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| SPMW 790 and 438 where we left off on July 18, 2021. |
In this post I'll be finishing the kitbashing and getting both models close to finished with painting and lettering.
Continuing Modifications
SPMW 790 - Adding Handrail
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| SPMW 790 with soldered handrail stanchions. |
In the last post on this car, I had cleaned out the grabirons, replaced them with wire 'dropped' grabs. Twelve grab irons are needed for this model. I also drilled the ends for air hoses, which will be installed after the paint and decalling is completed.
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| Cal-Scale 190-289 brass brake wheels used to replace plastic Walthers brake wheel |
I decided to use some Cal-Scale 190-289 brass brake wheels. I mounted a spare ratchet and pawl off an OwlMtModels F-50-series flatcar on the wire brake staff. The brake wheel is solder in place on the top of the brake staff.
SPMW 438 - Windows & Finishing Details
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| SPMW 438 - Cropped photo from Eddie Sims collection, circa 1958-1962 probably. |
I'm not sure the reason for the two different smokejacks on the prototype car. The one in the right side of the photo is the standard top seen on the SP's regular cabooses, so this might be for a normal stove. I've not been able to get any drawings for the interior layout of this special type of support car. I could see the scale repair man possibly having one end of the car set up as living quarters, and the other end as work shop and storage for repair equipment, unfortunately at this point I don't know, but that's my assumption. The other photo I have of the SPMW 790 scale test car is with a large ex-16 section bunk car... which may or may not be related to the scale test car's movement.
Window Frames
This is the only photo I have of the 438, so much of the function inside the car is a guess at this point, as are the windows on the other side of the car, which I decided to just mirror from this side.
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| Windows are framed with 2x4 styrene strips. |
I cut the vertical parts first, and am able to match the lengths. The top piece is then cut, slightly long to overhang the vertical frame pieces. The two bottom pieces are then cut, one being glued horizontally and the other vertically like the rest of the pieces.
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| The door was framed out. Wire grab irons formed and installed. |
For the grab irons I fabricated the 6 standard 0.012" grabs from the OMM F-50-series jigs. The vertical grabs needed for the modified door, measuring 40" scale. For custom length grabs I use my serrated tipped needle-nose pliers to hold the wire and provide an edge to make the sharp 90 degree bends. The end points of the grabs are marked with my carbide scribe and then drilled with a No.78 drill bit.
Smokejacks
The stacks on the SPMW 438 are from
City Classic's HO Roof Top Detailing Set, the SP smoke jack is shown above the skylight on their website. The rest of the detailing set are useful for other projects.
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| Right A-end shortened upper smokejack installed on small styrene platform. |
The top of the SP smoke jack is cut down and used at the A-end of the car. I fabricated a small platform out of a 2x4" styrene strip and a small square of 0.02" styrene sheet to form a level platform for the stack.
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B-End with brake staff and wheel installed, grabs, and lower smoke jack.
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The remaining part is used at the B-end of the car with the tip pointed.
Center Step Assembly
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Here's the first step of center step fabrication and installation.
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The center steps are formed from 0.020" PB wire to fit the two pre-drilled holes.
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| Lastly I formed the center steps and soldered an upper step rung across between them. |
A rung is cut to fit between the vertical parts and is soldered in place.
Roping Staples
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Here's a bottom view of the Roping Staples installed.
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Roping staples are installed under the bolsters. I cut notches in the frame to accept the OMM 1010 roping staples. I'm still working through the prototype photos as to the exact orientation of the staples, and the B-50-10 staples might be different, but I think this will work for now.
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| Roping Staple installed on Bolster |
The castings are rotated down 90 degrees from the usual installation on the F-50-series flatcars. A hole is drilled along the edge of the side and I notched the bolster to accept the shelf of the roping castings.
Brake Cylinder & Rods
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| Spare AB Cylinder taken from OMM 2002/2003 F-50-series kit. |
I decided to upgrade this car to use an OMM AB Brake Cylinder and hand brake rod. Later on I can fabricate some brake levers and brake rods to connect to the trucks.
Trucks
The prototype used Vulcan trucks with leaf springs, which will require some further tinkering. At this point some shop Kadee sprung Vulcan trucks are test installed. I'm not sure if I'll take the coil springs out of these sprung trucks and fabricate some leaf springs, like I've done with some of my cabooses in the past, or if I'll get a new HGC set of Vulcans from Kadee.
Part of the issue with both the RC Andrews which I had on the car earlier when it was primer sand color and the sprung Vulcans is that the car rides too high. Removing the springs and fabricating shorter height leaf springs will allow me to lower the height of the car at the bolster-sideframe joint, and also make the trucks rigid, which I prefer, but I'm not sure that's the way I want to go with it.
Painting & Lettering
These two cars are painted with Star Brand Black on the 790 and SP Freight Car Red (FCR) on the 438 with a double-action
Iwata TRN-1 airbrush.
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| Iwata TRN-1 Airbrush - I've used since around 2017. |
I like the TRN-1 because of the excellent grip and finger trigger, which is more comfortable to me than the 'standard' top controls of other brushes.
All decals are given a dose of Micro-Sol decal softening fluid which helps them snug down over the board details. The side lettering usually gets 4-5 doses. The first half-brush load of Micro-Sol is usually applied with the decal still slightly damp, which helps wick the Micro-Sol under the decal and the decal's already somewhat softened and able to pull the fluid in without any pre-existing airbubbles under the decal.
SPMW 790 - Scale Test Car
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| SPMW 790 nearly fully detailed and painted black |
I painted the whole car Star Brand engine black, gloss coated the vertical sides in prep for the decalling.
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| SPMW 790 painted all-black with decals from OMM 1210 and MS 87-911 sets. |
The decals themselves are a mix of sets from my "spares box" of decal fragments. The "SPMW 790" and "SCALE TEST" are from the OwlMtModels 1210 set, which is included in the 2002 and 2003 flatcar kits. The "SCALE TEST" had to be formed from nearly single letters, mixing the "RELIEF TENDER" and reporting marks. The "WT" comes from the spare tare data, along with the "3-27" from the new dates. The "BLT" comes from the MicroScale 87-911 SP single sheath boxcar set. I replaced the "100000" weight with a "8" from the tare dates section of the set.
I'm debating if I'll be painting the vertical ends of the hand rail and maybe some of the grab irons while, like the SP cabooses have. Because I don't have a photo of this car in the black scheme, I'm not sure if it had white visibility paint on the grab irons.
SPMW 438 - Scale Repair Car
Normally, I would have added a portion of either faded FCR or Light FCR to my FCR mix on the 438 but I forgot to do that. I like to vary the FCR slightly and it also would help bring out a bit more detail on the boards. This car was converted to this assignment in 1950, which is close to my modeling era, and even the gray prototype photo shows the car in pretty good condition paint-wise. I think I'll just go with the full strength FCR and then add a bit of light weathering after everything is done.
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| Decals applied to the side of SPMW 438. |
The decals for the carside came from both MicroScale 87-911 for the "SP" reporting mark and the rest is OMM 1210 set spares with individual letters forming the "SCALE REPAIR CAR" lettering. The LT WT is roughly what these cars would weigh, and I took a little liberty to put on the tare date from when the car was retired and assigned to Scale Repair service. The repack stenciling at the far right end is from the OwlMt decal set.
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| End lettering is pretty standard for SP lettering. |
The end lettering is gathered from the SPMW 87-155 set.
In Closing
The twin project of the SPMW 790 and 438 is almost done! The 790 only really needs to be clear coated to seal the decals and some light weathering on the journals. I'll install the air hoses after the paint work is done.
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| The SPMW 438 and SPMW 790 as of July 30, 2021 |
I guess at this point on the 438, I'll leave the truck modifications for a future post. I'll also need to do some finishing up with some window screen material, some light weathering, and perhaps some other small details such as running board end supports (a classic missing part from the Accurail boxcars), and I may do some door locks for the man-door.
Jason Hill
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