...and a Twelve Days Trail Drive update!
The white body without sides is the Baby Ruth car. In my color tests I found I got a better match to the original sides when painting the orangey-red over white. The gray car will have white ends and they're actually primed white though they're hard to see in these shots. The undersides of both cars will be black and once the primer is cured a bit longer I'll tape off the body and hit both with rattle can black. The roof of the gray-primed car will be Tuscan Red so it will need a second masking before that color will be airbrushed on.
If you look closely at the second image (right-click and open in a new tab to see it much larger) you'll see my simplified brake rigging. I tried to make brake levers from styrene and attach it to the center sill, along with a clevis formed from half a Tichy turnbuckle, my usual approach. Neither worked very well, and in the interest of time I just bent wire and glued it into a hole in the sill. Done and dusted. Another simplifying step was using the original grab irons pulled from the Baby Ruth car as roof walk supports at the end of each car.
Okay, on to the update. These cars are coming along nicely and are on track to be complete by Christmas. The cabooses are not as far along but could be ready if - and its a big IF - I really push through and make good progress each day. I'd rather not push too hard. I'm really pleased with how these projects are all coming together, but I'm also taking time to enjoy the seasonal fun like decorating the house, making treats and playing games with my family. We're getting nice sunny weather and I like puttering about in my garden, tidying the beds. So I'm planning on extending this personal challenge into the actual Twelve Days of Christmas, with January 6, 2021 the new target date.
Look for an end-of-year review and resolutions post soon. Thanks for reading, and I hope you all have a blessed holiday season.
No comments:
Post a Comment