POA scrap wagon

Finished POA conversion, with a pretty severe weathering job

We spent a lovely weekend camping in Dorset this weekend, but the net result was no modelling again over the weekend. However, work seems to have eased a little at the moment and I am home for at least two weeks now. This has given me sometime to actually sit down and do some modelling. Anyway, it looks like I might actually finish some models this week!


End view showing the comparison to the factory finish


And same again

The first thing I have finished this week is the conversion of the Bachmann SSA wagon to a POA wagon. The conversion only requires removal of original transfers and the addition of POA transfers on a black data panel box. The couplings were converted to 3 link couplings (see earlier post) and then a fairly hefty weathering job was applied. All in all I am pretty happy with how it turned out.

I now have the second one to do, which I want to damage a bit more than this first attempt, with a more prototypically bashed top. I also need to add some loads from Ten commandments or similar. The interior of the wagons were not really sprayed, due to holding the wagon from the interior, so I might hand-paint some weathered black pain onto the interior, once I have the loads in. I am looking forward to running a short scrap train on my branchline.


Another view of the finished POA wagon


The original Bachmann weathered finish on the SSA

I took some of the photographs of the modified wagon with the original Bachmann wagon, which comes ready weathered. I thin that it makes for an interesting contrast. The factory finished weathering is ok, but very light and all one colour. I am not going to bemoan the quality of Bachmanns offing, it is excellent. However, with a few evenings work on the airbrush, I think a much better weathered finish has been achieved.

All other projects are progressing nicely. The whale is nearly built now, the lighting unit is almost fitted in to the BCK and the class 108 is currently in pieces for some further weathering. I received the weathering masks from PH Designs last week, so my class 108 is the first test of these. I have also done a little more DCC research and have decided on my preferred DCC controller for the next layout, Watergate Halt. As soon as the baseboards are built I am going to purchase this controller, but I will leave the details of all this for another post....