This is a Kato SD40-2 painted, detailed and weathered as IC #6260. It has an MRC 1806-2 Sound Decoder (thicker green board than the original blue 1806), the MRC headlight has been replaced with the original Kato SM LED, and an 0603 LED placed into each ditchlight housing. The frame was milled out just in front of the rear truck well for a replacement Soundtraxx 10mm 8 ohm speaker/enclosure with the speaker pointing down into an opening in the truck well. The sound is better than just the original on the board setup, but was it worth all that work? I'm not sure. The headlight and ditchlights can be controlled separately although the ditchlights can't be made to flash since there are no light effects with this decoder. The ditchlights are wired in series, through a 270 ohm SM resistor, then to the motor tabs, so they are off when the throttle is at "0" but turn on and stay constant at any other throttle setting--I hope this will work in the long run, so far so good. The engine is faded and weathered to look like it has seen a lot of time in iron ore country. More construction details are in the Diesel Detailers Trainboard Group.
More vehicles being shrunk down: A 1946 Plymouth, a 1947 Buick, a 1949/50 Ford, and a 1950 Buick. The Ford was shrunk 10% from a 1/144th scale die cast, the rest were HO scale. I fixed the over-sized front wheel openings and added the side trim to the Ford. I think fender skirts were not that common but I left them on anyway. Here's a 1941 Oldsmobile, a 1941 Chevrolet, a 1950 Olds 88, and a 1946 Chevrolet 4 door. I rebuilt the front bumper on the '41 Chevrolet before shrinking it down. Fixing details on HO or larger vehicles is a piece of cake! Here is the Olds 88 in front of its 1/64th scale brother. It took me a while to figure out how to get this shrunk down from 1/64th but I finally succeeded. I spotted one of the next victims at a recent train show - a 1/43 scale '52 Cadillac 4 door that had been languishing in its box for years. You can see I already have a Hydroshrink part that is curling up as it dries. This is going to take two stages of Hydroshrink to get it down close to N scale. What a monster casting! For reference, that is an N scale CMW Dodge in the foreground.
These just came off my workbench in the last few days. I entered all three in the Pacific Model Loggers' Congress modeling contest. The last one, the saw filer's shack, placed third in its category.
I just started work shrinking an IHC Mack CF ladder truck. I didn't know setting the parts up for casting would be so involved. I am trying to make clean, easy castings using several parts (cab, body, turntable etc). So far I have the casting resin, with apressure pot on the way. I still need to get the RTV, Naphtha, and Hyro-Shrink. At least i'm on my way.
Daniel, be careful when trying to cast several parts out of Hydroshrink that you intend on fitting back together. You will get quite variable results out of different batches, depending on the mix ratio of water used. It's okay to have several different molds as long as you can fill them all with the same batch of Hydroshrink, but remember you must work very quickly! Better yet, you could make several cavities in the same mold for the various parts, so that you can quickly pour the Hydroshrink into the different areas without stopping.
Thats exactly my plan. A single side mold will cover three parts so I can pour all the parts in one motion. What was your formula for a 54% reduction instead of the advertized 51% reduction?
With Hydroshrink, it is difficult to get the exact reduction you are looking for. Once in a while I get a perfect N scale part with no flaws but that is mostly luck. It is almost better to mix the Hydroshrink something like 1.1 to 1.2 parts to 4 parts water, which will guarantee that it doesn't get too small. Then make an RTV mold mixed with Naphtha to fine tune it. I usually end up with this type of ratio anyway because the un-mixed Hydroshrink has the consistency of honey and can be a little difficult to control. This is especially true when the bottle is near full. Plus, one of the tough things about Hydroshrink is that you have to wait about six days to see if the part is going to be too small when it is dry. I've ended up with a few vehicles that looked pretty close to Z scale...
What don't I like here. Some good work being shown here from that pink caddie, to the SD-40, and the saw filer's shack. Good job all. I installed the last pilot house/cabin on my hulls today and just have to place the top roofs on them. Next comes installing the cargo hatches and the rails. Made a good size parts order today for ship parts and they had everything but the Plastruct railing, dangit. Also ordered three tenders and some GN steam decals along with some more detail parts. Then I ordered a 89 foot ship that a certain catologue outfit has on sale this month. Noticed that Sylvan which makes ships, vehicles, and some ship parts seems to have disappeared from the manufacturers lists of some venders. By chance does anyone know if they were acquired by Sea Port Model Works?
Sylvan is still around, I'm not sure why they are not carried by some US distributors. I just got a shipment today from a well stocked place in PA.
IMHO Clare would never sell Sylvan to Seaport. If you look at the quality and detail fedelity, you would know what I mean. Clare is planning on lots more models in N scale. Many are near production. These were all HO kits shrunk using resins. The quality of the work is fantastic. I persnally can not wait for the American LaFrance 700 pumper, which was introduced in 49 or 50. It should apeal to many transition modelers out there.
Well that is good news since I saw nothing on either companies website to indicate either buying the other. I have some of thier stuff from awhile back and all good quality. Since I literally have nothing left in this area, except up in Baltimore and can't find them listed amongst the suppliers hereon the board I'll probably have to go direct for a few items.
Sandhouse got its exterior walls up and painted. But construction has stalled, due to arrival of another beautiful northern.
hot dang Tony, that's gorgeous!! 90 star decals. Sounds as tedious as decalling a 5 unit spine car w/ all the individual warning labels . Beautiful work.
