Over President’s Day weekend my wife and one of my daughters and I took a long day trip to the famous city of Colmar, in the Alsace region of France.  Colmar is famous for a lot of reasons; among them, according to tourist sites, is picturesque half-timbered houses, romantic canals, flower-laden windowsills, a labyrinth of cobblestone lanes and delicious food.   They weren’t kidding.  Colmar is amazing.  Scenes like this are around every corner.  It’s also the capital of Alsatian Wine Country and we’ve resolved to go back this summer for a weekend of wine and cheese and touring.  And … Continue reading No. 138: Freight Car Modeling, Feb 2020, Part 1

The boys on the Proto-Layouts list on IO were asking about salt weathering, so I thought I’d whip up a quick post on using the technique to weather freight car roofs. I’ve used the technique successfully on a few models.  Here’s one example: The model above is a Sunshine Models 80-series kit of the Missouri Pacific 90000-series single sheathed box car.  Here’s a link to the Sunshine Models flyer on Jim Hayes’ Sunshine Models website: http://sunshinekits.com/sunimages/sun80.pdf.  Man, I wish I had a couple of those Sunshine Frisco cars right about now… I recently applied salt weathering on a Sunshine Milwaukee … Continue reading No. 113: Salt Weathering

It has been over a month since my last modeling post.  Work, Christmas celebrations and a ski trip to Austria the week before Christmas kept me busy, plus I spent a lot of spare time finishing up a freight car project for Frank Hodina’s Resin Car Works blog.   Look for that article soon at http://resincarworks.com/. Meanwhile my buddy Jeff Kuebler sent a photo of some of Union Pacific’s engines at the old Missouri Pacific yard at Dupo, Illinois, which is right across the river from south St. Louis.  They were on the way back from special duty moving President … Continue reading No. 111: Modeling N&W Low-Side Gons and NYC USRA Single-Sheathed Box Cars

One of Seaboard Air Line’s most famous and most-recognizable freight cars was the AF-1 and AF-2 class “turtleback” auto car.  Sunshine Models released an HO scale car kit in the early 2000s and I was fortunate to acquire one and finish it this year. Above.  Wilbur C. Whittaker photo, Dunsmuir, Cal, 05 August, 1951.  Courtesy Richard Hendrickson. The Prototype SAL received a total of 1,200 turtleback auto cars in two series the 1940s.  The first series of 700 cars were delivered from Pullman (Bessemer, Ala.) in March, 1940, PS-Lot #5617.  The cars featured 10’ 6” IH, Pullman “Turtleback” roof, Apex running board and brake step, … Continue reading No. 109: Modeling the SAL AF-1 Box Car

I recently returned from a week-long trip to Tunisia where I spent some time working with the U.S. Embassy and the Tunisian Air Force.  I spent the week in Tunis, which is near the ancient Roman city of Carthage.  When our work was done the embassy hired a tour guide for us and we got a first-class guided tour of many ancient historical sites around Tunis and Carthage. Above.  We were honored to visit the North African American Cemetery in Carthage a few days after Memorial Day.  This is the U.S.’s only WWII cemetery in Africa.  The man in black … Continue reading No. 108: Freight Car Projects, Nov 2018