[Pete Thornton]

I spent last week preparing one of the new Bachmann boxcars for my EBT consist, and it was Deja Vu All Over Again, (to quote Yogi Berra) as I did the same conversion about 6 years ago on an old Bachmann boxcar.

I won't bore you with the details as Kevin did the same thing recently and gave us chapter and verse in this thread:  archive.mylargescale.com/forum/topic.asp

However, as I don't have a baby daughter or a full time job, I had a bit more time to work on it, so I went a bit further with the end trusses and roof - those neat grabs on the side roof walks are actually cobbled up from a pair of the Bachmann grabs taken off the side of the car.

This is the end of my car, where it was a pain to fit the truss around the ladders. I was going to thread the truss rod and use a real nut, but after I bought the taps and dies, I gave them to the wife so she'd have something useful to give me for my birthday!  Those big nuts are Ozark fakes.

The day I took the photos the light was brilliant, so I got out my bigger camera and uploaded a full-size shot:
Large_pic_of_Petes_boxcar_225KB!

(I thought you'd like the alternate shot of the two cars, looking across the Chesapeake Bay to the bridge.)

A while ago, I posted a couple of shots of the amazing boxcar details and Jack mentioned the hardware totally hidden behind the boards above the doors:

Bachmann is really overdoing things.  That pawl for the brake shaft ratchet pivots on a tiny nylon pin that is pushed into the base.  Apart from the problem of losing it, you can't really tell that the pawl moves - nor would you want to?  This rivet counting has gone too far, IMHO.

Finally, you may recall the problems with the first Bachmann 1:20 cars, in particular the flat car, where all the details fell off as soon as you looked at it.  Bachmann learned already - this car has very firmly attached details.  So well attached that I broke off a corner foot grab - had to use an old Hopper nylon one to replace it.  You can see it in the pics if you look closely.

 

[joe rusz]

Looks pretty spify, Pete! You have a keen eye for detail.

 

[Matt Vogt]

Really  nice work, Pete! I love the detail. I'll have to bookmark it for when (someday, I hope) I'll take the time to do something similar.

Matt

 

[trainmaster1989]

Thats very good. Awesome detail.

 

[East Broad Top]

You've learned much, Grasshopper.

Seriously, great looking box car. (Both, in fact). You've also the advantage of warm weather that allows you to actually paint. Hopefully I'll get some warm days in a few weeks to get some painting done, but in the mean time, it's not like I don't have a plethora of other projects.

Later,

K

 

[Pete Thornton]

Posted By East Broad Top on 02/18/2008 8:08 PM
You've learned much, Grasshopper.
Seriously, great looking box car. (Both, in fact). You've also the advantage of warm weather that allows you to actually paint.


Excuse me?    Did you forget what Maryland is like in February; ask your Dad about the snow and rain we had last week, not to mention the cold. /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/crazy.gif  It was about 40 degrees for those photos - but we do get decent sun.

Painting is one of my problems.  I have to get the wife to take her car to work, which gives me a small garage to work in - fortunately it came with a built-in fan heater for working on the car and has a carpet left over from the exercise room that never was.  Wife is allergic to paint, so it has to be done early and the smell has to depart toot sweet.  I use spray cans (the brown is Krylon primer; it's a bit brown perhaps, but I'm going to seriously blacken/weather this car.)  After spraying, when you can hardly breath in the enclosed garage, I open the door and leave everything to cool down in the cold breeze.  The real problem is that the paint continues to smell for another 12 hours, so I have to leave the spray area and the model out in the garage for a while.  The heater keeps it from freezing./DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/satisfied.gif

 

[jimtyp]

Excellent Pete! Thanks for sharing your accomplishments. Top notch work!

 

[East Broad Top]

Er, 40 is warm. (Lest we both get too busy drowning in our cold sorrows, let's not forget our friends to the north. Poor saps.)

Actually the hoops you jump through to paint are strikingly similar to mine. My "paint booth" is also an unheated garage which needs to be vacated by the wife's car before I can set up to do any work. My garage is rather dimly lit, so I have to open the door to be able to see what I'm painting--hence my desire to wait until it's at least above freezing, if not mid-40s at the least. If it's on the "chilly" end of the spectrum, I've got three 500 watt halogen work lights which provide some local heat to whatever's being painted. I could use them for lighting in a closed garage, but I don't like the quality of light they give when compared to natural light, and the open door helps dissipate the fumes. (Allison's not allergic, but has a sense of smell that's the envy of bloodhounds everywhere.)

These hoops are also partly to blame for my switch to brush painting models with acrylics when possible. I can do that whenever I want.

Later,

K