Z's occasional modelling mayhem

[Zunnan]

Now that I have yet another house move out of the way, this one hopefully being the permanent one(!), I should now be back in the position to be able to pick up/catch up on some much needed butchery of RTR models in order to produce offbeat prototypes. My GP38-2 Snowfighter has now been languishing for the best part of 2 years in a near complete state, I think it high time that one was finally put to bed before I decide to do exactly the same thing to one of the new Genesis 38-2s!

 

Also in the pipeline, this one is yet to be started involves these three victims...No prizes for guessing what they will become, although UPY #835 does have a certain significance to this project.

 

 

Fellow SP fans out there will instantly recognise the core ingredients and what they will become! But why the C628 I hear you cry? Surely its easier to scratch build a slug than to butcher a RTR model and chassis. Normally I'd agree, but the Stewart C628 is a bit different, and so are my plans for it. All of the chassis material above the nose level is screw fixed in place, which means that removal of said parts leaves me with no chassis material to have to machine out for the greatly reduced carbody height. The PCB can relocate in the lower position...you can see where I'm going with this...and I reckon that if I can get a small enough can motor and flywheels, I won't have a dead weight for a slug in the consist. As long as the slug can haul its own weight, that will leave the Kato SD38-2 duo to do their thing unhindered. However, if it can also manage a few cars by itself... Of course, the entire body is going to need quite extensive surgery, the only parts that will survive are going to be the short hood, pilots and the walkway. I need to identify the dynamic braking fans used on the prototype and cobble up the intakes, but thankfully the rest of it is pretty simple with few doors and grilles to replicate, only really weld seams and a new set of handrails.

 

On to those 38-2s. UPY #835 is significant in that the real thing is one of the SPs former units, what better tribute to the old Espee than to backdate a UP unit to its original identity?! In the models favour, the dynamic brakes are correctly modeled back to front, which saves on one hack and slash job to the model. Against the model is the nose and cab, but nothing that Cannon & Co components won't be able to fix, and is nothing that I haven't done before!

 

Of course, with a house move there is certain more pressing issues to address before I can pick up tools once more...but the intention is finally there once more! More anon.

[Zunnan]

Thought I'd resurrect this old post being as its the most suited for shenanigans like this...

 

I was intending on picking up with my UK industrial incline layout except for the minor problem of needing to buy a load of modelling materials for it. So in lieu of being able to get out to buy layout building materials I have instead taken upon myself to ruin an Intermountain PS 4750.

 

Ruining a Perfectly Good Hopper

 

I'm not normally one to go on a weathering project, but if I'm going to re-enter modelling the dark side, I'm going to do it properly for once! What better starting point for a weathering beginner than this oh so simple little piece of work as a source of inspiration?

 

Copyright Paul Marshall.

 

I can quite happily relivery and repatch models, so that is a start considering this example is pretty much half a relivery job and is a wonderful mix of old livery and even older faded features as well as a real half assed patch job and repair and subsequent in service abuse which has rendered even the newer portions of the patching to become quite grotty. Also noteworthy are the replacement hatches and repainted walkway with flaking paint. I think for this one I'm going to go for a close approximation, it is a first attempts afterall...but they do say you can never overdo weathering. Well, this ones overdone to begin with! How hard can it be?!

 

The starting point, and victim for this exercise is a not so cheap Intermountain covered hopper. What the hell am I thinking?! The base model is gorgeous, I've had these hoppers in the past and this one is from the same number series as my chosen prototype so the detail should be pretty much right on the mark. Bought secondhand, this one had a few damaged grabs and the hatches were already pulled loose from the body, so it needs a little TLC anyway. Feeling a bit less guilty now. So by default it gets the short end of the stick.

 

 

Partially stripping the old livery down isn't too hard on these cars. A sharp scalpel (where have ALL of my scratch pens gone?!) and a bit of patience shifts the decals nicely and doesn't really do much damage to the base livery. So I got rid of the reporting mark and numbers to be painted over and the old Santa Fe Quality decal on the end to retain its original colour, and just for good measure I put some elbow grease in with the car polish and cotton buds to remove as many of deeper scrapes as I could. Then it simply becomes a nightmare masking job! Hopper loading hatches in component parts does help somewhat, but the hinges (which are functional once you break the glue by the way!) were a royal pain to mask off for repainting the walkway.

 

The end result of the base relivery however...is certainly a point a bit beyond being able to just repair the light damage and call it job done!

 

 

As luck would have it, my stocks of Microscale decals have disappeared with the mists of time. I have no white data decals to hand, only some grotty old '72-'88 Santa Fe and a plethora of black Southern Pacific hopper decals...most helpful! So, much like the industrial layout, this one too is going to have to wait a little while for bits and pieces to arrive for me to be able to continue.

 

More anon

Edited April 14, 2020 by Zunnan