Renumbering Bev-Bel TP&W Covered Hopper

This post describes how I renumbered the second of my two Athearn/Bev-Bel Red TP&W covered hoppers from 18175 to 18177. Removing the factory numbers was a bit of an adventure, as it always seems to be for me, anyway. There are many techniques for removing factory-applied numbers and it takes some experimenting to find out which one will work for a particular car. 

Accurail's FAQ notes that they use pad printing to letter their cars and that Mr. Color thinner works well to remove the lettering without damaging the paint. Reasoning that a similar printing method might have been used on my older Athearn/Bev-Bel car, I got a bottle of Mr. Color thinner to try. This is a lacquer thinner so I worked in my spray booth.

I first experimented on an old Athearn reefer that I've been cannibalizing for parts. A Q-tip moistened with thinner and some gentle rubbing worked very well to remove the Athearn lettering with minimal damage to the paint. I found the Q-tip a bit too large for my liking, so I bought some microbrushes and those worked better. Emboldened by this success, I set to work on one of the end numbers on the TP&W hopper.

My fatal mistake here was to simply assume that Athearn and Bev-Bel used similar paint and not test the thinner on the painted inside of the car first. The Bev-Bel paint dissolved almost immediately on contact with the Mr. Color thinner, leaving me with nice bare black plastic where the number used to be. Lesson learned for next time: always test solvents on an unseen part of the car first!

For the other end of the car, I tried wet-sanding the number with 1000-grit sandpaper. This worked reasonably well but I found it a bit difficult to focus the sanding action exactly where I wanted it, even when using a small homemade sanding stick. The picture below shows the result of the sanding method. The paint survived mostly intact but there is a little bit of black plastic showing through in a couple of places.

I've seen many articles and videos about how to use decal solvents to soften and remove lettering. The basic method is to cut a small piece of paper towel or tissue to cover the unwanted lettering, saturate the paper towel with decal solvent, let it soak for 5 to 20 minutes, and then remove the softened lettering. In some cases you can apparently peel off the softened numbers whole with tape, but I've never gotten that to work. I tried the soak method on the sides of the Bev-Bel car with both Microscale Micro-Sol and Walthers Solvaset and neither solvent softened the lettering enough to make it come off easily. I ended up (1) soaking the number with a paper towel and Micro-Sol for 5 minutes, (2) covering the number in a pool of Micro-Sol after removing the paper towel, and (3) gently scraping off the number with the tip of my knife, reapplying Micro-Sol as necessary to keep it wet. This method succeeded in getting the number off, but as shown on the image below, the paint was damaged enough to make it obvious that there used to be a "5" there.

Some paint touch-up was in order prior to applying the new number decals. I primed the bare spot on the A end of the car with Vallejo gray primer prior to painting. Vallejo paints dry to a flat finish but I want to apply decals on a glossy surface. My favorite thing about Scalecoat II was that it dried to a gloss finish so I didn't need to apply a gloss clear coat prior to decaling. Vallejo makes both gloss medium (70.470) and gloss varnish (70.510), and I decided to experiment with trying to mix a Vallejo paint that would dry glossy. The gloss medium proved to be the better choice here, as it is intended to be mixed in with the paint. The pure gloss varnish is very glossy but a mix of paint and gloss varnish didn't dry glossy in my experiments. I found that I needed to add quite a bit of gloss medium to get a sheen on the dried paint. I ended up adding gloss medium to my paint in a ratio of 2 parts paint to 1 part gloss medium. The 2:1 mix resulted in a satin finish, at best, but shiny enough for my purposes. The paint mix is the same one I used for the underbodies: 4 parts 71.003 Red to 1 part 71.086 Light Red. This mix dried a bit redder than the factory paint but close enough for me.

I masked off the entire car except for the immediate areas around the removed numbers. In the past when I've tried to use four pieces of tape to mask off a rectangular area, I've had trouble avoiding bleed-under where the pieces of tape overlap. To avoid that this time, I cut small windows out of single pieces of tape. It took a few light coats with the airbrush to get a shiny finish.

The new numbers came from Herald King set H-431, which is long out of production but I was able to find one on eBay. 

I decided to renumber the car to 18177 mainly to avoid having to individually cut out and apply the small end numbers; the decal set has groups of end numbers ready to go for 18177. The 7's for the sides are a slightly different font on the decal set than the factory numbers but not different enough for me to want to deal with the end numbers individually. As shown in the first picture below, I gently wedged the car in the top center drawer of my desk to hold it steady for applying the end numbers.

The final step was to apply a flat clear coat. I used Vallejo matte varnish (70.520), thinned 3 parts varnish to 1 part thinner. This was my first experience with the Vallejo varnish and I had a good experience with it. I was especially impressed at how well a thin airbrushed coat leveled itself on the model.

The finished TPW 18177, ready for service

Track Painting

One of my layout goals for this year was to paint the track, and I'm now about 95% of the way there with 2 months left in the year. Yesterday I was granted a large block of time to do what I pleased, and I seized the opportunity to lug the compressor and airbrush from the basement up to the attic and paint the track.

I used Vallejo Game Air Charred Brown (72.745) thinned about 4 parts paint to 1 part Vallejo airbrush thinner. It took 2-3 passes over each section to get a good coat, and I ended up going through almost 2 bottles of paint. To avoid getting paint in the electrical contacts at the point hinges, I didn't spray these areas and will come back later to brush paint them. It would have been really tedious to brush paint all of the rails even on this small layout, so the airbrush really saved the day here. In addition, it wouldn't have been feasible to use an aerosol can in the attic - too much overspray and fumes.

A scrap of 2x2 wrapped with paper towel was handy for wiping wet paint off of the rail tops.

Conspicuously unpainted in the first photo is the siding in the middle of the layout that will serve the feed mill. This was intentional, as it occurred to me recently that I should realign this track to be parallel to an adjacent street. I started laying out the streets earlier this year, and as shown on the photo below, with the current track arrangement the feed mill would end up in a triangular-shaped lot that would look unusual in context. 

It shouldn't be too difficult to realign the siding, other than now I'm wishing that I hadn't soldered the rail joints. 

Bev-Bel TP&W PS Covered Hoppers

 Over the years I've acquired four of the Bev-Bel/Athearn TP&W Pullman-Standard covered hoppers: one each of the yellow and gray and two of the red. These cars have remained unbuilt because I've lacked a good way to paint the underbodies, slope sheets, and brake gear - which are all unpainted black plastic - in colors that match the rest of the car. Now that I have an airbrush, I can finally paint the unpainted parts in matching colors and build these cars.

This project seemed like a good choice for a novice airbrusher - all of the parts to be painted are somewhat concealed on the finished model - and I'd also get some experience with attempting to match factory paint. This project was also my first experience with Vallejo Model Air paint. I have a strong preference for water-based paints and, thanks to Testor's, there aren't many water-based model paints besides Vallejo left on the market. 

TP&W 18140 (gray)

I started with the gray car back in April. To my eye, the following paint mix is an excellent match for the Bev-Bel gray:

• 1 part 71.046 Pale Blue Grey
• 1 part 71.276 USAF Light Gray

I thinned the mix 4:1 with Vallejo airbrush thinner and had good results spraying at about 25 psi. I sprayed the paint directly onto the black plastic and I was pleased to get a smooth, opaque coat. I was not pleased, however, at how easily the dried paint flaked off. The minimal handling required to remove the parts from my painting handles and finish assembly of the car resulted in the paint chipping off in several places. It wasn't a big deal to touch up these spots with a brush, but this experience did make me nervous about future projects where I'll want to do multi-color paint schemes with masking. I always wash plastic parts with soap and water prior to painting and don't handle them with my bare hands after washing, so I don't think the issue here was that dirty parts affected the paint adhesion.

TP&W 18102 (yellow)

In July, I moved on to the yellow car. Knowing that the yellow paint wouldn't cover the black plastic very well, I planned to do a white undercoat. My original plan was to just use white Model Air (71.001), but following the gray paint flaking experience and more time spent reading Vallejo's instructions, I decided to use a white primer instead. I used Vallejo Mecha Color white primer (70.640) because that's what my hobby shop had in stock. I didn't thin the primer because Vallejo cautions that thinning their primers degrades some of their qualities, but I had to crank up the air pressure to almost 40 psi to get it to spray well. 

I had a much harder time matching the yellow paint than I did the gray. I initially thought that a 1:1 mix of 71.033 Yellow Ochre and 71.078 Yellow would work, but upon closer comparison to the Bev-Bel paint my mix wasn't "golden" enough. There are very few yellow options in the Model Air line, but fortunately the Vallejo Game Air line has some golden yellows and these paints can be mixed with Model Air. The following mix is the best I could come up with for the Bev-Bel yellow:

• 2 parts 71.033 Model Air Yellow Ochre
• 1 part 71.078 Model Air Yellow
• 1 part 72.707 Game Air Gold Yellow

As expected the yellow went on rather transparent and required multiple coats to get an opaque finish. The yellow paint over primer combination produced a much more durable finish than the gray paint directly on plastic, so I will plan to always prime bare plastic before painting with Model Air in the future.

TP&W 18175 (red #1)

I painted the two red cars in October. I painted both of them at the same time but one of them required renumbering so I'll write about that one in a separate post. I used Vallejo's Grey Surface Primer (74.601) on the bare plastic. As with the Mecha Primer, I didn't thin it and had to spray at about 40 psi. The red proved even more difficult to match than the yellow. My method of color matching - brush-painting small patches of various test mixes on the insides of the shell - didn't work very well because the reds are very transparent. The red colors also seemed to get darker as they dried, which further complicated matters. After a good deal of experimenting, the best match I could come up with was:

• 4 parts 71.003 Red
• 1 part 71.086 Light Red

This mix looked too orange when I first sprayed it onto the model, but it got redder as it dried and I was pleased with the final result.

Stay tuned for a future post about how I renumbered the second of the red hoppers.

Legacy Building Update

It's been about 4 months since my last post, so it's about time for a new one. My Legacy Building kitbash is coming along, and the south wall of the building is almost complete.

This has been a good project to work on for 30 minutes here or an hour there. My razor saw has really gotten a workout to this point. This wall was challenging because of how I had to merge wall sections from the two kits together, especially with the way they overlap on the first floor. The left side is the front wall from the Walthers Magnolia Hotel kit with the third floor removed and additional height added to the first-floor storefront. The extra height was necessary so I had enough room to add the basement windows on the right side, which is composed of the two short second-floor walls with arched windows from the DPM Other Corner Cafe kit. The basement windows themselves came from one of the back walls of the cafe. 

Still on the to-do list for this wall are blanking out most of the windows, building the main entry door, and finishing the cornice. The latter has had me stumped a bit because I didn't have a great picture of the cornice from the 1970s and it has since been removed from the building so recent pictures don't show it. While looking through old magazines in my collection a couple of weeks ago, I stumbled upon a pretty good picture of the cornice from 1979 in the May-June 1987 issue of Prototype Modeler. Incidentally, I plan on modeling TP&W 700 in this paint scheme.

The scan quality above isn't so great, but on the original magazine image the raised lettering on the center of the cornice is legible and reads "City Opera House." There's also a picture from 1895 that shows this on the Legacy Building's web site. I'll try to find some small plastic letters so I can add this detail to the model. 

Legacy Building Kitbash - Part I

The diamond in downtown El Paso, IL where the TP&W crossed the Illinois Central's Charter (aka, Gruber) line will be a feature scene on my layout. Luckily for me, this was a popular photo spot for railfans in my era so many good images are available, like Lloyd Rinehart's excellent cover shot from the July 1983 issue of Railfan & Railroad:

The distinctive corner building that I circled on the cover scan is called the Legacy Building. It still stands today, though it has been restored to a natural brick color and much of the decorative cornice has been removed.

The Legacy Building in 2019 (Google Street View image)

I want to include a model of the 1970s-era Legacy Building on my layout. My goal is to kitbash a reasonable facsimile from readily-available kits rather than scratchbuild an exact model. Perhaps the most challenging part of this project will be reining in my eye for detail and accepting compromises that will be "good enough."

After a thorough review of HO scale kits for "Main Street" buildings, I settled on the Walthers Magnolia Hotel (discontinued, but still available on the secondary market) for the western part of the structure and the Design Preservation Models Other Corner Cafe for the eastern part on the corner. 

I chose the Magnolia Hotel primarily for its peaked cornice. The Walthers kit is for a 3-story building, so I'll have to remove one of the upper floors.

There weren't many options for buildings with arched windows like the prototype. The Other Corner Cafe seemed like my best bet, though its windows have prominent lintels that will have to be carved off. I'll have to use two Other Corner Cafe kits to get the arched windows on both the first and second floors. Also, the stock kit assembles into a building for a mirror image to the prototype corner, but that won't matter because I'll be doing so much cutting and splicing anyway.

I couldn't find a kit with a corner turret that looked anything like the prototype, so I will have to scratchbuild that part.

It's been a long time since I've built a structure, so I'm excited to start this project. 

Airbrushing Setup

Until now, I haven't felt like I needed an airbrush. I've been satisfied with the results I've achieved by using aerosol cans for locomotives and rolling stock and brush painting for structures and vehicles. Near the end of last summer I had started putting together a shopping list of Scalecoat II spray cans for planned projects, and at $11.95/can plus shipping the cost added up pretty fast when estimating 1 can per 2 models based on past experience. It occurred to me that if I was going to spend $100+ on paint, I might as well invest in an airbrush because it would give me a lot more flexibility. So I spent most of my hobby time last October-December getting set up for airbrushing. 

The Airbrush

For my first airbrush I wanted one that was simple to use and easy to clean. As a total beginner to airbrushing, I felt I would do better learning with a single-action airbrush because the paint output is preset and the trigger is simply on/off. I felt like repeatability would be a challenge with a double-action airbrush where moving the trigger also adjusts the paint flow. I ended up choosing the Badger 350, a single-action, external-mix airbrush. I went with external vs. internal mix for ease of cleaning.

The Compressor

I wanted an air compressor that I could use for airbrushing as well as for other things around the house, namely topping off car tires. I purchased the WEN 1-gallon compressor, and so far I like it a lot. The noise level is similar to a vacuum cleaner and it's very compact and easy to move around.

The Spray Booth

I elected to build my own spray booth both for cost-effectiveness and because I thought I would have fun doing it. While online examples of ultra low-cost spray booths made from plastic bins and bathroom fans appealed to my miserly tendencies, a spray booth is a piece of safety equipment and it's not a good idea to cut corners on safety. The booth I built ended up costing about $250, certainly not cheap but less expensive than commercially-available booths of comparable specifications. And I did enjoy building it too.

My spray booth is mostly based on the Vent Works DIY spray booth, although I also used two old Model Railroader articles as resources: 

• "A deluxe spray paint booth" by Ken Breher, August 1983 issue, pages 103-105
• "The Paint Shop spray booth" by Andy Sperandeo, January 1988 issue, pages 128-135

While my layout and the desk I use as my modeling workbench are both in our attic and I considered putting the spray booth up there too, I ultimately decided the best place for it was in the basement. Painting can be messy and spills would be much less of a problem in the basement, not to mention the fact that there's a utility sink nearby in the basement but no sink at all in the attic. While the compressor I chose is relatively quiet, it is not silent and in the basement it's much less likely to disturb sleeping children on the second floor of the house. 

I had to make my booth a couple of inches shallower than the Vent Works design to fit my space and I also adjusted the angle of the fan mount panel so that I could run the exhaust duct to the nearby window with only one bend in it. The Vent Works design specifies a Plexigas top panel to let in light, but my basement lighting is poor so I opted to use a wood top panel and mount an under-cabinet light fixture inside. I used the Dayton 6FHX9/70633277 blower, which accounted for nearly half the cost of the booth, and also purchased the Vent Works duct adaptor to make construction a bit easier.

Our basement has glass block windows, and I built the spray booth near one of the vented ones. When it's time to paint, I remove the hinged window and replace it with this duct outlet panel made from a piece of 1/4" plywood and a 4"-diameter duct starting collar. The perimeter of the outside of the panel is lined with foam weather stripping and a simple latch made from a piece of 0.060" sheet styrene secures it in the window opening. When I'm done painting, I disconnect the duct, remove the outlet panel, and restore the window to its original configuration.

I'm pleased with the results of this project and am looking forward to using it.