Happy Holidays!

 Wishing everyone a peaceful Holiday Season with family and friends.

Resin PRR X37 Build, continued

 Continuing with a detailed step-by-step description of this resin boxcar build.  The trucks and decals I ordered for this project arrived, as well as some 1/4 ounce wheel weights.  The photo below shows these and some other details that I intend to substitute for, or add to, kit furnished items.

From left to right, a Tichy AB brake set will be used for the underbody brake detail, 1/4 ounce stick on wheel weights as needed on top of the floor, will likely use a Detail Associates Equipco brake housing (#12 on sprue), Branchline 7 rung ladders are a close match for the prototype after being cut down to 6 rungs, and a Kadee Equipco brakewheel is in the upper middle.  The Bowser 2D-F15 coil elliptic trucks with steel wheels per my research, Yarmouth #220 etched brass sill steps for GSC tank cars will be modified for the corner sill steps, and Microscale set 87-1201 for the lettering with Shadow Keystone heralds round out most of the major enhancements.  I realized after the fact that I did not include the airhoses and brackets from Hi-Tech Details or the coupler lift bars (Tangent) in my photo.  

I have not yet decided whether I will use the resin “wood” running board from the kit, or substitute a Yarmouth laser cut wooden running board set.  In addition there are a few other items such as bracket grabs (Kadee or Red Caboose) and wire that will be used.  More description on these as I progress.

In my last post, I had test fit the floor into the one piece resin body after some careful sanding on the edges of the floor casting.  The fit is very snug and I was concerned about pressing the floor all the way on.  It was suggested that I drill and tap the bolsters for the trucks so that the screws could be used to help remove the floor.

The first step in doing so was to measure and locate the centers for drilling the bolsters using a small metal rule to check from side to side, verifying that there was equal material on both sides of the centerline, then marking the middle with a pencil.  The bolsters should be 5 scale feet from the end of the car, hopefully in the middle of the kit bolster.  After using a sharp probe to make a dimple, a #50 drill was used to drill through the bolster and floor, cleaning out the resin spirals as I went.  This was followed by tapping for a 2-56 screw.  The resin is soft enough that no lubricant was needed.

This photo also shows the Kadee #78 couplers and near scale draft gear boxes that will be used, although I will wait to mount these until after everything is set with the floor fit . The mounting lug at the back of the box will be removed and I will also check the coupler box overhang at the end of the car to reach six scale inches. After tapping the bolsters, I temporarily installed 3/16” long 2-56 screws so that I could continue with my floor fit check.

Putting the floor back in, I discovered that it is still just slightly long and will need more careful sanding to reduce the length, as you can see on the left side in this photo.  The floor width seems just right.  I also noted that the floor fits just too deep into the body on the right.  On the left side additional checking shows that it is about right when the floor is fully engaged on that end.  I may shim the right end to bring the floor closer to flush with the sides and end of the body.  

That’s my progress for now, and with Christmas upon us, will take this back up at the end of the week for my next installment.

Building a Resin Kit - PRR X37 Boxcar

For this first resin boxcar build, I’m going into somewhat deeper detail on the steps involved than one might typically see online, in hopes that the information may be useful for others just getting started, like me.

 In some respects, modern resin freight car kits are similar to styrene kits, containing a one piece carbody, a floor, or underbody, and various detail parts that are added. They differ in that they are all unpainted and usually require the modeler to furnish some items, such as trucks or styrene shapes and wire, and possibly decals or brake components also.  The construction steps are similar, although sometimes more involved.  Many who build resin kits will also do some research to customize the model for their modeling era or to match a specific prototype variation.  This aspect is one that I find enjoyable.

There is a great variety of prototype information available, both printed and on the internet.  This is worthy of its own post in the near future.  Kit instructions range from the greatly detailed to cursory, depending on the source.  It is worth the effort to do some searches online or to look for information and photos in reference books and magazines, if they are available to you.

After unboxing the kit and inspecting the pieces provided, it is a good idea to read through the instructions a time or two to familiarize yourself with the assembly steps.  Before you do that, you may want to wash the resin components to rinse off mold release agents and read at your leisure while the parts dry.  Dawn dishwashing detergent is frequently recommended, because it does not contain oils or additives such as lanolin that can cause issues when painting. Shout is used by some. You want a product that will clean off the parts without leaving its own residue behind.

I used a plastic food take out container and a soft bristle toothbrush to gently clean all the resin parts thoroughly before rinsing with cool water.  Then I patted them dry with paper towels and set them aside to finish air drying while I read over the kit instructions.  Now is the time to be sure you have any needed parts that are not in the kit, or to plan for substitution of kit parts if you wish.  Common examples are brake components and ladders.  I will point out several examples as the kit build progresses.

First off, I needed to get trucks, which were not included.  My research online indicated that most of the X37 cars were equipped with PRR 2D-F19 coil elliptic trucks, as mentioned in the previous post. In HO scale, there are examples of similar trucks available from Tichy and Bowser.  It seemed to me that the Bowser 40194 PRR coil semi-elliptical freight trucks had an appearance closest to the prototype, so I ordered a set.

I model 1965, so I also needed to consider the appearance of theses cars in my time frame.  The decals in the kit were for the as built Circle Keystone lettering scheme.  My research indicated that the cars had been repainted in the Shadow Keystone scheme by my modeling year.  Microscale offers a decal set 87-1201 that should provide what I need, and was ordered.

Once the major kit parts had dried, I inspected the body for flash (excess resin from the molding process).  This carbody has a fair amount of flash, including 32 “vent gates”, which are small rectangular tabs around the inside of the body near where the floor fits, as shown below.

Click to enlarge

These all have to go. I had not seen this before in other resin boxcar kits in my stash so was a bit confused at first. Some friendly folks at resinfreightcarbuilders.groups.io , an online modelers group, confirmed that I did indeed want to trim these nubs off so that the floor will fit. After a bit of pondering, I decided to use a micro saw and nippers, followed by chisels and sanding.  The JLC micro saw and Xuron sprue nippers did a nice clean job with the bulk of the gates.

You will note the N95 mask, which is good practice to wear when producing resin dust, as it can be an irritant and even toxic if inhaled in significant amounts.  The trimming was followed by my 2.5 mm wide Godhand chisel blade in a short handle to shave down most of the remaining material.I have written about this tool previously. You can find that post using the keywords on the sidebar.  This is one of my favorite tools, very versatile, with a range of chisel shapes.

Final clean up of these gates and the other thin flash on the sidesills was done with a #11 Exacto blade and several sanding sticks, ranging from 240 to 600 grit.  This work required patience and use of a magnifier to be sure it was flash and not part of the body being trimmed. The body cleaned up nicely.  I was pleasantly surprised in working with the resin material. In some ways, it seems more workable than styrene.  I did end up with a small notch in one of the side sill tabs, whether from an errant chisel or exposing a bubble in the resin, I do not know.  Squadron Green putty was used to fill it, followed by sanding once cured.

Shaving with chisel and sanding in progress

Once the gates were sanded smooth, it was time to check the fit of the floor.  It is not uncommon for resin floors to require sanding for length and/or width.  In some cases, the floor might be short, but more often it can be slightly long, as in this kit.  I used 240 grit sandpaper taped to my workbench to gradually and carefully sand the sides and ends, checking frequently for fit and squareness.  A piece of glass to tape my sandpaper to would be a good addition for my workbench.  Wear a mask during sanding to avoid inhaling resin dust.

You can see the mustard colored sandpaper and the green tape below the model.  I checked fit after a few swipes repeatedly until the floor was a tight fit.  My carbody is bowed inward slightly so I gently slid the floor in from one end.  Bowing or warping is another common challenge with resin kits.  My next post will discuss this and how I dealt with it.