Any New Restoration Projects or Customizing Junkers?

I've got two projects I've ben picking at.  One is an lionel u-boat that I am going to re-power with the guts of a WBB gp7.  I also have a lionel 70's era 4-4-2 that started out as an e unit upgrade and is likely going to get full new mechanism as well with a can motor.   For that one I'm just going to a newer version and put the old boiler on it.  I already checked that it will fit using ond of my son's engines as a test case.  

As long as we are pretending I'm going to finish these projects, I'd like to some ps2 or3 upgrades as well.

I guess these aren't really restorative projects, so much as tinkering projects.

Still cool 

My newest project is an American Flyer Comet PA that needs an apron replaced on the engineer's side. Also needs a coupler and centering spring, and then some touchup paint. Also have to put a drumhead on the observation car, then it is ready for a test run. Parts ordered from Port Line Hobbies, missed the mail today due to a flea market session. Photos on completion, depending on results. The loco runs well, not much run time, it seems to have been stored away after the Kennedy election. 

well I don't know if you would call what I do "restoration", I like to find junkers, and bring them back to life.I found a 6419 Work Caboose at a show, and did it up in PRR colors. Need to get a few details from Jeff Kane to finish it.

Found a beat up 2026 on the bay, missing some parts. The slide shoes had holes worn thru them, so it didn't run very well, so in the meantime I put some solder on them and now it just about flies off the track.

I've had this C&O  Northern project I made up from two broken 1666 shells I need to get back on.

 And last night I was looking at this 1684 shell sitting on the shelf, and a weird idea came to me about making a 2-8-0.....

Reading Steam Guru painted and detailed this Lionel Reading T-1 (6-18006; 1989) as 2124 in her Iron Horse Rambles paint scheme. Wowak added full working valve hear, a scale pilot coupler, brass whistle, and other details. J. D. S. Limited installed a fan-driven smoke unit and an LED headlight. This beauty runs like a Hamilton watch. She leaves a smooooth trail of smoke like 765 at her best.

At York in October I bought a MTH Premier Proto-1 model of 765 from Grzyboski's Trains. He had installed a BCR. I let some JT'S Mega-Steam soak into the smoke unit and it worked fine. I also enjoy the working Mars light. It looks great at night!

Nice to see junkers being brought back to life 

I like the Baldwin Disc drivers. That will be a fine 4-8-4.

Better not call her a "Northern," though. That name stayed North of the Mason-Dixon line. Call her a "Greenbrier," and good ol' Southerners will welcome her.  Here is a video of 614 for inspiration. She was running between Hoboken and Port Jervis. Her Reading passenger whistle is icing on the cake.

yeah I completely forgot about the "Northern", thanks!

I've done several of my junk box rebuilds. Really enjoyable hunting toe them and the parts to bring them back.

Dave, you're a man after my own heart.  I never tackled anything that ambitious though.

But here is a Marx E7 before and after.

I'm going to rehab some cosmetically worn out postwar F-3 AA's and redecorate them, along with some newer smooth sided streamliner cars, to make a facsimile of the Great Northern Empire Builder.  I need a pair of cheap cab units; I already have the power and dummy frames, trucks, etc.

I still need a smooth sided diner (e.g. Lionel NYC, Illinois Central, UP).  And I'll probably need to buy a vista dome or full dome GN Empire Builder by Lionel because I'm not sure whether I can buy the painted domes from Lionel.

The rehab of the F-3 units may include adding scale number boards, a second headlight (since I've seen some GN EB units in books with a second headlight and others with only the single) and other similar mods.  True scale is not the objective, just verisimilitude.  I'll post pics as I make progress.  It's not restoration, and I don't consider a cosmetically challenged F unit "junk," so what I'm doing and have done is probably similar to both.

Carl

My latest custom project was a Marx 198 clockwork loco.  That cute little number is my favorite of the plastic bodied Marx steamers.  This particular one had so much rust in the motor that nobody bid on the motor for .99 on eBay.

I took an electric double reduction motor from a 591 and did a transplant after filling in the holes in the shell for the winding key and operating lever.  The faux headlight was shortened and a lens from a 1095 diesel installed.  Weights from HO diesels were added so that the finished engine weighs just a bit more than the 591 did.  It's quite a puller (relatively speaking, for Marx).

Finished this Marx all black 397 last week. All black 391's & 397's can be a bit tough to find.

Steve

Way to go, rescuing another old hulk by turning it into a fine-looking piece.  Looks like you've been doing some business with Robert Grossman.

Looks great awesome job

Great looking little locomotive

 I shared these in another thread to catch up on lack of photos. and realized they kinda belong here. So I'm going to go over it differently.

 That's a two wheel Marx articulated M-10005 diner, and a tin can.

The bell, a wedding favor.

 The can, it just slides on. 

I should have shot the cars end too. It has a square hole that will be a walk-up carry-out window. The halogen bulb lens cover will be a veggie garden for the diner.

 The windows, I'll "steam" them up, and draw on them with tiny fingers.

   There is also a small supply shed,(cut off, sorry) made from a heavy tin pull toy passenger car, with a brass headlamp(sitting on the end right now).

 I'm going to mount & wire the headlamp like the diner proprietor uses it to light the building or sign.    

 HO or S is what it is by approx. An junked narrow gauge observation car, converted to a street car is what I say it is 

 I think the diner is called the "Diner Bell"??

This Extra AF crane cab and bridge house was a work caboose cab set in a Marx gondola for a makeshift work caboose. Note one of my favorite materials, tin cans from red beans & rice. If I have to move it, I'll pull it off & grab a photo of it as a work train caboose. It just slides on the frame , but does have wires for lights right now.

 Framework "beams" are made of shish kabob skewers.

Hot glue? Super glue? White glue? Epoxies? I used whatever was close each time.

"Oiled wood" paint is all dying bottles of Testors gloss from the 90's

Oiled wood was my only option without waking others that day. I was bored, so did it.

The signal lamp in the side is centered over a ground level line. I might wire it to function as this has burned out. 

The water tower was the scrap from mini slide top desks for dolls that my grandfather made for extra cash. Cloth backed slats.

 I'm just trying to illustrate my love of junk drawer building as a whole. 

See the white lamp cover on the pole in the distance? Its a bic pen's tube.

I need a bunch of ladders. Fe fi foe fum.. 

A frame to support the brick on soon to be concrete cantilevered shelf too (there is another tower too....next time)  

looks great Steve!

this showed up this week...

Hey Dave, I pulled up the older of two junk threads by Khayden93 by mistake! 

no mistake...great stuff

I finished this Standard Gauge station yesterday. It's like a restoration, but in non-original colors. I used texture paint for the walls to get the look of rough brick or stucco. There's a more completed account of how I did it over on the tinplate board, so no need to repeat the whole thing here. LINK

Gentlemen,

    I would never refer to what PaPa Steve does as Customizing Junk, and a lot of the other restoration in this thread, is also very well done.  With the talent for restoration I see here in this thread, especially via the Tin Plate, our hobby is in better shape than I actually believed to be.  

Great stuff guys!

PCRR/Dave

I'm currently starting my search for junkers for the winter project. Hoping to get some prewar 1700 engines/cars, smooth side versions to do a little metal work and paint to turn this;

…….into this.

Doesn't seem too hard. Just need to learn the best methods for filling in the windows, as well as model the oval screens. Then it's just working with masks for the paint. I've fixed up a few of these trains in the past and it's amazingly easy to work on as there really is not a lot to them.

Tim

I have been playing with my military trains of late and found a good condition 44 US Army loco with a broken pilot.  I added a coupler and now double head two of them for more pulling power.  The combination will easily pull 11 cars on Atlas track. 

Found a damaged 212 US Marines alco and did the same thing, adding a coupler to double head.  The combo easily pulls 10 of the flatcars with trucks and caboose.  I also found a red 6819 flatcar this week and use it for some of my extra Pyro trucks.  Put a radar and searchlight truck on it, a combo that Lionel did not offer.  Adds variety to the train!

Rolland

Very nice work

repaints with vinyl graphics...note...no valuable marx items were destroyed...i already had a plastic marx OD loco...just needed something to drag around behind it...

howard...

have any before pics?

more like King Midas.....

Be cause you are so right 

The other current "junk" thread

https://ogrforum.com/t...98#43524898068275198

As long as it starts as junk and is given new life, I think it qualifies for either post. I was just going to try and keep mine in only one. Oh well.

Papa Steve's junk, called out as junk?

That's just silly 

Steamer,

   King Midas, now that is more like it!  Definitely more realistic.  Heard Lionel & MTH had a Bounty on his head for restoring 100 year old Trains that the guys are buying, when they are trying to sell & make a profit on new ones.  Just a rumor however.

Steves restorations, especially on Crane Cars is better than owning any of the new stuff what so ever.

PCRR/Dave

did a little surgery today. comparing my shell to pics of the real 3768, a little cutting will let me use the trailing truck from a 675.

I wonder how much that bounty is....we could turn Steve in and split the cash to buy more junkers to fix!

On my final visit to Weaver last Saturday, I went dumpster diving and pulled some rolling stock shells out to practice weathering. I also picked up a set of sides to make a wood chip hopper from a two bay hopper. It will be the only Weaver wood side wood chip hopper!

Don