Scrap Steel Loads

One of the Wheeling Freight Terminal crew members has a neat method of creating scrap steel loads for gondolas. Here’s Mike Weiss with some ideas you can use on your layout.

Articles in model railroad magazines about making scrap steel loads for gondolas have often not considered industry standards for scrap composition and size. Additionally they usually don’t provide an easy way to remove a load without a wire loop or hidden magnet. We will address both issues in this blog post.

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Pre-Depression Era Models at the RPM

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Dick Scott’s O scale L&N 36-foot box car model.

I had a moment recently to take my time and review model images from the recent RPM Chicagoland meet. I found there were quite a few models representing prototypes built in the Teens and Twenties, but wearing later era paint and lettering. One of the prime examples leads off this blog post.

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Masking Tape as a Weathering Tool

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Masking tape has been applied to portions of the lettering on these freight cars before the weathering processes begin.

Several freight cars recently went through the weathering factory and each of them had some masking tape applied to protect part of the original paint coat or lettering. Model railroaders typically use masking tape in the process of applying large stripes or fancy paint schemes to locomotives or rolling stock. For these recent freight cars, the tape was applied to hint at changes made to the car. The tape became another tool in the weathering arsenal.

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More Decal Work!

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A couple more long term freight car projects have progressed through the decal phase. The actual builds were straightforward but the decals were lacking in parts to use for a 1926 presentation. This is one of the larger challenges when modeling the Pre-Depression Era. Many resin freight car kits do not include decals for lettering used before 1935. It’s just another part of the adventure. I’m fortunate a product is available that was instrumental in completing these cars.

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T-Section Bettendorf trucks

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I bought ten pair of the Walthers Proto T-Section Bettendorf trucks (TSB) awhile back. I thought I should prep them so they are ready for the new Accurail box cars. You can see the before and after view in the lead image. Let’s go through the steps to make these trucks a little better.

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