What non-auto model did you get today?

[Earl Marischal]

10 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Another HO train score, a decent size box of structure kits, freight car kits, some scenery material, and a couple of nicely weathered built-up freight cars with metal wheels, sprung trucks, and Kadees.

Just the NIB Bar Mills Staton Marine kit and the 3-fer Accurail gondola kit would have set me back considerably more on feePay than I paid for the whole mess.

Looking forward to a pleasant evening of opening all the boxes and looking at the contents. 

       

      

 

Bill,

Trying to contact you about a PIF.

steve

[Ace-Garageguy]

36 minutes ago, Earl Marischal said:

Bill,

Trying to contact you about a PIF.

steve

I cleared some message space.

[Ace-Garageguy]

Lot of 8 Proto 2000 freight car kits for less than $8 each including shipping, which is a deal.

These are quite nice, highly detailed kits that usually run at least $20. They have separate (and very fragile) ladders, grabs, steps, and other detail parts, aimed at adult modelers. The similar cars have different road numbers too, so that won't have to be dealt with later on.

Alas, a couple have been partially started, but the work is mostly OK and what's not can be camouflaged with weathering.

The five drop-end mill gondolas are appropriate for a steel mill setting.

The double-door boxcars can load either complete automobiles or, more commonly, stamped metal parts for automobile construction, so they're appropriate for a sheetmetal parts-factory setting, which could be close to a steel mill.

No real need for the stock car, as feedlots, meat packing plants, or cattle loading pens don't figure into my plans, but you never know.

   

     

 

Edited September 16 by Ace-Garageguy
punctiliousness

[Ace-Garageguy]

About 50 random packets of HO-scale detail parts, couplers, and mechanical and electrical bits, multiples of some.

Detail parts include diesel cab furnishings, air and MU hoses and stands, diesel railing upgrades, boxcar ends and doors, diesel winterization hatches, fan and radiator grilles, lights, horns, etc.

Mechanical bits are mostly gearsets for more realistic speeds of diesel locomotives.

Electrical stuff includes circuits for flashing strobes and EOT devices, and motor brushes.

Average cost about $2 each. 

   

[mk11]

Finally getting into some stuff I had in storage after dad passed away. I saved what I could of his hobby stuff, trains and such, before his wife cleared it out  

This old steamer, tender and some cars surfaced this week. Not sure which manufacturer but it's a brass 4-4-2 in what looks like O gauge. Any one know about this one?

[Ace-Garageguy]

More "antique mall" scores, including a NOS HO McKeen double 45-foot trailer kit in Burlington Northern colors, usually between $25 and $35 online & delivered, for $4. These are too long for the period I'll be modeling, but the chassis and wheels will work just fine under older, shorter shells fabbed from styrene stock.

And several NOS HO Athearn 34-foot open top hopper kits in random liveries and no repeating road numbers, for $5 each. These go for anywhere from $17 to about $30 online, delivered. I'll need a lot of coal hoppers to service the Hulett unloaders and the steel mill coke and municipal power plants, and I usually buy cheapo or broken RTRs that need weathering or parts like wheels, trucks, and Kadees to make them presentable...often for just a buck or two each...but when these nicely detailed kits come up cheap, it's hard to resist them for foreground placement.

        

My planned layout (a dream at this point, because I have no room now or in the foreseeable future EDIT: though I think I'll at least be able to build a module or two) is intended to celebrate the peak of America's heavy industrial period.

Photo below shows hoppers lined up waiting for loading under massive Huletts.

 

Edited Monday at 03:19 PM by Ace-Garageguy
punctiliousness

[Beans]

Wife picked this up at the bookstore.  It is now our project.  Mostly friction fit parts with some fiddly bits I have had to repair but overall a fun little kit so far.  

[Big John]

One for you train buffs...

[Ace-Garageguy]

Nice and cool this AM but I was creaky, moving slow, so instead of going straight to the shop, I slid by the little church car show held every first Saturday just a couple miles away. When that wrapped up, since I was in the neighborhood of one of the 'antique malls' where I sometimes find HO train stuff...

Jackpot. 32 NOS/NIB blue-box-Athearn, Accurail, and Branchline Blueprint Series freight car kits, some with high-end sprung, metal-wheel trucks and Kadees already in the boxes. Also got an old Athearn powered SDP40 in Santa Fe blue-yellow freight livery, damaged and "worked on" by some ham-handed chimp but restorable and also sporting Kadees, plus four Heljan, Con-Cor and AHM structure kits.

$5 each.  

Sad little loco, below. Box was marked in pen SD30, but it's actually an SDP40. Broken motor mount and driveshafts, buggered wiring, and a few loose handrails "reattached" to the body shell with a soldering iron...but the dual-flywheel motor runs fine, the trucks are OK, and I have the parts. Repairing everything else is pretty easy, and it needs a paint job. These were built for passenger service so wouldn't have been in freight colors (the longer squared tail houses a steam-generator for passenger car heating), and AFAIK SF never owned any anyway.

One of the structure kits, below.

The Branchline Blueprint Series kits are particularly nice, US-made, with separate ladders, grabs, doors, etc., and separate ends and roofs with nothing molded on that can be used as masters to cast more for upgrading el cheapo rolling stock.

        

 

[Earl Marischal]

11 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Nice and cool this AM but I was creaky, moving slow, so instead of going straight to the shop, I slid by the little church car show held every first Saturday just a couple miles away. When that wrapped up, since I was in the neighborhood of one of the 'antique malls' where I sometimes find HO train stuff...

Jackpot. 32 NOS/NIB blue-box-Athearn, Accurail, and Branchline Blueprint Series freight car kits, some with high-end sprung, metal-wheel trucks and Kadees already in the boxes. Also got an old Athearn powered SDP40 in Santa Fe blue-yellow freight livery, damaged and "worked on" by some ham-handed chimp but restorable and also sporting Kadees, plus four Heljan, Con-Cor and AHM structure kits.

$5 each.  

Sad little loco, below. Box was marked in pen SD30, but it's actually an SDP40. Broken motor mount and driveshafts, buggered wiring, and a few loose handrails "reattached" to the body shell with a soldering iron...but the dual-flywheel motor runs fine, the trucks are OK, and I have the parts. Repairing everything else is pretty easy, and it needs a paint job. These were built for passenger service so wouldn't have been in freight colors (the longer squared tail houses a steam-generator for passenger car heating), and AFAIK SF never owned any anyway.

 

One of the structure kits, below.

 

The Branchline Blueprint Series kits are particularly nice, US-made, with separate ladders, grabs, doors, etc., and separate ends and roofs with nothing molded on that can be used as masters to cast more for upgrading el cheapo rolling stock.

        

 

Those Blueprint kits are very nice.

 steve 

[Ace-Garageguy]

Also brought home a complete Lindberg 1/48 Snark kit. Not really cheap (different vendor from the train stuff), but less than online. 

I buggered a Snark model (Revell) when I was a kid, and always kinda wanted to do a nice job on one.

Some of the rivet detail at the fuselage seams will be tricky to get right, and I may or may not change the raised panel lines to scribed, but it's worth a shot.

[Brian Austin]

I could not resist this O Gauge 1930s cast aluminum Zephyr set,  though it's a bit compressed in length. 

Edited 38 minutes ago by Brian Austin