Posts

Marine Industries 51'6" bulkhead flatcar variants

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I recently completed a 6 car set of the newly released Kaslo Shops Distributing Marine Industries 51'6" IL bulkhead flatcars in several variations.  They are nice kits and go together well.  You can do as much or as little underframe detailing as you want.  I did the full underframe detailing on a few and just installed basic underframe details on the others.    The etched ladders and other bits are very nice and are close to scale size.  The cars go together quickly and the parts have good fit.  The center post cars are a bit tricky to get the posts vertical in all directions, I would recommend using a glue that has a longer working time than CA so you can get everything lined up.   The cars are quite light and finding space to add weight will be challenging.  There is space in the centersill for adding weight, and you could also add some weight behind the side sills.  These cars may need to  have permanent loads to get them up to appropriate weight for operation.  Running t

Painting wheels for roller bearing and standard bearing trucks

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One of my pet peeves is otherwise nicely done models riding on shiny metal wheels - it ruins the effect of all the other work done on the model.  And you should NOT use plastic wheelsets - they seem to attract dirt and grime and gum up your track.  Swap out the plastic wheels for aftermarket metal wheelsets.   Most of my replacement wheelsets are Intermountain, available in boxes of 100 axles.  The wheel profile is not the best but they are readily available and are generally in proper gauge or easily adjusted.  I have tried other brands but they are hit and miss as far as being readily available locally.  I have found that Rapido wheelsets are always too narrow compared to the NMRA, and they are a bugger to regauge.   My process for the wheels is fairly simple and gives good results.  Below are my go to paints: Vallejo Air Black and Vallejo Game Effects Dry Rust If you want to you can first clean the wheels with 99% (or whatever % you have available) alcohol to clean any oil and dirt

Kitmingling - A means to an end 40'boxcar 8' door edition

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CN rostered a gigantic fleet of steel 40' boxcars with over 42,000 cars of the 1937 AAR design, both 10' and 10'6" interior height (IH).  These cars made up over 2% of the North American boxcar fleet at their peak.  To say these cars were ubiquitous is something of an understatement as they could be seen pretty much everywhere.   The 8 foot door version of these cars numbered 5000 cars or over 10% of the CN fleet.  However these cars are not commonly seen on layouts as there are not many RTR versions available.  Trains Canada produced a version with NSC3 ends and a PS1 style roof, however some of the features like the car body rivets are terribly out of scale.  Yarmouth Model Works has a nicely done version of this same car style. What is not currently available is the 8' door car with improved dreadnaught ends (IDE) and a diagonal panel roof.  There were 1900 of these cars so they were relatively common.  I decided I needed to represent these cars in my fleet.   O

Kits for sale - New Page

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I have added a page for kits and models for sale that I would like to send to a new home.  It will be updated as things are sold and I find new treasures that become surplus to my needs.  You can find the kits for sale page link at the top of the page under the title block.  

CN Fowler boxcar in MOW service

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This is a Speedwitch kit with K brakes that I purchased from a friend's collection.  These are what maybe the best resin casting of a single sheath boxcar that I have seen.  Individual boards have saw kerf markings, different wood grain and other features that you notice on close inspection.  Absolutely top notch. I pretty much followed the instructions with a few minor variations.  I used Kaslo Shops Distributing 7 rung ladders as they looked better than the plastic kit ladders, although I used the kit end ladders.  The roofwalk was a bit too thick for my liking so I scratchbuilt it using scale 2x8 styrene.  The model has K brakes but I modelled it with a brake wheel conversion in place of the vertical staff brake the car was delivered with.  This was based on a few prototype photos showing this arrangement which is not what you expect in a 1917 era boxcar.   For the base coat I used Tamiya grey surface primer followed by various weathered wood colours.  When I was happy with the

CN 5304 cu ft combination door boxcars

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CN purchased roughly 740 52'8" combination door boxcars from NSC in 1972/73 to supply cars for lumber service.  These cars supplanted and later replaced the sizable fleet of 40' double door boxcars used in this service.  As the shippers switched to centerbeam flatcars carrying wrapped lumber these cars were put into general service.  As delivered they had a green sliding door to denote lumber service.  Later on as they were repainted the green doors got painted in the standard CN red #12.  Some of the green door cars survived in original paint well into the 2000's.  Most of these cars were retired by 2018 although a few likely survive in OCS service.   For many years the only available car was a flat resin kit from Kaslo Shops Distributing.  It was a nice kit however availability was often limited.  Rapido Trains has announced a RTR version of these cars, and recently Kaslo has re-released their original kit (HK-03) as a 3D printed car.   As well Kaslo has another new

Snowplows a plenty

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One of the thngs on my "to do" list has been to build some CN prototype snow plows.  CN had a wide range of snowplows, many unique to the railway and others from common designs used elsewhere.  Walthers brought out a Russell snow plow years ago that was good for some of the plows CN operated.  However the majority of plows were built by ECC, CC&F and in house by CN and were quite unique.   CN 55392 as it currently sits.  It was a late 1990's kitbash that has sat for years because I just wasn't quite happy with it.  I may just bite the bullet and finish it now.   I started kitbashing an ECC/CC&F plow years ago from a Walthers Jordan plow kit and got it to the point of being ready to paint.  But there were enough differences between it and the prototype to cause me to wonder if there was a better way.   With the recent influx of 3D printed models of unique prototypes the doors have been thrown wide open to model equipment that would otherwise never be done comme