Notes on Designing, Building, and Operating Model Railroads
A hobby adventure
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.
The Wheeling Freight Terminal has monthly operating sessions. A message is sent to several interested modelers and operators in the area about a week beforehand. I’ve typically been operating on the fourth Thursday of the month and a layout in nearby Las Cruces hosts a session on the second Thursday. August was busy for the usual crew and only Robbie was able to attend the recent session.
A few box cars were lettered in July. This is a great thing to do while various weathering washes dry on the models featured in the last blog post. Several cars have been in service that have been painted but lacked the decals. Let’s take a look at these.
Seven box cars were sent through the weathering factory recently. The effects of man and nature add to the appearance of the models and the Wheeling Freight Terminal layout. I enjoy working weathering into several different layers. Everyone seems to enjoy reading about the weathering processes, so let’s take a look at each of these models.
Ray Breyer is back with a fourth and final prototype summary for the upcoming Accurail HO scale 36-foot box car models. Four variations of the model are planned. Initial paint and lettering schemes were announced earlier this year. Ray estimates there were more than 40,000 box cars with these features built to similar designs. The PDF data sheet is posted on a special blog page, Accurail Prototype Data. Click on the link for the 1800 series for Ray’s latest summary.
Accurail has posted the introductory roadnames for their 36-foot box car models on their website under the specific kit series numbers; 1300, 1400, 1700, and 1800. The links for these are near the bottom of their main webpage. These models are scheduled for late summer 2016 release, as per notes on each of those product pages.
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