I tried stainless wire once for a radio antenna on top of a car. Same issue. You may end up trying more than one material before you find one that works for you.
Espeefan's Passenger Car Modeling
- Thread starter Espeefan
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I have an answer for your radio antenna. Paint brush bristles . they bend and can be bent right back.
That's those cheap Chinese figures. You get like 90 for $13. The box of seated painted Preiser figures is like $45 for 40 or so. The Preiser figures are detailed better and have more variety, but as you've seen, once the car is buttoned up it's hard to tell. I only use the Preisers in high visibility areas as in the Rapido domes I populated. I also have some Walthers dome cars for the Super Chief, and the City of Los Angeles that I used those for. Preiser even has a set of diners. The COLA had a dome diner. The Preiser dining figures came with their legs pre-amputated! They thought of everything! 
Not terribly anger provoking or even a big surprise as they were probably somewhere between 30 and 40 years old. Decals do have a life span. Only the old Champ sets would be usable after this much time, and they have accuracy problems in some cases. I had foreseen this and had plenty of Thinfilm sets on hand. I did have to assemble car numbers individually though. Each car is numbered correctly for its class, or in the case of the lounge, for the Oliver Millet per photographs. I spent a bit of time in the SP Historical Society's passenger car books making sure lettering and placement were correct. Fiddly work but worth it. Repeat after me: "Model Railroading is fun, Model Railroading is fun...."
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wheeler1963
Wheeler's Trains
Well I got everything black repainted, came out really glossy, but that's what he wanted.
I have an answer for your radio antenna. Paint brush bristles . they bend and can be bent right back.
Attachments
OK boys and girls (if there are any), it's interior time. Up until now, I've been cutting up Walthers interiors and using them as a base, then gluing them to the body rails as shown on page 4 here. These cars are a little different. No body rails. That may actually make things easier, as I can glue parts directly to the car floor. Some gymnastics will be necessary to clear the cross braces, but I think I can make that work. All three cars use this method of construction as shown below:
Now it's time for "Confessions of a Pack Rat". Some years ago a dear old friend passed away. I and a group of friends had done considerable work on his layout, and when he decided to begin liquidating, I spent a rather large amount of money on models, and among other things his tools and most importantly his parts cabinets. These things are a gold mine. Everything from Kadee spikes, to Grandt Line doors and windows, axle stock, drive line components, Campbell Scale corrugated roofing, NWSL parts, brass Loco spare parts, you name it, it's probably in one of the many drawers! Among the goodies was a fairly large stock of passenger car interior parts. There were three varieties. As shown below, from top to bottom, a Walthers coach interior, what I'll call strip seats since they are strips of six seats (no idea who made them), but there a bit more closely spaced than the Walthers interior seats, which is going to work out better. Nest up we have paired pot metal seats. These are Walthers part # U664. Old stuff, but nice considering. At the bottom we have a history lesson. Old milled wood seats and components that used to be an add on for the old Walthers wood and metal sides kits. Those things actually built into nice cars with a little patience. Today you'd have to add improved detail parts as they used stuff like staples and nails for detail parts! I have about a half a dozen of those things around here that I'll probably never get to. 
After looking at this stuff I tried mocking things up. I ended up with this:
Looking at the seating diagrams, these cars had bench style seats. The layout was essentially "every seat gets a window". This is never going to happen unless the car and interior are designed together, or unless you have unlimited time and energy to fuss with things. It usually ends up as "close enough is good enough" or "don't kill yourself adding detail nobody is going to notice" unless you're going for a merit award at a NMRA convention. The brutal truth here is the viewing public is going to notice that you have populated the cars, and that's about it. The strip style seats get awfully close so I'm going to use them. Next step is to paint a bunch. My pics show tan colored seats so tan it will be! Notice they even have left and right versions so the arm rests are in the right place. How neat!
Now it's time for "Confessions of a Pack Rat".
Some years ago a dear old friend passed away. I and a group of friends had done considerable work on his layout, and when he decided to begin liquidating, I spent a rather large amount of money on models, and among other things his tools and most importantly his parts cabinets. These things are a gold mine. Everything from Kadee spikes, to Grandt Line doors and windows, axle stock, drive line components, Campbell Scale corrugated roofing, NWSL parts, brass Loco spare parts, you name it, it's probably in one of the many drawers! Among the goodies was a fairly large stock of passenger car interior parts. There were three varieties. As shown below, from top to bottom, a Walthers coach interior, what I'll call strip seats since they are strips of six seats (no idea who made them), but there a bit more closely spaced than the Walthers interior seats, which is going to work out better. Nest up we have paired pot metal seats. These are Walthers part # U664. Old stuff, but nice considering. At the bottom we have a history lesson. Old milled wood seats and components that used to be an add on for the old Walthers wood and metal sides kits. Those things actually built into nice cars with a little patience. Today you'd have to add improved detail parts as they used stuff like staples and nails for detail parts! I have about a half a dozen of those things around here that I'll probably never get to. After looking at this stuff I tried mocking things up. I ended up with this:
Looking at the seating diagrams, these cars had bench style seats. The layout was essentially "every seat gets a window". This is never going to happen unless the car and interior are designed together, or unless you have unlimited time and energy to fuss with things. It usually ends up as "close enough is good enough" or "don't kill yourself adding detail nobody is going to notice" unless you're going for a merit award at a NMRA convention. The brutal truth here is the viewing public is going to notice that you have populated the cars, and that's about it. The strip style seats get awfully close so I'm going to use them. Next step is to paint a bunch. My pics show tan colored seats so tan it will be! Notice they even have left and right versions so the arm rests are in the right place. How neat!
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That might work for a locomotive antenna, but this antenna is used on passenger cars. It runs most of the roof length and sits on queenposts. See page 5 here, fourth page from the bottom.
Painted up a batch of seats. Floquil Depot Buff, and some acrylics for the headrests and chair arms.
Getting them oriented is next. The fourth row from the car end will have to be cut out and placed on top of the cross brace, and enough clearance so the screw doesn't interfere. The aisle will be a little skinny but I don't think that'll be very noticeable. Easier than gluing them to the body rails on the other cars! I'm not going to bother with rest room details. I'll just frost those windows.
I had thought this car was test run only but I was mistaken. Looking at the coupler knuckles, it has been operated, and the wheels were filthy! Also, when I went to open the car, one of the truck kingpins had a pronounced list. Someone started it off center probably after a truck removal and cross threaded the dickens out of it. Amateurs! I had to re-tap/chase the threads of the bolster and make sure the kingpin started correctly. This is pre-owned brass!
Getting them oriented is next. The fourth row from the car end will have to be cut out and placed on top of the cross brace, and enough clearance so the screw doesn't interfere. The aisle will be a little skinny but I don't think that'll be very noticeable. Easier than gluing them to the body rails on the other cars! I'm not going to bother with rest room details. I'll just frost those windows.
I had thought this car was test run only but I was mistaken. Looking at the coupler knuckles, it has been operated, and the wheels were filthy! Also, when I went to open the car, one of the truck kingpins had a pronounced list. Someone started it off center probably after a truck removal and cross threaded the dickens out of it. Amateurs! I had to re-tap/chase the threads of the bolster and make sure the kingpin started correctly. This is pre-owned brass!
Morning All! Started installing seats this morning. I was going to cut the seat strips apart and put one seat on each side of each cross brace. The window spacing actually worked out for this. Then Murphy threw me a curve. The dreaded cold solder joint! One of the cross braces just about came off in my hand. I checked the other. Same thing but not as serious. These braces are butt soldered to the car sides in a jig during assembly. I could have re-soldered, but I'd have needed to make my own jig. These things have to be square, and at the correct height or you get issues with body seating and such. It was irritating, and I could see where a previous owner had tried to fix at it, then chickened out. I don't blame him. The car isn't a true Coach Olive, which you can see if you look closely at the diaphragms vs the body. Soldering would have damaged the paint, and I couldn't be sure I'd match it properly, so I just removed the two braces. The floor will still mount to the car ends, and the mount won't be subject to much stress. Welcome to Korean brass, where cold solder joints are an art form! Swear jar 1/4 full. 
See all those projections forward of the seats? Those are tabs and sprues from underbody details. You can't grind them flush as the underbody details would fall off, so I grabbed the trusty Dremel and a burr bit, and ground out clearance areas so the seats would sit flat.
I mark the areas with a Sharpie so I'll know where to grind. You won't be able to tell once the car is assembled. Once again, canopy glue! it looks sloppy but again, it shrinks and dried clear. I have to take a short break after each strip of seats, so things don't move around until the glue sets up. After this, figures, and window shades!
I mark the areas with a Sharpie so I'll know where to grind. You won't be able to tell once the car is assembled. Once again, canopy glue! it looks sloppy but again, it shrinks and dried clear. I have to take a short break after each strip of seats, so things don't move around until the glue sets up. After this, figures, and window shades!
Here's the finished car. It tracks well, but has an intermittent short in one of the trucks. I've had a spate of bad luck with these lately. It'll need troubleshooting. Aside from that, it looks good if I do say so myself. You can't see much of the figures from this angle, but the presence of them. as well as seats and window shades does a lot for the car's appearance. viewing angles at the club are waist to mid chest level. from track level viewing is the best. This is why I say when adding detail consider what will be seen.
I'll try and post a track level view later.
I'll try and post a track level view later.
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Having intermission folks! I'm going to be out of town for a week or so. OTOH, the diaphragms and decals I need for the cars showed up yesterday, so I'm no longer "A-WOP" or Awaiting Parts as we used to say back in the Naval Aviation days! I promised a better shot of teh T&NO coach. Here you go:
Sorry about the glare, but I had to use a little supplemental lighting! Now you see why I don't paint coach interiors. Just domes!
Sorry about the glare, but I had to use a little supplemental lighting! Now you see why I don't paint coach interiors. Just domes!
I got to looking in project folders on the computer after I mentioned that great deal I got on a never run brass Westside Models GS-4 some years ago at the MAD City show. I have a number of these models in the collection. I think I probably posted some of this over on the Coffee Shop forum who knows how long ago. While the MT class 4-8-2's are my favorite SP steamer, the relevance of the GS class 4-8-4's can't be understated if you are an SP guy. Grom GS-1 through GS-6, there are eleven in my collection. That's probably overdoing it but overdoing it is what I do.
A point of interest with these Westside models is that the boxes say "Factory Painted" but you can tell that the factory painted part of the label is a stick on added later. This is the story behind that. I never knew Dick Truesdale. He was a fighter pilot in WW2, flew Corsairs I believe. He was an avid model railroader who excavated a basement under his existing house in California so he could have a layout. He founded and owned Westside models and imported some of the best HO and O brass models ever done. I spoke with him once on the phone, arranging the purchase of one of his personal models when he was liquidating his collection. He was a friend of a friend, the fellow in California I did so much painting for (mentioned previously). He imported several runs of GS models, and as time was coming to an end for Westside he brought in a run of GS-4s. They were originally unpainted. Because of this, they sat, even though they were very well detailed for the time, and very good runners and pullers. With a deteriorating relationship between the dollar and the Yen, and the builder knocking on the door for payment, he needed to move them. To do this he enlisted several SF Bay area painters, and they painted most of the models. A few unpainted did sell. These are uncommon. Once painted, they sold out! There were a few things that weren't quite right that I fixed on mine. They had silver pilots, wrong for that era. They also had black smokeboxes and fireboxes. This is correct for early GS-2's and maybe some -3s, but once they went into service and after some maintenance graphite paint replaced the black there. Here is the model from the factory:
Silver pilot, unpainted drivers and lead truck wheels, no decals, black smokebox and firebox. Below is the model after correction and decaling:
The silver pilot did eventually happen, later when the GS class was moved over to freight service and lost their Daylight livery. Even in black, they still look good!
At an open house I filled up the steam yard with them, a GS-2, 3, 4, and a 5. They are decorated for different appearances in their lives. Most have the aluminum pilot flashing removed. it got dinged up pretty fast and got removed. Some have Daylight emblems on the front of the skirts, some don't:
And there is your model railroad history lesson for today!
A point of interest with these Westside models is that the boxes say "Factory Painted" but you can tell that the factory painted part of the label is a stick on added later. This is the story behind that. I never knew Dick Truesdale. He was a fighter pilot in WW2, flew Corsairs I believe. He was an avid model railroader who excavated a basement under his existing house in California so he could have a layout. He founded and owned Westside models and imported some of the best HO and O brass models ever done. I spoke with him once on the phone, arranging the purchase of one of his personal models when he was liquidating his collection. He was a friend of a friend, the fellow in California I did so much painting for (mentioned previously). He imported several runs of GS models, and as time was coming to an end for Westside he brought in a run of GS-4s. They were originally unpainted. Because of this, they sat, even though they were very well detailed for the time, and very good runners and pullers. With a deteriorating relationship between the dollar and the Yen, and the builder knocking on the door for payment, he needed to move them. To do this he enlisted several SF Bay area painters, and they painted most of the models. A few unpainted did sell. These are uncommon. Once painted, they sold out! There were a few things that weren't quite right that I fixed on mine. They had silver pilots, wrong for that era. They also had black smokeboxes and fireboxes. This is correct for early GS-2's and maybe some -3s, but once they went into service and after some maintenance graphite paint replaced the black there. Here is the model from the factory:
Silver pilot, unpainted drivers and lead truck wheels, no decals, black smokebox and firebox. Below is the model after correction and decaling:
The silver pilot did eventually happen, later when the GS class was moved over to freight service and lost their Daylight livery. Even in black, they still look good!
At an open house I filled up the steam yard with them, a GS-2, 3, 4, and a 5. They are decorated for different appearances in their lives. Most have the aluminum pilot flashing removed. it got dinged up pretty fast and got removed. Some have Daylight emblems on the front of the skirts, some don't:
And there is your model railroad history lesson for today!
Either that or she's an amputee with a huge rack!Hey the interior turned out great!
Had to look twice at “Helen” in the green dress tho, I’m guessing her arms are crossed and those aren’t….. well you know.
View attachment 258547
That's those cheap Chinese figures. You get like 90 for $13. The box of seated painted Preiser figures is like $45 for 40 or so. The Preiser figures are detailed better and have more variety, but as you've seen, once the car is buttoned up it's hard to tell. I only use the Preisers in high visibility areas as in the Rapido domes I populated. I also have some Walthers dome cars for the Super Chief, and the City of Los Angeles that I used those for. Preiser even has a set of diners. The COLA had a dome diner. The Preiser dining figures came with their legs pre-amputated! They thought of everything! Further comments on figures: You stirred a memory Rico! Back when I first got serious about this hobby there was a guy in a club I belonged to. Mikey will remember him. He went down the figure rabbit hole. He would cut and splice figures to get what he wanted. He would liquefy styrene by mixing it with MEK and make skirts for women figures. He had a nudist colony on his narrow gauge layout which also had amazing structures, all wood or cast resin, and mostly scratched or kitbashed. The nudist colony was a hoot, and oh boy the things some of those figures were doing! 
You had to look for them like easter eggs, but if you had a sharp eye, you could spot some NSFW scenes! He also had an amazing collection of Vargas pinups. Interesting fellow.
You had to look for them like easter eggs, but if you had a sharp eye, you could spot some NSFW scenes! He also had an amazing collection of Vargas pinups. Interesting fellow.Morning All! Back at the bench! All of the painting, plumbing, and other work being done around here has disrupted modeling time rather severely this past month. I'll be getting back to the passenger cars shortly, but I happened upon an opportunity recently that will appeal to the frugal among us. I happened upon an estate sale and picked up quite the haul. Eight Stewart F units in SP's Black Widow, three Proto 1000 F units in the Santa Fe freight livery, and a few other odds and ends. An SP ABBA set of both F-3's and F-7's. These have the Kato drive, and as you may know, it doesn't get better when it comes to mechanisms!
The gentleman who owned these was an accumulator of the first order! These have never been out of the box, as you can see. No details installed, and they still have the old horn hook couplers! I'm going to detail these up and weather them rather heavily. Detail Asscoiates used to make a decent dress up kit for these which is sadly out of production, and now pretty much Unobtanium. I seem to have an affinity for Unobtanium for some reason! Fortunately, Cal-Scale offers something I can use, and I can always bend railings if I must! These models are not up to modern standards. The Athearn Genesis F's set the bar pretty high, but they are quite serviceable and dolling them up will be fun.
I decided almost right away that I would not install sound in these. I'm past everything needing to make noise, and I really didn't want to drop close to a grand for sound decoders and speaker sin one fell swoop. As part of the loot, I picked up enough non-sound decoders to get them all DCC'd. These units don't have any "DCC ready" language on the boxes. I believe they pre-date that particular marketing language. They are pretty easy to decoder though. The stock board comes out with two screws. I take it off and bin it, but I do save the phosphor bronze wires for later.
The decoders are older Digitrax, DH-165-AO's. Older stock, but they'll do. They go in easy, though in the below photo I have them in upside down! It happens. It's a habit from steam loco installs. Smooth side down! I found out when I had to solder a wire to a pad for a function. I'm leaving them as is. Once the shell is on, nobody will know! Note I used the phosphor bronze wires for the track power leads They're getting Athearn LED's, and I'm awaiting detail part packages from eBay. More on these later! Meanwhile, back to the passenger cars. What can I say? Short attention span!
The gentleman who owned these was an accumulator of the first order! These have never been out of the box, as you can see. No details installed, and they still have the old horn hook couplers! I'm going to detail these up and weather them rather heavily. Detail Asscoiates used to make a decent dress up kit for these which is sadly out of production, and now pretty much Unobtanium. I seem to have an affinity for Unobtanium for some reason! Fortunately, Cal-Scale offers something I can use, and I can always bend railings if I must! These models are not up to modern standards. The Athearn Genesis F's set the bar pretty high, but they are quite serviceable and dolling them up will be fun.
I decided almost right away that I would not install sound in these. I'm past everything needing to make noise, and I really didn't want to drop close to a grand for sound decoders and speaker sin one fell swoop. As part of the loot, I picked up enough non-sound decoders to get them all DCC'd. These units don't have any "DCC ready" language on the boxes. I believe they pre-date that particular marketing language.
They are pretty easy to decoder though. The stock board comes out with two screws. I take it off and bin it, but I do save the phosphor bronze wires for later. The decoders are older Digitrax, DH-165-AO's. Older stock, but they'll do. They go in easy, though in the below photo I have them in upside down!
It happens. It's a habit from steam loco installs. Smooth side down! I found out when I had to solder a wire to a pad for a function. I'm leaving them as is. Once the shell is on, nobody will know! Note I used the phosphor bronze wires for the track power leads They're getting Athearn LED's, and I'm awaiting detail part packages from eBay. More on these later! Meanwhile, back to the passenger cars. What can I say? Short attention span!
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DeaconKC
Well-Known Member
I love the Black Widows! Don't weather those too heavy as they are gorgeous, go all out on the regular paint fright guys. Looking forward to this.Morning All! Back at the bench! All of the painting, plumbing, and other work being done around here has disrupted modeling time rather severely this past month. I'll be getting back to the passenger cars shortly, but I happened upon an opportunity recently that will appeal to the frugal among us. I happened upon an estate sale and picked up quite the haul. Eight Stewart F units in SP's Black Widow, three Proto 1000 F units in the Santa Fe freight livery, and a few other odds and ends. An SP ABBA set of both F-3's and F-7's. These have the Kato drive, and as you may know, it doesn't get better when it comes to mechanisms! View attachment 262900
The gentleman who owned these was an accumulator of the first order! These have never been out of the box, as you can see. No details installed, and they still have the old horn hook couplers! I'm going to detail these up and weather them rather heavily. Detail Asscoiates used to make a decent dress up kit for these which is sadly out of production, and now pretty much Unobtanium. I seem to have an affinity for Unobtanium for some reason! Fortunately, Cal-Scale offers something I can use, and I can always bend railings if I must! These models are not up to modern standards. The Athearn Genesis F's set the bar pretty high, but they are quite serviceable and dolling them up will be fun.
I decided almost right away that I would not install sound in these. I'm past everything needing to make noise, and I really didn't want to drop close to a grand for sound decoders and speaker sin one fell swoop. As part of the loot, I picked up enough non-sound decoders to get them all DCC'd. These units don't have any "DCC ready" language on the boxes. I believe they pre-date that particular marketing language.
The decoders are older Digitrax, DH-165-AO's. Older stock, but they'll do. They go in easy, though in the below photo I have them in upside down!
View attachment 262912
Black Widows were the regular freight guys until 1958 when bloody nose started to appear. We'll see how things progress. I usually weather until they "look right" to me. As each of us has different ideas on what that is, "heavily weathered" is a subjective term. I don't intend to trash them though.
Tuesday was "Snake Bit Project Day" for me. Seems everything I touched turned to s**t! First, I needed resistors for the LEDs for those F units. I had every value but what I needed! I ended up ordering some from Amazon. Then I decided to decal the passenger cars, and Murphy struck again! I grabbed the wrong Microscale bottle, and instead of Micro Set, I grabbed liquid decal film. It took paint right off the car, so wash, dry and back to the paint booth! With the swear jar filling up and me running low on cash I gave up and spent some time testing resistor values, and installing truck details on the Stewart F's. That was therapeutic at least! Zen modeling. Easy, and just about impossible to get into trouble with, until a brake cylinder popped out of the pliers and headed off to mother knows where. I had some spares at least.
This morning with the paint dry and the frustration factor down to a reasonable level, I went ahead and did my decal work. It took most of the day to get the three cars done, even though the lettering for SP Coach Olive cars is really easy. I wasn't taking any chances. I used Thinfilm sets on these cars, as the Microscale lettering is the wrong shade of gold, and the lettering spacing is incorrect. As I've mentioned before, Thinfilm is excellent quality, but very unforgiving of careless handling. Going slow is the only to go with them. All three cars are now lettered. Next up is a clear/flat mix over the decals, then windows. I also got the partition walls into the RPO coach to separate the RPO compartment, and the Jim Crow partition. There were also bathroom partitions, but I'm skipping those. They won't be visible anyway once the car is buttoned up.
Calling it a day. Yeaterday was exciting. I thought I'd lose the roof off the house with that terrible thunderstorm and the hail. Tonight it's raining like a cow pi**ing on a flat rock, with more to come the rest of this week. Jeez!
Then I decided to decal the passenger cars, and Murphy struck again! I grabbed the wrong Microscale bottle, and instead of Micro Set, I grabbed liquid decal film. It took paint right off the car, so wash, dry and back to the paint booth! With the swear jar filling up and me running low on cash I gave up and spent some time testing resistor values, and installing truck details on the Stewart F's. That was therapeutic at least! Zen modeling. Easy, and just about impossible to get into trouble with, until a brake cylinder popped out of the pliers and headed off to mother knows where. I had some spares at least. This morning with the paint dry and the frustration factor down to a reasonable level, I went ahead and did my decal work. It took most of the day to get the three cars done, even though the lettering for SP Coach Olive cars is really easy. I wasn't taking any chances. I used Thinfilm sets on these cars, as the Microscale lettering is the wrong shade of gold, and the lettering spacing is incorrect. As I've mentioned before, Thinfilm is excellent quality, but very unforgiving of careless handling. Going slow is the only to go with them. All three cars are now lettered. Next up is a clear/flat mix over the decals, then windows. I also got the partition walls into the RPO coach to separate the RPO compartment, and the Jim Crow partition. There were also bathroom partitions, but I'm skipping those. They won't be visible anyway once the car is buttoned up.
Calling it a day. Yeaterday was exciting. I thought I'd lose the roof off the house with that terrible thunderstorm and the hail. Tonight it's raining like a cow pi**ing on a flat rock, with more to come the rest of this week. Jeez!
I left out one other incident. Some of these old Precision Scale brass models came with specific decals. I tried to use the ones that came with the RPO coach. They disintegrated in the water.
Not terribly anger provoking or even a big surprise as they were probably somewhere between 30 and 40 years old. Decals do have a life span. Only the old Champ sets would be usable after this much time, and they have accuracy problems in some cases. I had foreseen this and had plenty of Thinfilm sets on hand. I did have to assemble car numbers individually though. Each car is numbered correctly for its class, or in the case of the lounge, for the Oliver Millet per photographs. I spent a bit of time in the SP Historical Society's passenger car books making sure lettering and placement were correct. Fiddly work but worth it. Repeat after me: "Model Railroading is fun, Model Railroading is fun...."
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