Kitbashed CNJ 4-8-0 camelback
Painted and weathered, the finished model, complete with its three-man crew, is ready for service.
chased this part, the company has sold off its line of steam engine detail parts to another manufacturer.
The tender is also a Bethlehem Car
Works kit that is a pretty close match to the CNJ tender. It required only a few minor detail changes in the way of grab irons, chains, safety rails and a tool rack. The tender is slightly too short from the drawbar to the coupler face, but it is close enough to look right. The valve gear is a mix of parts from several man- ufacturers, mostly Shelly or Cal-Scale. The steam and sand domes are leftovers from my parts box. I modified the front pilot by soldering the distinctive CNJ footboards over the boiler tube cow- catcher, just as on the prototype. I used pictures taken of the CNJ 4- 4-2 camelback at the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore, Maryland, as a general guide for the cab in- terior details. I was unable to find any pictures or diagrams of how the prototype looked. This was a good choice because it was also a Brooks product built at the same time for the same railroad; I was very lucky that an ex- ample like that escaped the torch.
The handrails and plumbing were bent from brass rod, and the equipment box on the front pilot was scratchbuilt from styrene. The pilot truck needed to have the wheel spokes filled with body filler and the axle points cut off. They also needed to have the extremely large flanges turned down with a file; this was done with
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the wheelsets chucked into a drill. I used a NorthWest Short Line Rivet- er to emboss the rivets on the model.
The air tanks came
from brass tubing filled with body putty.
For
weight, a brass slug was
pro- vided by NorthWest Short Line. The coal load is a mix of fine an-
thracite coal that I obtained from Ashley,
Pennsylvania, and some dirt to make the culm mix these engines burned at the ends of there careers. All the painting and weathering was done
turned down to fit inside the
boiler, and it brought the total weight of the model up to just under a
pound and a half. I used the biggest can motor and fly wheel that would fit inside the boiler, refugees from my parts box. They were connect- ed to the second axle with gears also
with Polly Scale paints that were ei- ther applied with an airbrush or by hand with washes or drybrushing. The decals are from a CNJ Champ set, No. EH-16. To get an appropriate crew, I kitbashed four figures from different manufacturers into the three-man crew you see on the model. The engi- neer got the most work, having to repo- sition and swap limbs to make him fit. In conclusion, this 4-8-0 camelback is a good-looking model and a well run- ning machine of a distinct prototype. I am proud to have it on my layout. The contest thread can be viewed at www.
the-gauge.net as “E-paw’s EOY chal- lenge” under the contest forum.
JUNE 2012
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