My Inspiration

Hi Guy's

I haven't much to show over the last couple of months on the modeling scene. I just thought to share some of my old slides that are from the period that I like to model. Around this time of 1992/93, I had just finished high school and I had lots of time on my hands, fuel was cheap and I really did enjoy this time as I travelled many miles around the countryside.

The North Coast Line was quite uneek around this time as well. There was basically 3 classes of loco running trains up here at that time. All Alco and the youngest would be 20 years old. There was no air conditioners for the crews unless you were on the countrylink roster. Most trains were loaded up to there max so it was a good place to see alco's at work.

Just a side note. These copies of my slides were made simply by photographing them with my 100mm macro lens on my digital camera while sitting on my light box. The quality is OK for the purpose here but not much else.

This shot was taken in 1993 on 44238/44214 on 6290 frieght crossing Dead Dog Creek between Taree and Wingham. This was mostly a load of shipping containers heading for Cooks River. Most of the time this train would be 50% Contrans/TNT, but on this day it was 100% shippers. This train was tabled to run up to 700m long and I have no doubt that on this day it would of been a max load for these Jumbo's of between 2000/2100 tonnes.

Here we have 6382 freight with 4466/4486/4483 on the head as it approaches Mt George in 1993. This train was tabled to run up to 700m long as was in most cases empty Steel wagons.

Here is 6303 as it departs Taree with 4473/4454 leading. This train was mostly shipping but could some days be a real mix of containers and Louvers. It was usually a hand full for it's loco's mostly requiring 3 loco's but on this day was 1950 tonnes and 645m long.

This Train is 6184 on a Monday with 44100/44217. Usually this train is the return of 6269 pickup but as 6116 didn't run on a Monday it finished up having some louvers on it as well as some of it's usual pick up loading. At this time Jumbo's were not allowed to lead number 2 end leading due to Union Bans accounting most likely for the 44 leading and I would say it wouldn't usually get any longer that 400m unless there was lots of loading at Taree.

Here is 6269 pickup freight with 4475/4483 leading up to Wingham. This being a pickup, the first wagon would be for the wingham meat works. The Milk and opens and the 2 NLJX wagons would be for Taree where 4483 would of been left as the Taree Yard Shunter for the Day and returned on 6184 later that day. The next Milk wagon would most likely be for Wauchope and the following containers for Kempsey. The rest I am not sure. It was usual for interstate wagons to be on this train. This train could be on some day quite large until Taree but be less than 400m north after.

6395 was the Steel Train and around this time in late 1993 was starting to get a monster of a train up to 4000t. On this day it had a 44/45/45/44 combo lead by 4482 as it is seen departing Telegraph Point. It had 3469 tonnes on 48 wagons so they were working. today this train is usually around 72 wagons and weighing up to 6000t hauled effortlessly by 3 NR class loco's.

Anyway that is a bit of a look at the trains that inspire my modeling

Cheers Justin Moy

Weathering Progress

Hi Guy's

Just been stuffing around with these Auscision Opens and Vans. As I have said before I like to take photo's of the progress so I can take stock of where I am at with the weathering. The Base coat has gone on and I am just starting to muck around with washes using a paint brush. Anyway I will do a little more and then look at any other colours that can be applied with the Air Brush. Here is some progress shots

This one has had the most work done and looks mostly complete at this stage. This is the only AOOX that will have a green interia. All the others will remain in the original Red. The Base colour for the green is Floquil Burlington Northern Green. The washes mostly between the ribs are done with a brush using Floquil Rust with it darkened with Floquil Grimy Black.

This AKJY still needs the interia painted. I will hit it will a good coat of rust.

This AOOX has had the base coats only. I am not sure about the red interia as yet. I may lighten it a little before I continue.

This one will end up having a panel missing off the side. I have replaced the exchange panels on this one with smaller ones. I just need to remask the exchange panels and the area of the missing panel and go over with some more green.

I started playing with this ABFX applying some washes and I am not happy with it at this stage. I will most likely air brush over this and start again. I needed to let the faded coat dry for a few days so that it holds up to some washes over it.

I swapped one of my green vans for an ANR Red one. I have painted the top door runner yellow as I have shots of some of the Red Vans done this way which was common in the AN era. I still need to clean up the work a little. I have used Floquil Zinc Chrome Primer with just a little bit of Floquil UP Harbor Mist Gray as the base colour for the Van. You can see the difference if you look at the ANR panel that was masked up for this first stage of weathering.

Anyway all have a good long weekend, I hope to make it to the Epping show over the weekend some time, so if you see me there say HI

Cheers Justin Moy  

  

Masking

Hi Guy's

As I promised a while back, My Blog is going to follow the weathering work on my Auscision AOOX/ABFX wagons. Here is some shots of the way that I go about masking in readiness for weathering. The aim of this masking is to give the wagons a coat of a faded green as the base for all the weathering. The Paint work on the real wagons faded over time and most AN green painted wagons really showed this. So basically I am masking up anything that is not to be green. Hand rails and steps are easy to repaint after ward so I don't bother to cover them up.

I work on a piece of glass. I lay out Tamiya Masking tape out and use a razor blade to cut out the sizes and shapes that I need. I then use the razor blade to lift up one corner of the tape and then transfer it to the model using the blade. I then place it in position and bring in a finger from my other hand to put pressure on the tape so I can remove the blade. I can manage to do some really fine masking with this method so even the fine print on the sides of the wagon can be masked. I will remove the masking at some point during the whole process so that the code boards and what ever else involved can be weathered.

Anyway here is a heap of photo's of the process which may explain the masking process a bit better than what I can write;

Anyway I hope these photo's show the work as it was. Off to the paint shops so some more photo's soon.

Cheers Justin Moy

3 UP

Hi Guy's

With my family situation being as it is atm, I haven't had much of a chance to model. I have had a lot of time to think about things and my Layout is one. My wife Amanda has given me approval to build my train room. My secret Lab as my Boys call it ( Converted Garage ) will need to converted to a bedroom over the next 12 months, so I have been given approval to fill in 1/2 of our back deck. This will give me a room of about 6 x 4.4 metres in size which is good enough for me. Anyway I will update on the progress as time goes on.

Anyway the title of this blog is 3 UP. That is I have setup photo's each with 3 items in it. Now the main reason for this is for my own benefit. I like to photograph my rollingstock over time. I find it is a great tool for having a close look at my rollingstock as my eye sight isn't what it used to be. Having a photo up on the monitor is a great way of finding things that need attention on the models. Little details that I might not normally pick up on or someone else will when you have it up on display. Anyway here is the shots.

Just some notes on these last two

Here is a long term project. NPRY cement wagons. From what I can gather there is 3 main types of these wagons. I hope to model all 3. AR kits produce a model of the 1st type AFAIK which will be mostly just going to be a detailing job.. The 2nd type stands a bit taller than the others and the one here in the middle is my attempt at this stage. The 3rd type is similar to the 1st AFAIK but with a few different details. Anyway I will update when there is more progress.

Lastly is my PHS Powervan. This was built about 6 years ago and this would have to be my biggest kit bashing project ever attempted. From memory there is 6 cuts and joins on one side and 7 on the other to get most of the vents and doors etc in about the right spot. I still need to detail the ends so this maybe something to do between all the other responsibilities atm. Anyway I have the Candy one planned for a later date so hopefully I will document the process of making the other Air Conditioned PHS Power Van.

Cheers Justin Moy

 

Hannah

Hi Guy's

I would like to introduce Hannah Clare, Born last Friday 4/5.

Hannah was induced 20 days early due to problems that my wife Amanda was having with the Pregnancy. All went well and even though Hannah only weighed 2.82kg she was allowed to come home on Monday. Amanda made it through very well and my step sons Hayden and Callum love having a new baby sister. So with 2 princesses to look after I have been a little busy. I have been trying to finish off a couple of long term projects so hopefully I will have some stuff to present on my blog soon.

Cheers Justin Moy

NCNX

Hi Guy's

Just a quick one. I had recently bought an IDR NCNX kit from Hobbyland at Hornsby. I have a 4 pack of the Auscision RCSF's but I had only worked on 3 of them. The reason for this was to look into making the other into a NCNX. The IDR kit solved this problem in ways. I could of made it into a NCNX with the parts available but what I decided to do was swap over the tops so that I could get a CSX with tarp supports. Anyway the photo below explains the process better;

Some paintwork, decalling and weathering required

I have a couple of the new Bendigo Rail Models T class Loco's passing over my bench ATM.

Here is a quick photo of T413 which is a real nice looking model

Cheers Justin Moy

RBFX Photo's

Hi Guy's

I have just scanned some photo's out of my collect of some RBFX Vans. These I would think maybe stored at Broken Hill. These shot were taken by Steve McElroy in October 2000 and he has been kind enough to let me share these photo's on my Blog. These shots show some of the effects that I will be after when I weather my lot of ABFX's.

RBFX2661-G

RBFX2789-O

RBFX2810-F

RBFX4470-X

RBFX4486-H

RBFX4491-C

Photo's like these shot in full sun light are gold as far as I am concerned. I am not the best at scanning prints but these shots show the effects of weathering very well.

Anyway back to weathering up the first two Guinea Pigs.

Cheers Justin Moy