Weekend Update 1/30/22

[Erik W]

Here's the week's progress on my HOn3 Jordan Spreader OU.  Back when I began model railroading as a teenager in the mid-80s, I learned to airbrush using Floquil paints.  I then shifted over to Polly Scale acrylics about 20 years ago.  With the discontinuance of those lines as well as Testors Model Masters Acryl line, and with my old paints drying in their bottles over time, I decided to jump into another paint line.  For this project I've given the Mr Hobby Mr Color line a go.  In all of my time building models I've never primed a model before painting.  I had read good things about Mr Surfacer primer, so figured with all the different materials this model is built out of, I'd prime it.  I mixed 40% primer/60% thinner.  The primer went on smoothly with even coverage.  The final gray color also went on equally as well.  Since these paints were new to me, and since I want to test some weathering techniques for the side blades, I cut a mock side blade out of a piece of styrene to test the primer and paint before I used them on the model itself.  For the black deck house roof, I used Vallejo black.  I've been using Vallejo paints for brush painting for years.  With a little effort you can get a thin even coat with no brush marks.  Since this model is so prickly with easily breakable details, I had to build a jig to hold the model while I airbrushed it.  The goal was something that I could firmly grip and that would secure the model when tilted over to 45 degrees or so.  The jig is crude, but it worked.















Erik

[Jim Starbuck]

I finished the sound install in my Bachmann 44 tonner.
It has a Loksound Nano decoder, Soberton 8x12 speaker and an Iowa Scaled Engineering power keeper.
The headlight and rear light are 0603 LEDs but I put too big of resistor in and they’re kind of dim so I may change them.
I’ll post more detailed information in the DCC forum later.

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[btrain]

Almost completed the Hiles interlocking tower that sat in New London, Ohio, and guarded the NYC/ACY crossing. More details on the layout thread.

[garethashenden]

I finished the sound install in my Bachmann 44 tonner.
It has a Loksound Nano decoder, Soberton 8x12 speaker and an Iowa Scaled Engineering power keeper.
The headlight and rear light are 0603 LEDs but I put too big of resistor in and they’re kind of dim so I may change them.
I’ll post more detailed information in the DCC forum later.

Interesting to see this. Just yesterday I though to myself "I bet a Nano would fit in a 44 tonner" and you've done it!

[Jim Starbuck]

Interesting to see this. Just yesterday I though to myself "I bet a Nano would fit in a 44 tonner" and you've done it!

I wasn’t the first one to do this. I just did my version of it. There’s a video on YouTube by Ron Calhoun. He’s done several sound installs and made videos of them.

[garethashenden]

After five years of procrastination I tackled the outside cylinders on my North London Railway 0-6-0T. I had to extend them out from the body more than the prototype did, but it doesn't look out of place. Even with the extension there is still almost no clearance.




I have also decided against the printed boiler and smokebox and set about making them from 0.015" nickel silver. The front and back were sweated together and fretted out. Then I cut a strip of nickel silver the width of the smokebox minus the front and back. When cut to the correct width it was attached to one of the ends. Then a vertical piece was attached, then the other end.



I cut a strip of 0.010" brass the width of the smokebox, plus a little just for safety. This has been rolled to shape and will be trimmed to length once it has been attached to the smokebox.

[PiperguyUMD]

Lots of progress for me this weekend. February is crazy busy for me, so I wanted to get a number of projects to a place where I could dabble on them as time allowed.

First up WM RPO 182. This is a 3d printed shell with a spliced Mirco Trains roof. Added wire grabs, and a few other details salvaged from a Micro Trains RPO. These are the pre-primer glam shots.



Second up was fascia on the Dawson Truck Dump module. I wanted to get this one to the point that I could fiddle with scenery as time allows. That meant, 1) getting the basic foam sculpting done, 2) fascia, and 3) The basic structure of the truck dump so that I could estimate the lay of the land around the tipple.





Specifics and more pics in my layout thread!

[altohorn25]

I'm calling this one done for now.  A Life-Like E8 detailed shell mounted on a Kato mechanism with Digitrax DCC installed.  This is for Lowell Smith 's upcoming "Pan American".

Gold Medal Models steps and windshield wipers were added.  Front numberboards were painted and had numbers added.  The model was lightly weathered as well.

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[GonzoCRFan]

Started working on Conrail SW1500 9613, which, like all of CR's ex-Reading SW1500s, had small housings on the pilots for MU hoses. I figured this would be a detail worth sweating and also make a fairly simple little project to finally get my feet wet with Tinkercad. I'm pretty happy with how the drawing turned out, I just gotta finally source some screen protectors and I can finally fire up the Mono X.

[johnhale]

Finally started building my first Free-moN module. This is a straight 3 foot two main track module that will be reference module that all the other modules that our club is building must mate and adhere to.

This is the start of Free-moN in Maryland! We already have a half dozen people lined up to build modules. The goal is to have a Free-moN layout at the October 2022 Great Scale Model Train Show in Timonium MD.

[brokemoto]

First up WM RPO 182. This is a 3d printed shell with a spliced Mirco Trains roof. Added wire grabs, and a few other details salvaged from a Micro Trains RPO.

What are you going to use for lettering?  I hung WM lettering on a MT baggage/passenger, baggage and single window coach, but i used the lettering from the fireball diesel set.  That font is not correct, but it was the closest that I could get at the time.

[nkalanaga]

Lee:  I wouldn't worry too much about the FM, unless the flicker bothers you.  With a light on each end, the two will protect each other, so there won't be any damage.

As for the Fs, given the ease of replacement, and the low cost, I'd agree that you're probably better off not trying to protect them.  There's no way any of this will damage the motor.

[peteski]

Lee:  I wouldn't worry too much about the FM, unless the flicker bothers you.  With a light on each end, the two will protect each other, so there won't be any damage.

Only if Lee connected both LEDs in reverse parallel, with a single resistor in series with that combo.  If each LED is on its own with a separate resistor, then there is not much protection.

[PiperguyUMD]

What are you going to use for lettering?  I hung WM lettering on a MT baggage/passenger, baggage and single window coach, but i used the lettering from the fireball diesel set.  That font is not correct, but it was the closest that I could get at the time.

John at Mt. Vernon Shops has done HO passenger decals.  I’ve talked to him about doing them in N, and he’s willing. He’d need an order of 25 to make it work for him. I’m game for about 10 sets, so I need to make some friends! I haven’t heard from him I in a while though, I should probably send him these pictures to keep the ball rolling 

[StewRRFan]

No pictures worth posting.  Just ran trains.

No Springfield, No Montana and 12" of snow.  Inventoried engines/cars no on the layout.  497 total.  I may have a problem.....