A few days ago Jim Shiff of Searails asked the Intermodal Z community to come forward and do personal reviews of his new Intermodal releases. I took Jim up on this offer and out of the four items to choose, I chose the IM-2 Reacher. Within a few days I had a Reacher in the mail. Last night I took a few hours to assemble and paint this new item. The instructions are all on one sheet. A faded colorful side view of the Reacher is the background on the page. Looks cool. I read the instructions, but was somewhat confused at some parts of the assembly. Once I inspected the parts I quickly understood what the instructions were stating. By the way, Searails is using a new cleaner to remove the production wax from the parts and it really makes a great difference. The kit comes in 2 main pieces. The main chassis and the boom. I'll start with the main chassis first. As I inspected the chassis, what I thought to be a muffler under the chassis is actually the two lower halves of the hydraulic cylinders. Two are conveniently attached to the bottom. You will need to carefully cut them from the bottom and sand/file them smooth. I found that a small .040" drill bit is needed to clean the wax out of the inside of the hydraulic cylinder housing. * Hydraulic cylinders- Bottom half of the cylinders (Cylinder Housing) are hollow. The top half of the cylinders (Cylinder Rod) are the size where they will fit inside the lower cylinder housing. The chassis is ready for assembly once you cut the cylinders from the bottom. No extra work needed to assemble the chassis. The boom is made where the top half of the hydraulic cylider rods are already built into the boom. Near the hook end of the boom the hydraulic cylinder rods are attached to each side. Carefully cut them away from the boom. The cylinder rods are also attached to a pivot near the back of the boom. Do not cut this. The piece is made to pivot/rotate inside of the boom. You might need to press the pivot to shift through the boom to loosen it up so it will pivot/rotate the cylinder rods down. Man o man. I wish I would have taken photos as I built it. Ugh!!! Alot better than trying to explain it without photos. All I can say is if you like my photos, and you get one, you will see what I am talking about!!!!! :teeth: Ok, I checked the fit of the boom to the chassis. Perfect fit. Also included in this deal was a Gripper and a 53' Searails container. The Gripper is unique in that it has a built in swivel to allow the container to swing and swivel round and round.. Just look at the photos!! mg: I checked the angle of the boom and then trimmed the hydraulic cylinder rod to the correct length I needed and then inserted the hydraulic cylinder housing over them. I applied CA Gel to the parts and assembled all of the Reacher. Do not glue the Gripper to the Boom. It fits in the boom hook. I used PLAID Clear Acrylic Sealer Matte to coat the assembled Reacher before painting. After drying I used PollyScale acrylic paints to airbrush and detail paint the model. The Reacher is RP printed in a light gray color so applying paint is easier than if it was printed in clear material. I applied one coat of white to the chassis as a primer before airbrushing the red. I airbrushed the boom and the gripper in black. I hand painted the details with a Testors #0 brush. Silver for the tread plates and cylinder rods and black for the tires/rims and windows. I made some decals in CorelDraw to apply to the Reacher. Since I was modeling this Reacher after a Kalmar container boom lift, I made some Kalmar decals and some double stripes. Simple but added detail makes a difference. Stripes were applied to the front fenders and the back counterweight with the words "Kalmar" on each side of the Boom. Here is a prototypical photo of the Kalmar I am modeling. Here is what my end results were!!!!! Hobo Tim
Gripper Swivel Action!!!! These three photos show the swivel action of the Gripper on the end of the Boom Hook!!! It's amazing what can be made with Acrylic RP!!! Hobo Tim
It looks good to me, admittedly non-intermodal as I am. I also want to thank you for taking your time to create this review and posting it here. It is both an excellent and informative thread. Timely, too, I would say. Thanks again. Also thanks to Jim Schiff of Searails for the new product in Z scale.
Hi Fred, you should sign up for a Railimages account at http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/ then follow their procedure to upload your pictures. Next you copy the address that your pictures are stored, and press this button then a small popup opens up where you enter the address into your post. You can also use this format:
You also see something like these on alot of construction jobsites with forks on the end for pallets. That would be a variation to build also.
A "scratch-builder" friendly feature of the SEARAILS IM-2 "Reacher" model that Tim originally suggested is that Kalmar and others use the same superstructure and engines to attach to a variety of handling equipment such as the fork lift pallette/board carrier you mention, as well as log handlers, pipe grabbers, etc. Visit the KALMAR.com site as well as others to see these examples. Jim
I wonder who have been buying up the Z automobiles? The latest letter says only 45 have been sold so far. I bought 8 of them. 45 seems low, is there any one else wanting these? I didn't buy the vette or mustang because they are both too new. The rest have been great though. None painted up yet since I'm working on the layout first.
I bought 10, and spent a couple hours superdetailing one for a foreground model at the show. A few minutes later, before I could photograph it, I looked and it was gone. Only the wheels remained glued to the layout. Someone wanted it, and broke it off my layout. I decided not to work with RP models anymore, due to their fragile nature, and the fact that all my models are displayed at shows, so must be able to take that level of abuse.
Hah-ha-ha!!! Too Funny!!!!!! Gotta keep that camera handy Robert!!! Can catch these little cars driving off!!!! Wheels or no wheels!!!! Have a great day!!! Hobo Tim
Wow, Robert, that makes me heart sick. I WANT to order some of these, at least one of each, but have been having to scrimp even for this purchase. Got hit with some huge bills at the beginning of the year that destroyed my budget (other than my one credit card indiscretion). Just now finishing paying off stuff I had ordered before the budget disappeared. If they are still available in another two months, I will be ordering all of them. I wonder if it would make more sense to use the RP pieces as masters and go back to casting the production in resin like SeaRails originally did for their early vehicle efforts? I don't mind the RP so much, but it does seem that many folks do. Randy
i bought 5 of the first offering belairs, that came with the hole in the door. i was asked if i would still accept them if they were patched, and said "yes". but the patch was a glob of something that wasn't done well and fell right out after i tried to improve it. $25 for a membership and $25 for poor quality cars. i don't have a lot more to spend on stuff like that. that and the waxy stuff all over the car changed my mind about the products. i really do like the things they are offering, and would use them, but i have to see something better for my money. now they are reporting that the products are smoother in finish with no waxy coating on them. i like that a lot. i'm watching to see how they are received. but i'm hesistant to buy a car based on a picture, knowing what i got before. the older cars don't appeal to me (i'm the opposite of chris, but he is into steam era and i'm not). now if they made a chevy/gmc pickup in the 1952 range i'd buy a lot of them. if they would make a prototype first, to show us, and then sell them, i'd probably bite, but it feels to much like a "wing and prayer" to buy from a picture in light of my previous experience. dave f.
Flash, RP stands for rapid prototype. It uses laser to fuse liquid acrylic into a 3D model. Not all RP are the same. The RP from MK4D are the best. Its almost like a normal platic car, except its more crunchy and you can't cut it. The ones from MK4D are smooth and are ready to use. The ones from MMM and Searail have laser lines and waxy substance. With the MK4D, you can use lacquer based paints. You can't use that on MMM stuff. You must use acrylic based paints.
RP Acrylic! http://www.makemymodel.com http://www.mark4design.com http://www.searails.com These comapnies use Acrylic RP machines to create the beautiful models. The material is delicate though. If too much stress is applied, it could fracture or break the material. It is a fast way to create an item and cheaper than plastic injection but has its delicate nature to take into account.Hobo Tim
Info! Searails is using a new chemical de-waxer to remove the wax from their RP items. The Reacher that I recieved in the mail was very well clean of 99% of the wax. I use to have to remove alot of the wax from their items. Very time consuming!!!! Painting must be done with Acrylic paints. It is best if you make sure the item is clean, then apply a few light coats of PLAID's Clear Acrylic Sealer Matte. When I said Light coats, I mean LIGHT COATS. Allow to each to dry. This PLAID brand Acrylic Sealer can be found at Hobby Lobby and Michael's Craft stores. By using the sealer, you will not have to apply 50 coats of paint before it looks good. The sealer helps greatly!!!! By all means apply a primer white coat or two to make other colors stand out/bright!!! What else can I add to this???? Oh, Randy made the comment of using an RP item as a cast resin master!!!! Dude, better seal it real good, I mean real good for the RTV Rubber has a tendency to vulcaniZe itself to the RP item. How do I know this!!! Hmmmmm!!! Been there, done that!!!!! :shade: Hobo Tim
So 23 out of 45 cars were bought by 3 people. I thought sales would be better than that. The newer cars are better than the 55' Chevy, but still a bit fragile. I honestly didn't understand the "car club" membership thing. I though that would commit me to buy every car weather I wanted it or not. If anything could improved I would say bulk up the under body of these. I don't need things like axles and mufflers under there. Bulk up the undersides of the bumpers. I still think they are worth the cost and don't feel ripped off at all. I just need to find time to paint them up.
