Great looking build. Fill every place you can with lead and it will surprise you what you can pull.

Looks great! Can you fit the decoder under the 'pilot' and fill the body with lead. That would work wonders for power collection reliability too

The TCS KAM decoder+KeepAlive won't fit under the "pilot," no matter how I wished it would.

It will fit within the battery box once I trim the mounting bolt for the Stanton drive. Hooking up all those bitty wires will be lots of fun.

I have to be careful about keeping added mass balanced above the center of the Drive. I'm trimming bits from a sheet of 1/16 lead to stick in here, there, and everywhere. I'll provide an update when I can claim success..

Not much use having a mine motor without mine cars. I collected photos and drawings and dreaded scratchbuilding a string of them.

Then BTS came along and rescued me. BTS sells a a 3-pack kit of cars: On30, #17241, $ 39.95. They cars are designed for rotary dumping. Since my sorta-primitive tipple will be an end-dumper I slightly modified the cars to allow the end gate to (theoretically) swing free.



Ipainted the car black- it's too much and will need to be grayed down.

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Looking great! Can't wait to see how thinga are coming along. What color are you thinking about painting that motor? Also I wouldnt worry about how many cars that little motor could pull. A little motor like that wouldn't be pulling more than about four or five. The car looks great as well. Keep it up!

Love the ore car. I have pulled my JY mine out of moth balls and have been working on it so maybe we can inspire each other.

Thank you, gentlemen.

The project is "maturing" at the moment. I diverted off to put together a circus train to scratch an itch shared with my better half. Some years ago we visited Circus World at Baraboo WI and the virus took hold. Been collecting and building 1/48 wagons and flats.

I will paint the motor yellow. I found somewhere, maybe on this forum, a photo of one that is beautiful. It's dirty yellow with plenty of crud and rust. I will need to make some plastic boxes and practice before I mess up my model. I think I'll start with yellow over a brown undercoat.

I need to order and fit a TCS unit with Keep-Alive, including wiring it up in the miniscule space available, along with LED's.

My module is to be 16"x72" and is a point-to-point "U." Curve radius is 6." I need several curved turnouts that have to be fabricated; I've never built a turnout before and, I guess, I'm procrastinating.

The mine dump at one end is inspired by the Robertsdale dump on the East Broad Top. I'd like to make the delivery/return remotely operable but that feels like a bridge too far. The mine is inspired by my collection of Eastern coal mine photos and some ancient mining books.

Lars, I can't wait to see what you do with the JY mine.

These are fun kits!

Some crusty inspiration for you



I have another i stole the side frames from, they match perfectly with the davenport.

andykins: That's the one! I pray mine turns out as well as yours.

A brief summary of your methods would be appreciated!

Yeah no worries!

Prime, paint, thin, first and second coat un changed yellow, last coat, slightly thinner, with some white/off white added, vertical strokes only for this coat (i could have gone another faded coat tbh)

let DRY (i left mine a week)

chips and rust pits painted on with vallejo paints, black gray and german camo black brown, "rough mixed" (swirl then use, the subtle difference in tone works well) leave to dry for a day or two.

thin washes of raw umber (i use inexpensive craft paints for alot of my weathering, much to the shock of some guys :P ) and i mean thin, maybe 99% thinner 1% paint, i used 70% alcohol, strong can work but i find it shifts the base coats. add as many washes as you feel works, but leave them over night, come back with fresh eyes, its easy to get carried away.

rust streaks are artists gouache, burnt sienna and a little raw umber, dot on with a toothpick or fine brush, leave to dry, come back with a wide flat brush that is ever so slightly damp (folk argue over hot water v warm, v cold, i find it makes zero difference) dip the tip, rub it off your trousers, can you feel damp? too wet, can you see moister? too wet, brush across the back of your hand, feel like a cats nose? probably right, carefully drag it down, if its doesnt streak enough, brush again.

make a royal screw up of the rust streaks? just wash it off with water and start again!

let dry over night, add chalks too taste if you wish and seal.

Have fun (sorry that wasn't so brief hah)

Thanks! I'll save it for when. Your description sounds like you've done done this before.