This tread is solely for posting pictures of your kitbashed locomotives. And please explain the basic work you did to get the kitbashed result. (For a locomotive to be considered kitbashed it has to be distinguishable from the stock model of the locomotive.) Thanks!
Steve
If everything seems under control, you're not going fast enough!
C&O F-20 4-6-2 No. 488. Kitbashed from BLI USRA Light Pacific. Added a number of brass detail parts, several scratch built detail parts, piping, modified cylinders, new running boards and steps, replaced trailing truck, modified tender. Repainted, decaled and weathered (just a bit more to do).
Rick G.
OK, so does this fit?
An Athearn SD40-2T, cut down to fit an SD40-2 Athearn frame, and equipt with a Canadian wide/saftey cab, and added details parts, like grabs, fans, screens, etc.
Mike.
My You Tube
NWP SWP This tread is solely for posting pictures of your kitbashed locomotives. And please explain the basic work you did to get the kitbashed result. (For a locomotive to be considered kitbashed it has to be distinguishable from the stock model of the locomotive.) Thanks!
I have kitbashed a couple of HOn30 critters for Boothbay Railway Village. The shells were kitbashed from Athearn Hustler bodys with Bachmann N scale mechanisms. This is one on the layout
And both shells before painting. I removed the walkways, split the body down the middle to narrow them and adjusted the length (after cutting away too much) to fit the mechanisms.
Thsi is another we bought at a train show. It is an N scale Kato (?) NW-2 body and mechanism with an HO scale cab, and added detail parts.
George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch
Wow! Some really nice work and some very imaginative re-builds.
Mel, while the cab forwards were a good solution to the problem for which they were designed, I always preferred the looks of the AC-9s...very stylish, as is your model.
I'll start with some older ones, like this Tyco Mikado. It's mostly a detailing job, using about a hundred dollars worth of detail parts, mostly from Cal-Scale, and Kemtron, although I did alter the running boards and added scratchbuilt front steps to them. The sandbox is an altered dome from a Tyco 3-dome tank car, and the cab is from Model Die Casting. The tender is an MDC oil-type tender modified into a coal-type, with an open bunker. Those six wheel trucks under it accounted for almost half the money spent on detail parts...
The 886 pictured below is an Atlas SD35, with a scratchbuilt safety cab - I had seen CN's original safety cab on a GP38 in 1973, I think, and took a few photos, and then converted a couple of Atlas SD35s and SD24s...
This is a John English Pacific, from the early '50s. I got it, used, in the mid-'50s and altered it with some Cal-Scale detail parts and a Kemtron vestibule-style cab. The tender was scratchbuilt, with modified Central Valley trucks. This locomotive is currently awaiting another makeover...
Another Tyco Mikado, mostly re-detailed with Cal-Scale parts and a scratchbuilt vestibule cab - it was built over the original plastic cab, then anything of the original cab which showed through the windows was carved away. It also got a can motor and NWSL gearbox, along with some additional weight...
This Pacific, originally a Bowser NYC K-11, got pretty-well the same treatment as the Mike above (including a Tyco tender), along with some fairing along the running boards. The vestibule cab was built over the stock metal cab...
This one's a pretty simple-looking one, based on an article in MR showing how to convert an Athearn SW1500/SW1200/SW7 - depending on when it was marketed - into an NW2. The basic operation was to alter the sloped section of the hood, immediately in front of the cab, into a stepped section. I took it a bit further with some added details from Detail Associates, Details West, and Juneco, a full GSB cab interior, a large Sagami can motor and Ernst gearsets...
This one was seen in the photo of the diesel with the wide cab. It's a Bachmann Santa Fe Northern, somewhat Canadianised. The front end is pretty-well all Cal-Scale: pilot, air pump radiator, headlight, Mars light, class lights, and bell. The vestibule cab is again a styrene scratchbuild over the original. However, the tender is the biggest part of the re-build. I shortened it somewhat, then opened the oil bunker area and converted it to a modelled open coal bunker. The original four axle trucks were cut into 2- and 3-axle sections then joined to form the centipede-style bottom. All detail except the journal boxes was then filed off and overlays, cut from styrene, were applied to form the cast tender bed. I then added spring detail using wire and parts cut from Kadee coupler boxes...
More diesels, both Model Power FA/FB-2s originally. I modified them to better match my favourite prototype cab-units, CNR's FPA- and FPB-4s. This involved moving and replacing several body panels to correct the batten placement, new numberboards, scratchbuilt fuel tanks and new radiator intake sections. Paint and lettering is SMP Accupaint and Accucals, done in the style of CNR's freight scheme in the '50s. The roadname was done with individual letters from Champ alphabet sets...
Another Model Power makeover, this time an E7B Phase II made from two E7A-units. It was inspired by and based upon a drawing in the March, 1987 issue of Mainline Modeler. In addition to the splice job, this one included a lot of new or re-worked body panels and openings. Like all Model Power units of that time, a great runner and fantastic puller...
This CNR 2-10-2 was done for a friend, and like the real locomotive upon which it's based, started with a used USRA 2-10-2, this one a re-motored brass model, shown here with a Bachmann tender...
The CNR bought ten such locomotives from the Boston & Albany when that road received its first Berkshires, and re-worked them, pretty-much as I did with the model. Here's a photo of the real one...
...and the re-done model...
The thread showing the entire re-build can be viewed HERE
Here are some more recent efforts, including an IHC Mogul, more-or-less "stock" (the oil tender has been changed to coal)...
...and re-worked with a cab from a Bachmann Consolidation and the tender further modified...
The loco above usually runs with this one, a brass model of a B&M B-15, which originally looked pretty-much like this...
The loco wouldn't run when I first got it, so I put a can motor in it, turning it into a real sweet-runner and a surprisingly decent puller for such a diminutive engine. As shown below, it got a new Bachmann cab, modified cylinders, and further modifications to the tender. Here's the two old girls together...
The re-build of the two above is covered HERE
This is another pair of locomotives, this time Bachmann's Ten Wheelers. They probably could have been used on my late '30s-era layout pretty much as-is...
...but I thought them to be too dowdy-looking and didn't like that big (too long and too wide) tender, either. My first job was to modifiy the existing slide valve cylinder castings into a more modern piston valve type, and I then replaced the stock boilers with stripped-down ones from Varney/Bowser cast metal Ten Wheelers. I hacked off the cast-on cabs and replaced them with my road's stock choice from Bachmann's Consolidations...
After shortening (razor saw) and narrowing (large handsaw) the tenders, I added details to locos and tenders and ended up with these...
You can check out the procedure, with lots of photos HERE
...and finally, for now, anyway, my latest kitbash, a Bachmann USRA Light 2-6-6-2, bought "used"...
I shortened the locomotive's boiler and the USRA long-style tender so that the pair would fit onto my scratchbuilt 90' turntable (which is actually only 89' long due to limited available real estate). I then added a bunch of detail and a bunch of weight, plus a second tender for additional water capacity, and ended up with this...
The work done in order to get to that point can be viewed HERE.
Wayne
OK, I will share. Most of my kitbash projects are a lot simpler than some of the great work above, and photo skills are not the best. Some of these locos are not finished, some I simply don't have competed photos.
All are freelanced for my ATLANTIC CENTRAL, and the main goal is to create a "family" look.
First up, USRA 2-6-6-2 from Bachmann, the original tender replaced with a Vanderbilt tender and the trailing truck changed to a Delta type. I have two of these, still need a little weathering.......
Next we have a Bachmann 2-8-4 converted into a modern heavy 2-8-2 similar to the DT&I 800 class. I actually have five of these with various minor sub class versions. These were done by mixing and matching parts from all three versions of the Bachmann Berkshire/Kanawha. Two of the five have long Vandy tenders and the larger Kanawha cab. The Delta trailing truck is the old Kemtrom piece now PSC. This photo is obviously before the paint work.
Next up, a Bachmann 4-8-2 Heavy with a Delta trailing truck - not a big mod, but again, part of the "family" look. There are two of these with the oil tender, and 5 more with coal tenders.
Next up a Broadway USRA heavy Mike with a Delta trailing truck and a Bachmann long tender. The ACR has two of these as well. The Delta trucks came from the original Athearn Genesis 4-6-2.
Next we have the easiest kit bash of the century - A Proto 2000 2-8-8-2 turned into a 2-8-8-0.......and lettered ATLANTIC CENTRAL. This one also has a twin....
Well, there are more, but that's all the photos I have handy,
Sheldon
I am going to contribute something that is not the least bit impressive.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
This is Bradford Valley Lumber Co. no. 10, the latest addition to my On30 fleet. All of my engines are kitbashed in some way, but this is one of the more extensive ones:
It started as a Bachmann On30 2-4-4-2 tender engine. I designed a cab and side tanks in Blender, and had them 3D-printed by Shapeways. The hand rails on the cab and side tanks are copper wire. The additional platform on the front was scratchbuilt from styrene and copper wire.
The Location: Forests of the Pacific Northwest, OregonThe Year: 1948The Scale: On30The Blog: http://bvlcorr.tumblr.com
Chicago Yelowstone and Pacific #35, a Baldwin DS 4-4-10, poses in the Central District. Kitbashed in the early 1990s from an Athearn S-12, and another shell. Body and frame lengthened to represent the longer 8 cylinder powered locomotive. Mashima motor, A-Line flywheels, NWSL wheelsets were also used. Scheduled to be shopped with DCC decoder, likely sound, upgrade some of the detail, new paint. This was built from an old 90s Model Railroader article.
Bob your link doesn't go anywhere. Posting links from this site is challenging. Posting pics is unforgiving of mistakes. See the sticky in the General Forum on posting pics.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
BigDaddy "Bob your link doesn't go anywhere. Posting links from this site is challenging. Posting pics is unforgiving of mistakes. See the sticky in the General Forum on posting pics." This forum is bunk with their picture posting through third parties. Come on! it's the 21st century. Other sites have direct posting. As to my post, I followed the directions and the photo did show after posting. I noticed a spelling error, went through edit and changed that. Then the photo would show, "404" error and not display!! i'm not going to fool around like this, taking a photo, hope that the third party site works, get an address, then finally make my post, then find out that it doesn,t work. It may work well for others, I don;t have the time. Too bad as I would participate if this outmoded method wasn't used.
"Bob your link doesn't go anywhere. Posting links from this site is challenging. Posting pics is unforgiving of mistakes. See the sticky in the General Forum on posting pics."
This forum is bunk with their picture posting through third parties. Come on! it's the 21st century. Other sites have direct posting.
As to my post, I followed the directions and the photo did show after posting. I noticed a spelling error, went through edit and changed that. Then the photo would show, "404" error and not display!!
i'm not going to fool around like this, taking a photo, hope that the third party site works, get an address, then finally make my post, then find out that it doesn,t work.
It may work well for others, I don;t have the time. Too bad as I would participate if this outmoded method wasn't used.
Sorry I can't provide any photos but my biggest undertaking so far was when I kitbashed a Kato Canadian National Mikado from its original appearence to more like the actual prototype that I found while looking at photos of Steam Town locos. I began by removing the bell from the front of the smoke box and placing it between the stack and first dome on the boiler. I then made up a new number board and glued it to where the bell was. I then added a water heater above the front of the smoke box and the plumbing that went with it. After that I mixed flat black and silver to create a graphite looking paint and painted the smoke box and fire box. Last but not least I built up the coal tender and raised the coal stack. In the end it turned out pretty nice if I do say so myself seeing how it was my first undertaking so it was a big deal to me. It's also N scale so it was a little harder to work with than if it had been HO.
marksrailroadIt's also N scale so it was a little harder to work with than if it had been HO.
Who made the locomotive that you started with?
.
Before Athearn released their SD39, I made my own, with a bunch of Cannon & Co parts and Hi-Tech hood sides on an old Athearn SD40 frame
Here it is before painting:
Here's my Rio Grande SDL-39. No such thing, I know, I know, but I wanted one. Started with the Kaslo Shops resin kit, then added Rio Grande details. Gotta have dynamic brakes, so those were obtained from Atlas, a part that is made for their SD-24 IIRC. The nose-mounted Pyle light came next. That was mostly it, plus paint. Still waiting on buying the air horns, because they were kinda more than I wanted to pay at the time. I should think of doing that, but $13 for a set of horns ain't cheap.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
mlehman$13 for a set of horns ain't cheap.
What kind of air horns are you looking for?
Hello all,
Amazing!
Hope this helps.
"Uhh...I didn’t know it was 'impossible' I just made it work...sorry"
mlehmanHere's my Rio Grande SDL-39. No such thing, I know, I know, but I wanted one.
Some of the MILW SDL 39's had a crazy looking air hood across the top, gave it a unique look. Nice build!
Thanks for the kind comments everyone!
Kevin,
It's the K5LA I like to use, although this wasn't the only air horn in use by the Rio Grande. I see that Walthers now has some much lower priced Cal-Scale examples in stock, so may have to pick some up now that they're much more affordable.
mbinsewiSome of the MILW SDL 39's had a crazy looking air hood across the top, gave it a unique look. Nice build!
Yeah, I went with the snow shields on mine, because seemed like an option to take up for working in the mountainous West. And they do look cool
Now here's something that's a more radical bash, what I call a NW2M. It's a NW2 adapted to narrowgauge and with dynamic brakes and a steam generator added. I build them from the easy-to-narrow Kato model by hacking another hood to remove the taper and add space for the DB and SG. What this does is add a little room for the decoder , given the space in the original model is all atken up by the massive weight that helps these Katos run so smoothly and powerfully.
I presume these would count as kitbashed:
I consider these Tythearn GP20s. They are Tyco GP20 shells mounted on modified Athearn GP35 drives. The frame has been filed down in certain areas and the coupler mounts removed and the shell has also been modified to allow the shell to mate with the drive. The handrails are a combination of Tyco rails and modified Athearn stanchions. They also all have brass airhorns and antenna with rotary beacons. (Been too long to remember who made which detail part.) The couplers are body mounted Kadee 142s on the rear and 149s on the front (to clear the plows).
The passenger unit stripes are Microscale 2" silver stripes. The silver decals on the first two pictures (Nose on the first unit and lettering on both) and the green lettering on the pink engine are all custom lettering done by me. (Silver was done on an ALPS printer. The Green lettering was done on an inkjet. Ii's been too long ago remember which one.)
While the pink engine doesn't show it, all these engines and their other 5 stablemates are equipped with front snowplows. The first engine and one other are equipped with passenger plows (Details West 217s). The other two and four other stablemates carry a freight plow (Details West 206s).
mlehmanKevin, It's the K5LA I like to use, although this wasn't the only air horn in use by the Rio Grande.
I looked through my box of extra detail parts. I do not have the piece you are looking for.
Great work by all you guys. I really like the work on that AC9. Ambitious kitbash it was and is.
Here is one of mine completed in the days before Athearn made a GP60M:
She started life as a GP50 and I modified the shell with a Train Station Products Safety Cab, dynamic brakes and truck side frames. Additional parts came from Details Assoc, Details West and Canon. It was not a difficult bash, but I just hadda have on of those GP60Ms and the GP50 looked like a great place to start.
SeeYou190I looked through my box of extra detail parts. I do not have the piece you are looking for.
Thanks, Kevin. No sweat, Walthers has them in stock at a nice proce now.
Here's something you don't even see the parts for everyday, my Lilliput Gemeinder diesel #82.
The drive is basically stock, the only drive that exceeds the Kato, except that it's now HOn3. This is much easier than t sounds. This model comes on HOe/HOn30/9mm trucks, but a kit to widen it to HOm/12mm is available for around $20. HOn3 is in the middle at 10.5 mm gauge, so it was merely a matter of reguaging the wheelsets and adjusting the wipers supplied in the kit to get to HOn3.
I did the paint and added a K5LA horn.
For around $200, you get a powerful diesel that will run on three different gauges if you grab a Lenz Silver decoder that plugs right in to take full advanatge of the lighting.
I have a luxury cruise train that it pulls when I'm feeling modern. Lately, 82 spends much of its time as a very effective helper at the start of the Cascade Branch.
https://vimeo.com/188094788
tbdanny
Beautiful Loco Danny!
In my signature is an HO Scale two truck Shay built from the Bachmann 3 truck Shay.
"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination."-Albert Einstein
http://gearedsteam.blogspot.com/
Geared SteamBeautiful Loco Danny!
Gotta agree, tbdanny is doing some very nice work after a few initial mechnical difficulties that frustrated him greatly. Steam is just more complicated than diesels, etc. Shows how if you stick to things and work through the issues that arise systematically, you will end up with both a great result and a good understanding on how to get there again. That's the basics of building your skill set to kitbash locos. Just do it, learn some, than come back and do an improved loco the next time. Seems to have worked for many of us, because most of us learned by doing.
#10 is a vaguely Whitcomb-looking loco and the only one of my kitbashes I didn't build myself. I bought it off the Jeep Capt. on the auction site. He used to produce different bashes of HOn3 locos from HO standard ones, so there may be a sister loco to this one out there. It's made from two Hustler shells and the chassis of the old style Athearn SW.
It has a lot of heft and works well on my logging branches. I added a decoder and LED lighting. Several tuneups made it run better than ever. It crawls with a nice growl, so like many of my HOn3 kitbashes, doesn't really need a sound decoder if you use a little imagination.
I lay no claim to this one but I hope to someday...
Here is a center cab kitbash using two Athearn Hustlers and an Athearn SW9 shell and frame. I saw this in an old Railroad Modeler from the 70's and thought it looked cool.
I cut the Hustlers in the middle of the cabs and glued the two shortened shells together and braced them. I cut the steps and part of the apron off the sw shell and attached them to the front of the Hustler shells. I used squadron putty to hide the joints. Krylon flat black paint and some custom decals finished the job.
I replaced the original motor with one from a proto 2000 switcher. I had to custom make the drive shaft to get the proper length. I installed a TCS decoder with BEMF and it will quietly and smoothly creep along. The next step is to add a few more details like hoses and do some weathering which will help highlight some of the details. Overall, I am pleased with the way it turned out.
Chuck
Modeling the Motor City
RR_Mel You ask for it. This is my first of three kitbashed Southern Pacific Yellowstone 2-8-8-4 AC-9s. They began life as Rivarossi Cab Forwards. I went on to kitbash two more and I’m working on my fourth. My second AC-9 was my first attempt at using dual Canon EN22 motors. I had purchased an old Cab Forward at a local train show that had a cracked frame. I took that on as another project and built a new frame from K&S brass.
Marvelous work there Mel
Perhaps you would like to take shot at this.....:)
Have there ever been any manufacturers that have considered making the 'massive' C&O H7 in plastic rather than just brass?...HO scale
I had a fellow who at one time was going to kit-bash one of my Proto 2-8-8-2 into an H7 lookalike, But it fell thru. And I wanted mine to utilize a vandy tender
Just found this Youtube video of an O scale one,....what a sound !, What a brute ! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9DdHckE42I
http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/30786
interesting discussion
Brian
My Layout Plan
Interesting new Plan Consideration