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Kitbashing a Rock Island hybrid in N scale


cessed slot in the short hood. The old headlight housing in the short hood of the RS-2 had to be re- moved with a micro-chisel and sanded smooth. I then used styrene cement to glue in a plug made from .090″ styrene rod which was then sanded smooth with the nose. A new headlight mount- ing pad was fashioned from a piece of .010″ styrene cut to size and the new Pyle type casting was glued in place. I drilled two No. 74 holes through the casting and plug for the installation of fiber optic strands at the end. The strands were cut for the rebuilt head- light with the “lens” end bells formed with a soldering iron. Further detailing included front and rear air hoses bent from .012″ stainless steel wire with crushed ends to simu- late the glad hands. Two of the round grabs on the short hood end were bent from .008″ phosphor-bronze wire, and the piping on the long hood between the sets of louvers was formed with .012″ stainless steel wire.


Before the all-weather window was drilled and mounted, I traced the com- ponents onto clear styrene to cut out pieces for the replacement windows.


The styrene was mounted with Krystal Klear after the final weathering to maintain their clarity. Prior to painting I made sure that the cab, sill and hood pieces fit correctly over the TCS de- coder. I painted the engine with Polly Scale RI Maroon and SAL Yellow applied with an airbrush. The yellow hood ends were painted first and masked off for the maroon. I had to mix in a few drops of Engine Black to get the right hue seen in the prototype pictures. The in- side of the shell was also painted with flat black near the headlights to pre- vent light from leaking out of the shell, and the LED’s on the decoder were also covered with shrink tubing to help guide light to the lenses. After the shell dried, I sprayed sever- al light coats of Future®


gloss clear as a


base for decaling. All of the decals used are from various Microscale sets. The non-standard spacing of the stacked billboard lettering required the decals to be cut into individual letters to fit the prototype’s locations. (The spacing on both sides is different, as can be seen in photographs). Also, the white frame stripe had to be cut into pieces to


Bill of materials:


BLMA No. 11 Early style cut levers No. 60 18″ Grab irons (some bent to fit the curved hood) No. 90 Lift rings No. 100 M.U. hoses (some trimmed to match pictures) No. 224 Nathan K5HR24 horn


JnJ


Pyle type headlight No. 166 Number boards


MLE Scale Models N-04 All-weather windows


Detail Associates No. 229-8207 Spark arrestors (flared) No. 229-3504 .012″ Stainless steel wire (brass wire would probably be easier to bend)


Tichy Train Group No. 1100 .008″ Phosphor bronze wire


Evergreen Scale Models No. 9006 .010″ Sheet styrene


Microscale Decals No. 60-18 No. 60-527 No. 60-4280


Plastruct FOP-20 .020″ Fiber optic strand


Sunrise No. N-251 Bell


Gold Metal Models No. 32 Diesel loco stanchions


The big change to the model came with the addition of an EMD long hood from an Atlas GP9. The two original exhaust stacks on the roof have been replaced by spark arrestors.


fit between the stanchions and accom- modate the “F” front decal on the long hood end. The ACI decals were mount- ed on .010″ styrene pads that were cut to size and glued to the sill. Weathering was applied with an air- brush using thinned Polly Scale UP Dark Gray (9:1 ratio) on the under- frame and hood and carefully layered to prevent obscuring of the hood base coat. A wash of Oily Black (5:3) was used in some areas on the sill and adja- cent to the cab, but was also applied full strength for oil spills on the side of the cab and on the air tanks. Washes of Grimy Black (9:1) were used to backfill the fans and grilles to give them an il- lusion of depth. I created rust spots and patches (most notably around the rebuilt headlight) with Liquitex Raw and Burnt Umber, using a pin and toothpick to apply these acrylics. After all the weathering dried, a final flat coat was sprayed on with Tamiya X-21 Flat Base mixed with Future (3 parts flat to 8 parts Future).


52 MARCH 2012


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