Building a classic cab unit–the MLW FPA-4: Pt. I 7. 8.
7. The cut levers were fashioned from .010″ wire and a thin strip of .003″ brass shim stock. Kapton tape was used to hold the pieces in position. 8. A new headlight was made using a brass, dual sealed- beam casting which was installed in a piece of ¹⁄₄″ brass tubing. 9. New glass windows were made using masking tape templates and cut from glass microscope slide covers. 10. A drafting circle tem- plate and a scriber was used to cut the headlight lens.
9.
10.
lightly glue them in place. I used G-S Hypo Tube watch crystal cement. Fu- ture®
floor wax would also work.
The backs of the bulbs will extend slightly behind the casting. Cover them with a small strip of self-adhesive alu- minum foil tape folded in half (don’t short out the wires), which will serve as a heat sink to protect the styrene body. Although tiny LED’s could be used I prefer the appearance of incan- descent light. The glass bulbs also look like tiny lenses, better emulating the prototype’s appearance.
Cut the glazing for the cab side and door windows from microscope slide cover glass to suit the interior recesses of the body. Draw the outline of each window on a piece of smooth hard- wood, then cut the glass by placing a piece over the outline and gently scor- ing it using a diamond-tipped scriber run along a straightedge. Not much pressure is required, hard- ly more than the weight of the scriber. The key is keeping a light touch and, as with anything, practice makes perfect. Each piece can be removed from the sheet by placing the scribed line over the edge of the block and snapping it. Alternately, the waste can be snapped
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off with a pair of tweezers. Wear safety glasses and be careful not to let the scrap pieces stray. Hold each piece with tweezers and gently clean it with eye- glass cleaner and lens cleaning tissue. Store the glazing in a small envelope until after the model is painted. Make the headlight lens by using a plastic drafting circle template instead of a straightedge. (This was suggested by a friend, Gerard Van Andel.) Gently running the scriber around inside the appropriate diameter a couple of times will produce a clean circle, and adding a few radial scribes extending out- wards from the circle allows the scrap area to be snapped off using tweezers. Install the lens with tiny amounts of cement. Once the glue is dry, coat the glass with liquid frisket masking film applied with a toothpick and leave it in place until the painting and weather- ing are completed. Cement the head- light assembly in place; it projects slightly from the louvered nose trim. Use a Miniatures by Eric L13 MLW rear light casting for the backup light. Drill it to accept a brass tube with an interior diameter suitable for contain- ing a micro-bulb. Again, clean it, paint the inside silver, glue the bulb in place
and protect it with frisket film until af- ter painting. The bulb’s glass simulates the lens.
Doing the glass windshields requires a little more patience. To begin, one section of the clear Proto 2000 wind- shield casting is separated from the rest and any flash is cleaned up. Stick a piece of Tamiya masking tape onto it and carefully trace it out with a new No. 11 knife blade. Place the cut-out tape on a piece of glass, then trace around it with the scriber until a suffi- cient score is obtained. Make addition- al radial score lines to help break off the waste. Do the other side the same way. You should be able to make a win- dow that fits the shell perfectly. Store these pieces for now.
Chassis and wiring Aside from mounting the couplers,
plus cleaning and lubrication, little needs to be done to the chassis. There are two options for mounting the cou- plers. The existing frame mounting tabs are designed to retain a Kadee- style coupler shank with a U-shaped plastic clip snapped on from under- neath. Since the frame is electrically grounded to one of the rails, insulated
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