.  Santa Fe was as nuts as any company I've ever heard of on appearance, remember the train was washed en route at Albuquerque and at both ends.  The trucks on the diesels were spray painted silver regularly, some say as often as every trip.

I'm sure somebody can produce a pre-71 shot of a 'maybe dusty' Super Chief/El Cap, and maybe the exhaust on top didn't get cleaned, but overall, this is a company that got so disgusted with the way Amtrak worked that's why they yanked the name rights.

[Mark5]

That's gorgeous, but they look too "sanitary". I guess now's the time to dirty them up a bit.

Hehe, yeah like Randy said some railroads kept their trains clean "back in the day"