After stripping the model down to its hood, frame and cab, I stripped off as much of it's orange Rio Grande lettering as possible, leaving a black shell. Although my original intent was to use spray paint on this project, I really haven't seen a "room temperature" sort of day in the last month or two, so I wound up using Testors Paint Markers instead. I didn't care that much about the colors aside from making sure to use light and dark blue on the unit, as I talked to one of the guys who painted the prototypes about the colors used, and was told that they bought blue and light blue up at Port Huron Paint to use on the engines.
Here's a shot of the unit after the two blue colors were first applied:
Despite getting the first coat of paint on the body and the frame, I wasn't sure how to go about doing the stripes and the lettering. I've not come across anyone who's made a decal set for these engines in N scale yet, so I initially thought I might have to resort to ordering decals from a custom decal shop. However, I was able to find dry transfer stripe decals at the train show in Saline yesterday, which saved quite a bit of frustration and art prep time. Here's a couple of shots taken after some of the first decals were applied:
Last night I was able to get the rest of the #@$@&^%^%! stripes applied to the hood, the lettering in place and mostly dullcoated into place. I'd rather not have to take the dry transfer stripe route again on one of these units. I think I wound up with a couple of stripes on myself rather than on the unit. I also wound up using most of my sheet of appropriate sized letters after redoing the lettering several times. I'll probably redo it again after finding another sheet of the decals in the near future.
Today I managed to get the handrails attached to the frame, painted yellow and touched up a couple spots on the paint. I then reassembled the unit, and test ran it to be sure that it still works. The following shots are of the reassembled unit, and the unit with a couple of boxcars, my attempt to replicate several photos I've seen taken of traffic on the prototype railroad.
I still have a couple of details to add, specifically a strobe light to the roof, and quite a bit of black paint to the pilots and walkways. I'd also like to get some of the handrails painted bright yellow eventually and get number decals in the right font style onto the front of the hood, but at this point I consider it to be complete.
Hope you enjoyed this look at what proved to be a rewarding project that was both easier and harder than I anticipated.
Charles W.
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