Canadian National F-7's

[CNR Glen]

I just finished my F-7 a and b unit project. I started with a pair of Bachmann plus engines. The A was undecorated and the B was painted on Pennsylvania. A quick dip in 99% isoprpyl alcohol took care of the B's paint.
I used a detail associates Stewart F-unit detail set on both. That gave them the ladder grabs, nose grabs, coupler cut bars, lift rings and MU hoses. A quick email to Minatures By Eric got the roof mounted bell, horn, windshield wipers, winter hatches and back up light on the A unit. I had to modify the cut bars to fit since they weren't designed for this model.
I also replaced the number boards on the A with a cast metal set from Details west.
I left the grabs, wipers, horn, bell and MU hoses off for painting but drilled the holes for them. I attached all the other parts with thick CA.
Unfortunetly i don't have pictures of the shells before the painting started but I have pictures of the rest of the process.
I used tru-line acrylic paint for the green and yellow, airbrushed of course.
here's the A shell in yellow and asked off for spraying the green.

I do like the grill detail moulded into the shell. I was going to add a detail associates stailless steel grill but decided to leave it off.
The green has been painted here. I used microscale decals on the engine and used the scemeatic included with the decals to figure out the masking. This has got to be one of the hardest masking jobs I've done.

I flourescent light in my spray booth made the green look lighter than it really is.
The decalling was a real challenge. The separation between the green and yellow has a narrow black pinstripe. I unfortunetly made a mistake in the masking and the yellow stripe is just a bit too wide. The 'Canadian National' it supposed to be under the rivet belt line but I did manage to squeeze it under the porthole.

 

[Old 97]

Looks great! I love the green and yellow scheme.

 

[CNR Glen]

Thank you. That era has always been a favorite of mine as well.

I finished the decaling with the chevron and CNR emblem on the nose. The chevron has it's own challenges as well with trying to line it up correctly and keeping it from breaking (it's all one piece) I numbered the A unit 9132 and the B 9133. CN numbered it's A's in even numbers and B's in odd. For some strange reason the side numbers ran a bit when I installed them but weathering took care of that.

To paint the ladder and hand grabs I inserted them all in a piece of corrugated cardboard and sprayed them flat black. Much easier than trying to paint them all by hand or even worse, after installing tem on the model.

All the other details were installed, grabs, MU hoses, wipers, ect. Then re-installing the shells back on the chassis. Bachmann doesn't make a dummy B so I had to buy a powered one that I didn't need. I did, however have an athearn F-7 dummy chassis that the bachmann B-unit shell fit right over. I'll use the powered chassis for another project down the line. I also used kadee's Bachmann F-7 coupler kit on the A. I'll be trying to find a set of short-shank couplers for the B to shorten the distance between the two.
Here the finished engines are before weathering:

And after:

I wanted the look of a set of hard working but well maintained engines that maybe should visit the wash racks soon. The lower parts (fuel tank, skirts, lower body and pilot) were first airbushed with grimey black, followed by dirt. The trucks got the grimey black, dirt and a spray of rust of the back shoes, followed again by grimey black to tone the rust down just a bit. The couplers also got the grimey black/ rust treatment. These were all Poly-S colors.
I used Testors Model master acrylic flat black on the roofs to simulate deisel soot and exhaust. spraying around the stacks and then feathering out away from them. (I experimented on a scrap shell first)
After that I brush painted the stainless kick plates on the ladder into the cab and called it finished. I might add some fuel spills off the tank yet, haven't decided.

 

[Rico]

Very nice Glen!
And just the right amount of weathering too.

 

[Railrunner130]

Very nice job!