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I bought a bunch of Polly Scale in the early 2010s before it was discontinued. I'm working through what I have left pretty quickly alas, especially the Boxcar Red. Supposedly the Microlux paints from Micromark are blended to match the Polly S colors, but as you can tell from the pic below it's...

Well, scratch build overstates it slightly since I used some bits of caboose roof, end blocks, and freight car flooring from Northeastern Scale Lumber. The curved roof is not prototypically accurate but it is what I had on hand, so I went with it. The length is closer to 30' than the supposed...

I could have sworn there was a book thread floating around somewhere, but I can't find it. My apologies if I've missed it. I have become a little obsessed with reading about railroading, late 1800s through early 1900s in particular. Some of this is in support of my eventual plans to create a...

B&W photo makes it hard to tell what is going on. Seems like this could be natural wood with something like boxcar red-ish lettering? This flat is from 1904 - no idea how often cars went unpainted in those days. This was from Barre VT so the elements would have been fairly severe running in a...

My files have become clogged with metal shavings, possibly even melted metal from overly aggressive filing. I've tried to use a wire brush to get it out with no luck. Someone recommended filing the end grain of a scrap board, which did seem to remove a little, but overall neither has made much...

I few months ago I built a Labelle tank car kit and thought to myself "I can probably scratch build that a lot cheaper". If you factor in time spent, I was of course completely wrong, but if you factor in just materials, I MIGHT have been right? :D Anyway, pics below on my brazen knock off build...

I built one of these kits last year, and it turned out great - not too terrible to build, and lots of nice details. I bought another one recently and figured I'd try to build this one with an open side door. I managed to delete the first couple pictures, but there's not much to miss - end walls...

The inspiration for this build is a well car designed in 1900 by Edward Blossom of the Woodbury & Hardwick RR. This was to be used for shipping large granite slabs that would be too wide for flat cars. Background on the car US Patent 670529 Looks like Barclay Bros borrowed the car and did a...

Just finished building and painting an old time tank car - https://www.labellemodels.com/texas-midland-tank-p-61.html I'm having a devil of a time with the decals, though. I'm certainly no expert but have applied decals to probably a dozen cars in the past. Never had any real trouble with...

Finally finished this one up after a looooong time working on it, and another loooong time painting it. I ended up going to my local gaming store to purchase some nice detail paint brushes intended for painting gaming miniatures - worked great on the trim for this once I got the hang of them...

Finally finished painting up the Labelle open platform coach (Roof: Grimy Black with matte overcoat Body: Vermont Green with gloss overcoat Platforms: Steam Power Black with gloss overcoat). Windows are still awaiting the proper glue (I left the top unglued for now) but it's about time to think...

Getting to the point where I'm about ready to install windows, supplied as sheets of acetate, on my Labelle coach car. If I remember correctly, CA can cause crazing in clear plastic - what's the right glue to use for this purpose?

I've been slowly (SLOWLY) working through the Labelle open coach platform kit - https://www.labellemodels.com/1883-open-platform-coach-p-38.html I'm a bit stuck on a particular bit of instruction and am hoping someone can either confirm my assumptions or set me straight. The instructions say...

Forgive the long background in advance, please, but I think it's relevant :) I bought a whole bunch of HO scale stuff around 10 years ago. Then life got in the way, and I packed it up and stored it away. A good bit of that time things were stored in an unconditioned attic space. Fast forward to...

I found an old "Scenery Kit" purchased probably 10 years ago. It has a bottle of Woodland Scenics Scenic Cement included. It was somewhat separated, but after a good shake it seems to have mixed again. Worth trying to use, or should I ditch it in favor of some fresh stuff?

See previous thread for background: https://modelrailroadforums.com/forum/index.php?threads/scratch-building-an-old-ish-caboose.34987/ I decided to try again, this time with a bit more of a plan. It didn't take long to get off track if I'm honest, but I have taken advantage of some of the...

I'm loosely targeting the late 1800s/very early 1900s granite railroads, specifically in and around Barre, VT, in HO scale - see previous (very very old) thread on building a flat car...

A very, very long time ago I posted a thread on scratch building a flatcar. For whatever reason I've dusted off the modeling supplied recently and have tried to come up with a better way to produce plans to follow when building new flatcars. My originals were hand drawn, to 100% scale, but very...

While I don't have a layout, I've decided whenever I do, it will be based on turn of the century central Vermont - Montpelier, Barre, and especially the Barre granite railroads. I've read a lot about this era, and have seen many pictures of locally built flatcars, so I decided to take a crack at...

This might be better off in the Project Room somewhere, but I couldn't decide which forum, so here you go: http://www.wired.com/design/2012/08/inside-adam-savages-toolbox/ Also contains a link to his list of tools: http://www.wired.com/design/2012/08/adam-savages-tools/ That toolbox is about...