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I'd like to first start off with thanking Tom Densel for the inspiration of this project. When I read Tom's post on his  N9 Transfer Caboose, I was inspired to make my own.

Chessie is my favorite Railroad, so I decided to make a Chessie Transfer Caboose.  There was only one made in real life.  Here it is.

Chessie xfer Caboose

From what I have read, many transfer cabooses are made from box cars.  This seemed like a difficult proposition since I needed roof overhangs and steps on the frame.  I've never Kitbashed a train car before, so I did not want to make life too difficult.  So I decided to use the MTH Bay window caboose as my base model to hack up.  I purchased this one on Trainz for $25.  It was broken... but I figured I was going to break it even more, so why not.

NS Bay WIndow Caboose

Disassembly was pretty easy.  Then, cutting it up was not too hard either.  I did quickly realize that the car would not be scale dimensions.  The car would not be as tall as the prototype and because I will be using this to house my   BlueRail board and battery, so I needed the car to be a little longer to ensure all would fit inside.  I also left the lights in place even though the prototype did not have lights... because I like lights.  I still need to figure out how to make the plate on the end with the 4 red dots.  Not sure what those are for.

My next challenge was the windows.  I had too many of them.  They were also square and the windows I needed were oval.  I used this Perfect Plastic Putty that worked great.

IMG_20210314_083357060

I glued some styrene behind the window and filled in the hole.  Then some wet sanding, It filled in nicely.  For a brief moment I thought about cutting out new windows, then I decided to make a homemade decal for the side window.  I think the decal came out pretty good. What do you think?

I had to make a new deck out of styrene because the existing metal frame showed the screws for the trucks and the hole for the wires.

IMG_20210117_135722540

The most challenging part for me was the handrails.  I used an combination of plastruct and brass to try to get as close to the prototype as possible.  It took a long while and admittedly it's the most fragile part of my model, but I was happy with the results.

Because of the car size differences noted earlier, I had to take some artistic license on decal placement.  The O scale Chessie decals were actually too large, so the Chessie System, B&O and C3051 are actually HO decals.  The C3051 on the end of the roof was a challenge too.  I did not have a "C" that small.  But the HO decal set has a Chessie "C" logo that was very small.  So I decided to use that.

This was a fun first time project.  The biggest challenge I find with kitbashing is a lack of instructions.  I take steps in an order that seems logical.  But there were times I would regret assembling or gluing something, because it made the next step more difficult.  Live and learn I guess.

Here is the final product.  The story of the figures I purchased and painted is here.

Have Fun!

Ron

xfer Cab 4xfer Cab 3 MPxfer Cab 2 MPxfer Cab 1

Attachments

Images (8)
  • Chessie xfer Caboose
  • NS Bay WIndow Caboose
  • IMG_20210314_083357060
  • IMG_20210117_135722540
  • xfer Cab 4
  • xfer Cab 3 MP
  • xfer Cab 2 MP
  • xfer Cab 1
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Ron, very nice job for your first kitbash. Quite impressive by my viewing.

Very clever idea for making a decal for the side windows. Did you do that for the windows on the end doors also? And I also just did a search for that Perfect Plastic Putty. I'd never heard of that before. Looks like I'll have to mail order that, since I don't see anyone local that has it.

Again, great job. Ironically, this has been an item I've been brainstorming about lately.

Last edited by brianel_k-lineguy

"I still need to figure out how to make the plate on the end with the 4 red dots.  Not sure what those are for."

Ron, it's just a rear marker with reflectors, to show the end of the train, day or night .. rather than a red flag, IMO. How about a piece of styrene painted with (I guess it's silver?) and four dots of red paint?

Rusty

Oh, and I forgot to add, wonderful work by you on this project! I think it turned out great! This is the kind of kitbashing I used to do in HO years ago. I want to try stuff such as this in O gauge soon.

Last edited by Diverging Clear

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