I'm a so-so modeler that is falling into lower cost modeling due to the economy. I have a question about all-wood boxcars. I remember seeing a couple of the older outside braced wooden boxcars on the

By all-wood, I mean the double sheathed wooden upper bodies with steel under-frames. Those came with double-sheath wooden ends, steel framed single sheath ends, or all steel ends.......... all on then

Thank you Bruce, and the rest of you guys........... This is part of the continuing build-up to going photo-real modeling with enhanced blow-ups of the Red Ball card side catalog pages. Catalog #9, da

You guys are guessing correctly. In the fine art world it's a painting that looks real enough to be a photo. In the modeling world it's like the HO WW-II Varney heavyweight passengers cars that while

Many thanks for this link. The tank car is a true test subject for this sort of model building. I may have to re-think my ideas on model rivets. It looks like it would be very worthwhile to have true

WEAR A MASK !!! You will otherwise be inhaling fragments of decals, paint, and sometimes rust. A safer blast medium is not your only concern. Best to ya, Mike Bauers Milwaukee, Wi

A well fitting dust-filtering mask. It can vary due to facial hair like beards........... But in general you are just filtering out dust when you blast or air-erase. A heavy blasting needs a more robu

It still can be NP boxcar red………. The old paint is faded and dulled while the new paint fresh from stores is going to be fully bright and glossy. We all have seen remarked older cars where new paint i

It’s a challenging thing to make without resorting to some sort of power tooling. You’ve led me to an idea of how to make its inner panel with a rotating profile scraper, a plaster blank or clay blank

Just this week I went for some vintage Red Ball parts because of the very clean looking freight car ends without cast on ladders or grabs.[my phone shot is not as crisp as the casting] I ID'd them as

I just took a closer look. Those lines of rivets are seamless. It's as if the stamped end is one large panel attached to inner ribs by the two horizontal rivet lines, and bounded by edging members. I

Recently I got a couple of their catalogs picturing most of their car-sides. The majority of them were bog-standard boring cars. But the few odd-balls they did make are certain to be memorable. I made

I think you guys are overlooking the roadblock of financial success. According to the recent closing of a major hobby shop here, the owners stated that sales of everything have steadily dropped since

It is a complex problem. You reminded me that one thing they said was that books and magazines sales were still doing well, but not enough to carry the store. Its a large building and perhaps a third

Trust me.......... The world only looks flat.......... Young and creative people -are- out there, all around us. Best to ya, Mike Bauers Milwaukee, Wi

Actually, I am listening. I had been separating brick and mortar sales from Internet sales................. With an eye on those that now only buy from hobby swap meets because retail and discount sal

In the day, model trains were the analog of todays personal computers. Let's put it this way...... In Europe and Japan model railroading is still a vibrant hobby of both the old and the young. We have

I slipped on a word............ Here is what it was meant to be.... " Maybe I'm too optimistic about the pre-decorated aspect. But look at carbon3d.com and see how the newest 3d printers make prints i

I was afraid I'd scare too many with that one. Its very complex. But it sure shows how complex curved surfaces can be done in materials one wouldn't expect to work. Best to ya, Mike Bauers Milwaukee,

In another Yahoo group, they are discussing ways to bring in new modelers. They inspired me to come up with a display that starts from the basic level and ends with the completed models along with som