Sierra West Scale Models - Work Train - HO

[nextceo]

Hey Gang,

    My next project is the Sierra West Scale Models - Work Train in HO Scale. I believe there are 11 cars that make up this kit. For those of you that plan to build it in the future, it does NOT come with Couplers and Trucks. Those extra items are going to cost you about $100...that is on top of the price I paid for this kit which was about $250. This kit is no longer made by Brett at Sierra West.

Lets get into the Build. The first car is the Water Car. You begin by weathering and staining the wood. Its funny, here I am going to town on the wood with this little brass brush to create lines in the wood. After 20 minutes and my arm being sore, I thought man...all that work and I don't even really see a difference. The next step is to "paint" the wood with Grim Paint by dipping it into the paint and then directly into 91% alcohol before applying it to the boards. As I'm applying this watered down solution, I cant even tell if its sticking...and it looks like the exact same color as my wood. The last step is to apply a light Indian ink wash. After doing all this and waiting about 10 minutes for everything to dry I came back downstairs and it was like magic...the boards looked awesome. The grain showed up from all that scrubbing with the brass brush and the Grim Paint I applied showed up to give a fantastic peeling effect. See picture 3 for a close up of the boards.

The next step is the tank. After painting the tank with a Rust/Brown mix paint and letting it dry, the fun part comes...weathering. After putting the decals on, you spray the tank with dullcoat. This gives the surface a "tacky" texture. You then start by applying various shades of chalk...starting with the blacks and working up thru the browns, yellows and finally the reds and oranges. The end result is a fantastic looking rusty, weathered looking tank. See picture 4 and 5 for a close up. There is still a bunch of stuff left to finish up the car but this is as far as I got...

Alan

[Mark Dalrymple]

Looking awesome, Alan!

I've got this one tucked away for an upcoming build.  Looking forward to watching your work-train develop.

Cheers, Mark.

[GPdemayo]

Very well done Mark.....great kit, I missed getting it when I was taking a break from the hobby a few years ago. 

[S&S RR]

Alan


It looks great - I too, have this one on the shelf waiting for a time slot for the build.  I will be watching with great interest.

[ollevon]

Looking awesome so far Alan, I'll be fallowing along on this one. Should be another one of those NEXTCEO's  great builds.
   Sam

[Zephyrus52246]

Looking great so far.

Jeff

[ACL1504]

Alan,

Ditto to all the other comments. Well done.

Tom

[nextceo]

Hey Gang,

   Thanks for all the kind comments. With that said, part of the reason I'm posting this build is for educational purposes to help those that choose to build this kit after me but the other part is for criticism. As some examples, if you guys think I over weathered a decal or I need to redo a grab iron, please let me know.

Before I move on, I want to address a few of your questions.
Q: How big are these cars in HO Scale Feet?
A: The frames on the small cars are 7 ft by 10 ft and the frames on the larger cars are 7 ft by 21ft. If you consider a slight over hang from the wood platforms, add another foot to each of those measurements.

Q: What type of chalk are you using to weather the cars?
A: Rembrandt chalk from Dick Blick. They always run sales on them and you can usually pick them up for about $3.00 a stick. I like variation in colors so I have a bunch...see the 1st picture. I use a razor blade to scrap off the chalk onto a powder on a sheet of wax paper. I then dip my brush into 91% alcohol and then into the piles of powders.

I didn't like how the handle on top of the water car looked...I thought it was too rounded so I pulled it off and created a flatter one. The next part of this build doesn't show much progress but I wanted to go thru it with you because I did things differently than Brett suggested. Anytime that happens, I'll document it.

1 - I bought a tap and die set from Hobby Lobby to drill the holes for the 2-56 screw used to hold the trucks (wheels for the train car) in place. I bought the screws at Ace Hardware. The instruction don't say what size...but you want 2-56 - 1/4 long. For whatever reason, the trucks dont come with the screws. With that said, I had read another build thread that suggested drilling the hole(s) for the trucks ahead of time before you start building the car. I'm glad I did...it took some force to drill those holes. I tested the hole by putting on the truck and screwing in the screw. Everything looked good so I removed it. Brett doesn't call for this step until later. I wouldn't wait...otherwise you might break off some parts from your car as you struggle to drill those holes. 

2- The instructions call for 5 min epoxy to attach the tank to the wood deck. Instead I used Weldbond Glue with a little super glue towards the middle of the tank. The only reason I did this is I'm very comfortable with Weldbond glue and it always has worked for me...plus it drys clear.

3 - Next step was to add the straps over the car. The instructions call for drilling little tiny holes using a 77-drill bit thru the wood deck and the frame. If you've used a size 77 drill bit before, you know they bend very easily. After spending 10 minutes and bending two drill bits, I decided to just drill the holes into the wood. I then used super glue at the base on each side of the tank to hold the bands in place. This process seemed to work fine. Before putting the bands on, I did soak them in Blacken-it but they still appeared shiny in certain areas. I used black paint with a fine brush to cover up those areas. I then immediately took the rest of my black wire and dropped it back into a Blacken-it solution.

That's all for now...
Alan

[Mike Engler]

Now there is a man with some Rembrandts! Great fading of the lettering. Still legible enough! Some good tips- I hope to get one of these HO work trains as I love the cars. I have the On3-30 kit so maybe I can trade it for the HO version. Another fun thread to follow Allan, and am looking forward to seeing you at the Expo. Glad to see that you signed up for the forum 'Meet and Greet'.

[ReadingBob]

This is simply awesome!     Thanks for sharing.  I'll be following along.

[nextceo]

Thanks Bob. Yeah Mike, look forward to seeing you at the Expo and talking to you about your Sierra West Builds...

Alright. One car down and 10 to go. Hope all of them are as fun as this one.

Here is what I did different from the instructions.

1 - The hose at the front of the water car - the instructions call for bending a wire. Not sure how that would have happened. I used Solder instead. Painted it a Grimy Black and added some weather chalk.

2 - The Stirrup - Called for me to use a 77 size drill bit to drill into the frame. Wasn't even going to try doing that after my last experience. Instead just used superglue for both the Stirrup at the front of the car along with the grab iron.

A couple of side notes...Used white chalk on the pipe coming out the side of the tank (with the 2 red shut off valves on it) to represent calcium buildup since that pipe probably has water sitting in it most of the time. Used gray chalks on the hoses to represent worn rubber. Everything else I followed the instructions to the "T".


Here is the finished product. Next up the Sand Car.

Alan

[coors2u]

Alan, I love the texture that you were able to get. If the rest of the cars turn out this good that's going to be one fine work train.

[nextceo]

Thanks Dustin!

Alan

[nextceo]

Hey Gang,

After reading everyone's feed back from a couple of the forums I've posted this build on, I decided to make a couple of changes to the Water Car:

I first went back and replaced the Hose on the back of the water car. It was originally made out of wire. A few folks thought it looked "too perfect" so I replaced it with Solder to make it look more realistic - this material allowed for more "bend". Some others had commented that the weathering didn't look quite right on the one side of the car. I went back and fixed that and also changed the decal on the side of the car to read just "20". This now matches up with how Brett shows the car in the instructions. To add some additional interest to the water car, I added a wrench to the wood deck directly below the shut off values since that tool would have probably been required at times to loosen and tighten the water hose coupler. To the other side of the car, I added an oil can which would have been used to run the pump located on the front of the car. Both the Wrench and Oil Can do NOT come with this kit.

To see these improvements, I have updated the pictures on my previous post. I appreciate the constructive criticism I received on the water car as I feel it has made the finished model look more realistic.

I also started the Sand Car. So far I painted the Frame and Sand Box, drilled and threaded the hole for the truck, added the decals and applied a solvent solution to the decals to help them better adhere to the car.

Next up is the building of the Wood Deck and the weathering of the Sand Box.

Thanks for following along...

Alan

[nextceo]

Since my last update I weathered the sand box. This was and still is quite difficult since the wood sides and the brown rust on the metal all seem to blend together. One thing that the instructions does not call for but something I decided to do was dry brush all the metal pieces on the Sand Box with Old Silver to make the metal "pop". Since most of the metal is part of the Sand Box mold, you're going to need to use a Flat Brush (aka Brush #3) instead of the typical Dry Brush (aka Brush #4) otherwise you'll have silver all over the place. I attached a few pictures of the brushes and the paint I'm referring to in my description. I also installed the Sand Shovel and Bucket to the front of the car. Both of these pieces do come with the kit. I'm still going to have to play around with the powders to get this car to the color I want it. Here is a picture of where I stand currently.

That's all for now...
Alan