brake system details under the floor of the car. I added a Cal-Scale heavyweight pas- senger car system in its place. The parts were mounted on thin sheet plastic, cut to fit the different floor bays, and painted before installation. I also added nearly all the brake system air piping from wire. I somehow managed to get five pipes locat- ed in the holes in the rear of the triple valve (no guarantee that they are in the correct holes, however). Another major job to the body was to close in the vestibule and cut windows into the end bulkhead so the ves- tibule could double as a motorman’s cab when the unit was run in reverse. The last big job was to make and install an interior for the passenger compartment. I started by lightly scribing the top, bottom, and sides of the two end windows and drilled a 1/8-inch hole in the center of each. Then, using a new No. 11 blade, I slowly cut my way out from the hole to the edge of the new windows. Take your time, and take just a little at a time, check frequently, and finish the last “scosh” with small flat files. If you want to take the easy way out, just do the motorman’s side and leave the other side blank. That way, you don’t have to get two windows the same size and at the same height. Luckily, I managed to get both windows the same size, shape, and square to boot! Some- times things go right.
I added 1x2-inch small strips of sty- rene under each opening to represent the window sills. I cut a window into a piece of 0.030 styrene, scribed a “door” around it, and then cut it out of the sheet and glued it into the center opening in the end bulk- head wall. This provides a closed cab for the engineer when the unit needs to run in reverse.
Because I was going to provide seats in the coach section of the trailer, I now need- ed to add bulkheads to close in the com- partment. Rivarossi provided an interior wall for the vestibule after a fashion. It was in the correct location but was smooth, clear plastic, being part of the window/ roof casting. I added overlays cut from some 0.050 sheet styrene to each side of the interior “wall” on the vestibule side. I painted these a light gray, as was the rest of the vestibule. In the center portion, I added a door cut from 0.010 styrene with a window added, which I also painted gray before installation. This provided a nice solid bulkhead with a glazed window
in the door. The interior bulkhead at the front of the seating compartment was also made of styrene, but the door there does not have a window in it. Just forward of the bulkhead loca- tion are two “leaded glass” windows, one on each side of the car. I picked out the raised leading with a black Sharpie and covered the inside of the window with bits of Scotch Brand Magic Tape to repre- sent toilet compartment windows. I then enclosed both with walls made of 0.010 styrene and painted the walls light gray to match the vestibule. If I were doing this project again, I would probably blank out one window with styrene and add some form of car heater in that corner, either a stove or a Baker car heater. There would not have been any need for two toilets in this car.
Because the car has large, single-pane windows, I made up eight seats from sty- rene to place in the interior. These were painted dark green with tan armrests. Af- ter gluing the seats to the floor — remem- bering just in time to leave space along- side the sides for the window glazing — I decided to add the wiring for the car lights before painting the rest of the interior. I had removed the bits needed for light- ing from the locomotive’s circuit board, so I could use the empty space in the baggage compartment to hold the batteries for the lighting. I had run the leads from the head- light through the cab body, taped to the
underside of the roof, and then through the rear wall of the cab, making sure to leave as much extra as possible. When the units are connected, which is meant to be semi-permanent, these wires will enter the baggage compartment through the front wall. The trailer contains the following lighting: five PFM micro-miniature bulbs on the ceiling, four in the seating compart- ment and the fifth in the vestibule. A sixth PFM bulb is mounted in the rear-facing headlight, above the engineer’s window at the side of the roof. This bulb has the wires extended into the baggage compart- ment but currently is not connected. (The locomotive headlight is also one of the PFM bulbs.) There is also a set of working marker lights from Tomar. These lights add immeasurably to the look of the car as it passes in a darkened room. The wiring for the PFM bulbs is con- tained in the roof. I cut a length of styrene channel stock to fit between the bulkheads of the passenger compartment. After drill- ing four holes through it, I installed four of the bulbs with the glass portions just ex- tending through into the passenger com- partment; the fifth bulb extends through the rear bulkhead to illuminate the vesti- bule. The channel neatly contains — and hides — the wires. To date, there has been no heat damage from the incandes- cent bulbs. However, in the future, I will probably use LEDs for lighting a project like this. LED technology is such that you
The roof and bulkheads for the passenger compartment are nearly finished here. The light bar, with its five PFM bulbs, is ready to be mounted to the underside of the roof. The single bulb at the end will illuminate the vestibule. I have not yet added the last bulb to the head- light. This bulb was installed but remains inoperable until I redo the wiring to include a means of reversing the headlights and marker lights to reflect the direction of operation.
FEBRUARY 2016 93
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