Mogul Update

I have been making steady progress on the IHC 2-6-0 rebuild, reaching the painting and decal stage.  Now all that's left is to wire the LEDs.  The headlight will be wired to two connector pins and the resistors will be wired in the tender, along with the rear light.  The LEDs are prewired nano LEDs from Evan Designs, set into holes drilled into cast brass light housings.

Paint is all acrylic except for the brass bits.  The graphite is a craft paint called 'tin' and the red is called 'lipstick'.  The black is BLACK - not gray, or weathered black, or black warmed with red and softened with white a la John Allen, but BLACK.  I've never been a fan of painting a locomotive any color other than what it was or is in real life.  Funnily enough, I freelance.  Still, black is black.

I got a bit of an orange peel finish on the cab roof, due to the gloss varnish not going on thick enough.  I'm not happy with the way the gloss behaved - some of the paint buckled and wrinkled, but it wasn't in a place where it will be seen.  Overall the finish is fine, but I am going to look into the Tamiya varnishes as I've heard great things about them.

Once the LEDs are wired I will reassemble the loco and add final touches like the crew, coal load and bell and whistle cords.  I have cleaned paint from the tender trucks but will run the engine on DC to turn the drivers.  Weathering is something that'll happen down the road, most likely.

BTW - my most recent post on "What Vintage" has far and away surpassed any other post I've made on this blog.  Welcome to all the new readers who came by for that post.  Stick around and check out some of the other posts and feel free to comment!