Friday, April 25, 2014
Thunder Mesa Inspirations #3: Knott's Calico Mine Train
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Sunday, April 20, 2014
Friday, April 18, 2014
Building a 14' Excursion Car
The Wildest Ride in the Wilderness
The trains on Disneyland's Big Thunder Mountain Railroad attraction feature distinctive gold and brown cars that are meant to evoke ore gondolas of a bygone era. In reality though, they only remotely resemble any kind of equipment used on a real railroad. Since, in the world of Thunder Mesa, my railroad existed first and helped to inspire the attraction, it makes sense that the TMMC would have a short string of excursion cars converted from old ore gons. The challenge was creating something that could act as a believable "prototype" for the Big Thunder trains.
Big Thunder Mountain Railroad postcard showing the distinctive "ore" cars that folks ride in. © Disney |
Starting with a Flatcar Kit
Canadian modeler Heath Trollope graciously asked me to review a kit for a 14' On30 flatcar that he plans on producing, suggesting at the time that it might be just the thing for the Thunder Mesa excursion cars I had talked about building. Since my original plan had been to cut down Bachmann flatcars for the job, I readily accepted the offer. Mostly because, A) I love getting free stuff, and B) I knew Heath would produce a quality kit that might be perfect for my needs. Below is a distilled version of how it went together. My full review and build thread can be viewed on the Railroad Line Forums.
From Flatcar to Excursion Car
Heath was right of course, and his great little kit was the perfect starting point for my long delayed excursion train project. I've built one car thus far as a prototype and plan to add four more in the not too distant future now that the bugs have been worked out. My plan above shows two different styles of car, a basic and a deluxe model with a shade canopy and seats facing both forward and back. Though the basic car more closely resembles the Big Thunder trains, I decided to build a car with the deluxe seating pattern, sans canopy, since it makes more sense for the point to point operation I have planned. Still, I tried to capture the flavor of the Big Thunder cars and I hope there is enough of a family resemblance there that folks will understand what I'm getting at.
Each bench/bunker was created as a separate sub-assembly. Here are the pieces for the center benches with the exterior and interior walls glued back to back and the edges painted a matching color. |
The assembled center benches before trim was added. The benches are reinforced underneath with 1/16" square strip wood. |
Two of the bench/bunker sub-assemblies cemented to the flatcar deck. The color scheme and diagonal bracing are direct references to the Big Thunder cars. |
Each excursion car can hold up to 12 O scale people. These folks look a little pale and could use a paint job. |
All Thunder Mesa passenger equipment is numbered in the 100 series, starting with Combine 101. These excursion cars will be 107 - 111. Now it's back to the car shop to build four more! |
Okay! That about wraps it up for this week's project. Thanks for following along. And very special thanks to Heath Trollope for getting me rolling with his excellent flatcar kit! As always, questions and comments are welcome. Thanks for checking in, folks. Adios for now!
Friday, April 11, 2014
Using Photo-Textures to Model a Boxcar
After a successful experience using printed photo textures to build Combine 101 for Thunder Mesa (see the 2014 On30 Annual), I've turned my attention to some other rolling stock projects that could also benefit from this technique. Here's how I put together a freelanced 20' boxcar for the TMMC.
Using photo-textures of real wooden planks downloaded from cgtextures.com, I laid out all of the parts to be printed in Adobe Photoshop, adding graphics and text, color correcting, and adding some weathering to the boards. The car was designed to be built on a Bachmann On30 freight car frame cut down for the 20' length. |
Turning the frame over, a weight was cemented in place to help the car track well. This one came from an old Acurail HO freight car. |
With careful measurement and assembly, the frame fits nicely within the new car body. |
Grandt Line narrow gauge boxcar corner braces were added to detail the car ends. |
Door guides were created with printouts from the original plan, laminated over 100 lb bristol board. The door latches are from Grandt Line. |
Coupler blocks were made for each end from scale 4x6" stock and Grandt Line nut/bolt/washer castings, painted and then cemented into place. |
To ensure that the stirrups and grab-irons would line up properly, a jig was made from 100 lb bristol board, indicating the position and spacing where holes needed to be drilled in the car sides. |
The grab irons and stirrup steps are white metal castings from Wiseman Model Services. The brake wheel, stave and fittings are from a Bachmann boxcar. |
More Cars to Come
With my new boxcar proudly riding the rails of the TMMC, I turned my attention to some possible future projects that will make the most of this photo-texture modeling technique. Here's a preview of some other boxcars I'll be creating for interchange traffic with the TMMC. Some of the names may be familiar.A car paying tribute to the late, great Ward Kimball. |
A boxcar to carry explosives for the Lytum & Hyde Co. out of Sparks Nevada. |
John Olson's HOn3 Mescal Lines Ry. was always a great inspiration for me. |
Freight bound for down-river travel via the Western River Expedition Co. will ship in this handsome car. |
Final Thoughts
Photo-texture modeling is a promising technique for any number of projects that need crisp, clear graphics. Though only recently finished, I actually started the boxcar before building Combine 101 and the project was mostly an experiment to see what was possible; what the plusses and minuses of this technique might be for rolling stock. Next time around I'm sure I'll do a few things differently, like wrapping the printed textures completely around the car ends to avoid gaps and visible joints. All in all though, I'm pretty happy with how the car turned out and really enjoy watching it ride the rails on the TMMC.
Thanks for checking in, everyone. Adios for now!
Thanks for checking in, everyone. Adios for now!
Friday, April 4, 2014
Aerial Views and the Depot Scene - April 4, 2014
First light paints the sky to the east as the station master prepares for another busy day at Thunder Mesa Depot. |
Two Year Anniversary of the Thunder Mesa Blog!
My, how time flies! I started this site back on April 1st, 2012 to document the construction of my On30 Thunder Mesa Mining Company layout and here we are two years later. It's been a great ride so far and I continue to appreciate the great feedback I get from followers and the many friends I've made in the hobby. Thank you all!
Two years ago: April 1, 2012. |
Last month: March 1, 2014. |
Today: April 4, 2014.Nothing has changed in the expansion area so I'm just focusing on the original Thunder Mesa section this month. |
For a more complete view of the layout's progress to date, check out the Layout Construction slide show on the Photo Albums page.
Zooming In
I'm trying something a little different with the aerial views this month, zooming in on specific areas that have recently been completed or are currently under construction. Imagine we're drifting along in a Victorian airship, snapping photos of the scenes below...Zooming in we can see the recently completed scenery around Saguaro Siding. It looks like the Marc F. Davis is getting ready to dump another load of leaverite at the tailings trestle. |
Drifting northwest, we pass over Geyser Gulch. There's still a trestle that needs building here. |
The Depot Scene
Checking our map, we can fly over to the depot area to see how this scene is progressing. The recent addition of Rainbow Desert Freight Lines has inspired me to bring this newer corner of the layout closer to completion.
Two new lamp posts have been installed adjacent to the depot platform. The lamps are 2.5mm yellow flickering LEDs built atop juice box straws. Rainbow Desert Freight Lines has acquired a wagon from Grizzly Mountain Engineering but is still waiting on a team of horses. A small cactus garden has sprouted up next to the depot platform along with an assortment of springtime weeds. The ground cover in this area is Polyblend sanded grout and the mud puddle was made with Woodland Scenics Realistic Water. |
Another night shot of the scene with all the lights aglow. The sky was added in Adobe Photoshop but all else is as modeled. It's the magic of scenes like this that keeps me building. |
Some good progress has been made on the depot scene but there's still loads to do before I'll call it finished. The tunnel portal needs work, a freight house needs to be built, and the entire scene needs more weeds and junk, figures, lights and so on. Looks like I'll be busy on this one for awhile! We'll check back in with more aerial views next month to see how things have progressed.
As always, questions and comments are most welcome. Thanks for checking in. Adios for now!