Under the dirt and grime lurks a colorful paint scheme, but the heavy weathering is quite appropriate for the time period being
be sanded down to fit under the slight overhang. Milliput putty was then added in the seams at the ends to fill any gaps. Letterboards and grabs were created the same way as the Pullman-Standard coach; however, the underframe on the Budd car proved to be a bigger challenge because of the lack of clear reference pic- tures. All underframe parts used were from the kit, and one battery box had to be cut in half and the water tank length- ened to match pictures. After painting, the styrene glazing for the windows provided in both coach kits was mounted with Krystal Klear with No. 4315 Roscolux photo filter behind it to simulate the cyan window tinting. Further modifications to the kit instruc- tions included cutting off the truck- mounted couplers from the trucks and using 36″ BLMA wheels for better rolling qualities. I also body-mounted Z scale couplers on .040″ styrene pads ce- mented to each underframe end for a more scale sized appearance.
Paint
I painted the E8 with a custom mix of Badger Modelflex Rock Island Red with D&RGW Gold (approximately four parts red to one part gold–mileage may vary as I was using very old paint) and Polly Scale SAL Yellow applied with an airbrush. The yellow nose, side stripes and engineer side door were painted first and masked off for the red. An in-
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN
modeled. Note the headlights, number boards and fire cracker an- tenna (centered just behind the horns) on the finished model.
dispensable tool that I discovered for this project was Tamiya masking tape, as it proved very useful in masking the compound curves found on the nose. The slots in the molded-on side grilles were painted Engine Black to model carbody slots behind the etched metal grilles. The inside of the shell was paint- ed with Engine Black near the head- lights to prevent light from leaking out of the shell and the LED s for each light pipe were also covered in paint except for the front surface to help guide light to the lenses. After the shell dried, I sprayed several light coats of Future® floor finish gloss clear for decaling. Both coaches were simply sprayed all around with Tamiya X-11 Chrome Sil- ver followed by several light coats of Fu- ture for decaling. The numbers and names for the coaches were chosen based on what was available in proto- type pictures and history of what was left on the roster after the Rock Island sold off and scrapped much of its pas- senger fleet in its final years. I found that Microscale actually offers two dif- ferent ROCK ISLAND letterboard spacings, with the ones on sheet No. 60-1078 be- ing correct for the cars I modeled. How- ever, the car name, Herington, had to be taken from set No. 60-1218.
All of the decals used are from various different Microscale sets. The split bill- board lettering required the decals to be cut into individual words to fit the proto-
typical locations on both sides of the cen- ter door. The fuel and water markings, side numbers and billboard lettering are from No. 60-18, the F (front) decals are from No. 60-527, and ACI tags are from No. 60-4280. The number boards proved to be a challenge since the numbers on the prototype were black on white and mismatched fonts; they were just scav- enged from my scrap box of decal num- bers for a close fit.
Weathering I applied weathering with an air- brush mainly using thinned Polly Scale UP Dark Gray (9:1 ratio) on the under- frame, nose and sides, carefully layered to represent the distinctive curved grime pattern and to prevent obscuring too much of the base coat. A wash of Oily Black (5:3) was used in some areas on the fuel tank for oil spills. Washes of Grimy Black (9:1) were used to backfill the fans and grilles for an illusion of depth. I created rust spots and patches (most notably on the nose of the E8) with Liquidtex Burnt Umber and used a pin and toothpick to apply the acrylics. The majority of the under- frame on the passenger cars were sprayed L&N Gray to represent years of accumulated dust and grime. After all the weathering dried, I used a final flat coat of Tamiya X-21 Flat Base mixed in with Future (3 parts flat to 8 parts Fu- ture) to seal everything.
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