7mm Richards P48 US Thread

[richard carr]

I've been busy with quite a few things since I got back, including the S7 layout !

I brought a couple of tank cars back and I have been 3D printing a suitable bolster to enable their conversion to P48



Here's the first one



These are brutal close ups, here's what you can see on the tank car





Once these are painted a suitable colour they will look just fine

This is the underneath of the print



I keep wondering how to get smooth bottom to it ?

 

[simond]

Need to look at your printer settings for the first few layers. Presuming that side was on the print bed?

 

[richard carr]

Hi SImon, yes that was the print bed side

 

[simond]

It’s a while since I did any FDM prints but I recall that Cura has settings for the first few layers, and for the infill. I guess all slicers are similar.

 

[richard carr]

I'm using Cura Simon, I think I need to watch a Youtube video on it.

Thanks

 

[richard carr]

I've been doing a bit more boxcar weathering this week, I watched a few videos on youtube for some new ideas.
So this car was first dulled down with a very pale grey acrylic, then it was dirtied with some oil paints.




It got a bit too much pale grey on the left hand side, the right hand side I'm very pleased with.









I also picked these up from my last trip

The UP SD70 MAC in ONE livery is an Atlas premier loco so formerly an MTH loco





Then this Boston and Maine GP7 (I think it's a 7) another lovely SUnset models loco

 

[richard carr]

Yes it's the middle of the night in the UK but I'm here in Kuala Lumpur and it's nearly 11am in th emorning.

At the weekend I managed to do a bit more weathering on some boxcars and tank cars.

I was using oil paints to weather a yellow TTX box car.



The first stage was to spray the underneath with a dirt colour using acrylics and just along the bottom edge of the car. Then it's time to add some dirt coloured oils to ribs. I'm using Abteilung 502 oils which are readily available on the web, this is a 50/50 mix of smoke and bitumen, thinned with a bit of enamel thinners.
I then go and remove most of the paint with a paint brush and lots of enamel thinners, I have put too much paint on here, so it took a while to remove most of it, so I put a lot less on the other side.
Now it looks like this





It's well on it's way now, this does take a while, over an hour to do the whole boxcar.
I now need to do the roof, but most boxcar roofs are actually fairly clean.
Then I need to tone down the yellow to make it look faded.

 

[richard carr]

Here's another of the the 50 foot box cars



It's had a similar treatment to the yellow one, and then has had a spray of matt Tamiya X21 flat base acrylic, thinned with Tamiya lacquer, 25% X21, 75% lacquer thinners.

And this one



This one started out with the underneath coat of dirt, then it had the X21 mix but more like 50/50 and it went on far too thick so it turned grey.
Fortunately most of this wiped off with some paper kitchen towel. It then had the oil paints mix, but this time in a thin wash about 10% paint.

Any constructive comments are very welcome.

Richard

 

[Stephen]

Looks good Richard - wonder whether its worth scuffing up some of the lettering, particularly the 'Southern Pacific', so it gives the impression that paintwork has taken a bit of a battering too?

I guess depending on how filthy you want to go:



Rust trails from particular rivets/areas could be good to add as well?

Cheers,

Stephen

 

[Jordan]

Note on the prototype photo above, the white lettering covered by the right door when open is a lot cleaner than that beyond the stops. The effect is there on the left but not as pronounced, suggesting the right hand door got more use.

 

[timbowales]

Also note the reporting marks and car number have a stripe through them. Does that indicate a condemned car?

 

[Big Train James]

Note on the prototype photo above, the white lettering covered by the right door when open is a lot cleaner than that beyond the stops. The effect is there on the left but not as pronounced, suggesting the right hand door got more use.

I'm guessing it's got more to do with the door track above than the doors themselves. That doesn't explain why the right side appears less weathered than the left side of the door though. Although at least on modern cars the right hand door of a pair of plug doors is the first opened and last closed, so it also makes sense that the right hand door would get more use.

Also note the reporting marks and car number have a stripe through them. Does that indicate a condemned car?

One way or another, it would indicate that the car was off the roster. That usually means sold, which could include to a scrapper or another railroad, or it was coming off a lease and being returned. The car was built in 1964, per the Moloco website, so it would only be halfway through it's service life at the time of this photo.

Jim

 

[richard carr]

Thanks everyone, that's all appreciated, I think I need to tone down the Sothern Pacific lettering at the right hand side.

I'm in KL this this week and I have the Twin Star Cars SP PCF B100 box car kit with me.





I have added the first corner of grab irons and will do the rest shortly using some 0.4mm nickel silver wire.

It will make a relatively unique car for the layout.

RIchard

 

[richard carr]

So waking up again in the middle of the night here in KL I did manage to progress the box car.



All the grab irons are now fitted and I have made up the ladders.

I started doing the brake gear, I'm fairly certain but just wanted to check, the B end is the left end in this photo ?

 

[Big Train James]

The B end is whichever end that has the brake wheel. I presume there's either a cast in place handbrake housing to which you would add the wheel, or the handbrake housing is a separate part. Either way it should be clear which end receives the handbrake.

 

[richard carr]

Hi Jim

Unfortunately it's not clear which end the brake goes, the brake housing is a separate piece that needs gluing to one end, but which end of the floor is the B end ?

There is also this, I have no idea why you need the upright thin extenions ?

 

[Big Train James]

I would have thought there would be a hole or multiple holes on the end receiving the handbrake, so its position would be automatic. It seems irresponsible not to have done something like that. It would seem equally irresponsible to not spell it out in the instructions either.

I've done a quick troll through photos I have here, and it seems the cylinder typically points to the B end. I wouldn't bet my life on it though, without further research, but there seems to be a trend forming.




For the end crossover platform, again I can't speak with any certainty without more info about the kit, but I wonder if the long extensions are supposed to be folded over and back on themselves to represent the mounting brackets? It's the best idea I have at the moment. Something like this, but different......



Remember that the platform with the hole in it goes at the B end, for the brake chain to pass through.



Here's a photo from the Rapido website for their HO SP B-100-40 car. It looks like yours in most respects, the door width being the obvious exception to me. It might help figure things out. The brake cylinder definitely points to the B end.


Hope that helps. You could email Twin Star and ask for clarification, but good luck with that at the moment with the holiday tomorrow.

Jim

 

[richard carr]

Thanks Jim

Very helpful

 

[Scale7JB]

Looking at the Rapido photo, looks like the extended straps for the etched footboard follow the shape of the formed roundly bits on the end walls.

Other technical terms are available..

JB.

 

[Big Train James]

I'm beginning to think that the step is oriented upside down in your photo. Meaning that the "straps" should come off the bottom of the face of the tread and then angle back to the end face of the car. But that doesn't seem to address the situation entirely. Proto photos seem to show the brace turning down at the car end, with a rivet or huck bolt attaching it. There is also then a strap that comes from the top of the step at the car face with it's own rivet or huck bolt. So it would seem that either I'm looking at photos of cars from the wrong series, or the etched part is incorrect, or perhaps the top side straps are cast into the car end?

I'm presuming that the model is of an SP B-100-40 (or 41, 42, or 42) class car. Following are some examples of prototype cars in that number range, all clipped from photos from the Railcarphotos.com site. I've also lightened them somewhat to try and get a better view of the details. Copyrights as noted, and the photo data are also the filenames.