#135 ~ Silver Gates

 Modeling Gates For the Class 1 Cars

Considering different materials to simulate the chain link construction.

Invented in the mid 19th century and brought to the United States in the 1890's, I suspect that chain-link fencing may still have had a novel quality about it when these cars where built, before becoming somewhat of a blight on the landscape by the mid 20th century.

I had some Precision Scale Brass Screen left over from previous projects so I decided to use that.

I cut the screen to size and then painted it silver.

And glued it to the car. I tried using CA (super glue) but found it too difficult. I settled on using white glue. That gave me plenty of time to position it before it dries and gives me the opportunity to remove it later.

But I'm not real pleased by how dense the screens look. It should have a more of a see-through quality about it.

So I might try something else.

Several different model manufactures offer screen material in various size meshes for modeling. Somehow I would need to determine the mesh size needed. Clover House lists scale conversions for their mesh sizes. Available in brass or nylon.

Another inexpensive option is Tulle from fabric stores. Tulle comes in a wide variety of sizes and materials.

I think I'll leave it as is for now and reevaluate when the construction of the car is complete.  If it still bugs me I'll swap out the gates with one of these other materials.

Yes sir! If it still bugs me!

Dandy

#135 ~ Signs of Destiny

 Researching and Making Decals for Route Numbers and Destination Signs

In the Vast Majority of Photos of the Class 1's, the Cars are Sporting Destination Signs. So then Shall My Cars.

But this turned out to be a big research project to determine what exactly these destination read.

Fortunately I have accumulated a lot of photos of these cars over the years. So I can actually read what most of the destination signs read.  But I don't have photos of all the routes, so I have to make educated guesses as to the rest.

The San Diego Electric Railway seemed to change some of its routes rather often making it kind of difficult to determine what exactly the routes where when these cars were new.

Schedules published during that era gave some helpful route descriptions. What I had to do was determine what they would have put on the signs.

And this colorful display is what I came up with. (Click to make Big). The colors are a complete guess though- routes weren't color coded back then like they are now. So I may have gone overboard with the colors. But it shor is purty!

Detail view. I will be making these decals available to you through Custom Traxx very soon.

Yes sir!  Destined to you very soon!

Dandy

SDERy Class 1 Car #135 ~ Decals

 Metallic Gold Decals for #135

Designing and printing metallic gold decals will be a new adventure for me.

Christian Chaffee who saved the three remaining SDERy Class 1's from destruction is shown here with an original panel inlaid with gold-leaf filigree. 

Because these decals have a metallic color I'm having to send them out to be printed. The company I chose to print them is none other than the "couple people" Kadee! They have an ALPs printer capable of printing metallic colors.

Fortunately for us, good photos exist that clearly show how the lettering and striping was laid out. Because the drawings I do are being sent to a printer, my drawings have to be "printer ready". So I chose to draw them with Adobe Illustrator. I loaded the photos into Illustrator and scaled them to HO scale. Then I was essentially able to "trace" the photos. 

I had to make a compromise though.  Kadee can only print 3 colors with the ALPs printer.  The original cars have brown with gold-leaf.  But printing brown is a three color process. So brown + gold = 4 colors. So I had to go with black + gold. Luckily it turned out great!:

And here are the printed decals I got back from Kadee!  There are enough for 5 cars on one sheet. I will cut this up so that they can be sold, most likely through Custom Traxx.

Next comes making a sheet of Route and Destination Signs decals. That'll be a big project to research!

Yes sir!

A BIG project! 

Dandy

SDERy Class 1 Car #135 ~ Tru-Colorization

Mahogany and Golden Yellow Paint for #135 

#135 went to the paint shop for some color:

Tru-Color brand paint is the paint of choice for this car:

TCP-256 Light Primer

TCP-069 Reefer Yellow

TCP- 082 Rich Oxide Brown

TCP-010 Black

TCP-730 Metallic Copper

TCP-288_Brass

Battleship Grey was tried for the roof but it was too dark. So I reverted to Light Primer which seems to be a ringer.

The front end prints of the car include a trolley controller! I painted the top of the controller Metallic Copper.  The Brass paint is used for the grab-handles next to the doors.

It has occurred to me that painting the car may be easier while it's still in its kit form.  This would simplify painting the interior, as well as installing window glass and gate screens.  If this car is a successful runner on my layout I will most likely build some more of these cars. I will give painting and detailing before assembly a try.

Color Theory

Photo: Just a car guy.

After their useful service life, three SDERy Class 1 cars were pushed together to make a "triple wide" house in El Cajon, California. A few years back these cars were "rescued" and one of them was cosmetically restored. But they painted the windows green. I don't think this is correct. 

Newspapers and magazines back in the day liked to write accounts of new streetcars. This article written for the Electric Railway Journal by H. M'Nutt, Superintendent of Motive Power San Diego Electric Railway describes the cars; "Selected cherry is used for all doors, sashes, moldings, etc, the surface being rubbed down and left with a dead finish".  

This leads me to believe that the window were painted green by the residence to help the cars feel more "homey". So I stuck to the Yellow and Brown scheme without the green.

Next comes the stripping and lettering.  Which include gold!  So this will be a new venture in decal making for me.

Yes sir!

Special decals!

Dandy

SDERy Class 1's in H.O. Scale!

 West Coast Traction Supply's H.O. Scale San Diego Electric Railway Class 1 Streetcar Shell.

A beautifully designed 3D print kit of this historic car.

I got my wish! Andrew Chier saved me a lot of trouble by designing and 3D printing an H.O. scale model of San Diego Electric Railway's Class 1 streetcar for sale soon on his West Coast Traction Supply shop on Shapeways.

Some assembly required. But it goes together easy enough. Just make sure (unlike I did) that the upper portion of the center divider that is printed with the roof corresponds with the enclosed half of the car (the half with the smaller windows). Though I don't know if the center divider will be able to fit with the drive. We shall see when I get to that part of construction.

Some filing on the prints was required to smooth things out.  Then the parts were cleaned with Dawn dish soap and a sonic toothbrush to remove any oily residue that would prevent paint from sticking to the model.

This is the first time I've built a model with super glue.  I've been weary of using super glue since it can shatter in freezing temperatures. But nobody seems to be having that problem, so I went for it.  After it was all built and looking good I airbrushed on a couple coats of primer. Since the model will be painted a light color (yellow) I used a light primer.

Next comes painting. I'll be painting this car in San Diego's mahogany and golden yellow paint scheme.

Yes sir! Colors!

Dandy

Classy Class 1's

The 1912, San Diego Electric Railway Class 1, Center Entrance, Pay-As-You-Enter Cars. 

Numbers 125 - 148.  Built by the St. Louis Car Company

By the 1910's, San Diego's double deck and other single truck cars, as well as some of their California Cars, were getting pretty old. So the SDERy, looking to update its fleet, developed a new, modern car. The Class 1's:

The new design incorporated the feature that made the old California Cars so popular with riders, an open section on one end to take advantage of San Diego's mild climate and an all weather enclosed section on the other end for when San Diego's mild climate wasn't so mild.

Another feature was the depressed center section. The lower floor meant that passengers didn't have to climb so high to get in the car. This safety feature reduced step accidents dramatically when folks were boarding and exiting the car.

The big innovation was the P.A.Y.E. system (Pay-As-You-Enter).  The conductor was stationed at the center of the car, opening and closing the gates and collecting fares as passengers boarded. This feature would soon be adopted with other cities around the nation. 

The cars are designed in the Art's and Crafts style with tall windows, and an arch roof. This gave the car a very airy, roomy, modern feel to it. 'They were adorned with warm yellow colors, gold-leafed oak leaves, hand-polished cherry wood, and solid bronze hardware -- even the push buttons passengers used to alert the motorman were inlaid with mother-of-pearl'. -Wikipedia

Painting by Ken Eberts

Apparently, with the more efficient loading and unloading as well as more powerful motors, these cars made good time and allowed the company to actually run less cars, thus improving profits.

You know, for such a successful, innovative and attractive car, it sure would be nice if someone came out with a model of these wonderful, stately cars.

Yes sir! Sure would be nice if someone came out with a model of these cars!

Dandy

1926 SDERy Route Map

 Geesh! The San Diego Electric Railway modified it's routes often!

Here is how it appeared in 1926 according to the April 1943 issue of the Railroad Boosters Wheel Clicks publication.

I'm posting it here for posterity considering the rarity and delicacy of this issue. Click to make huge:

My latest effort is fabricating destination dash signs for my San Diego streetcars. So I'm collecting material about the various routes. I'll keep you posted.

Yes sir! Destination Dash Signs!

Dandy

Ain't it Grand!

 A Great Photo of a Grand Union Intersection from Roanoke, Virginia taken in the 1930s.

Photographed in ideal conditions as well- nice new dark asphalt and the sun is just right to light up the rails.

This junction was at the intersection of Campbell Ave, and Jefferson Street in downtown Roanoke. 

What is interesting to me is how tight the intersection is. The rails of the left turn routes intersect right on the rails of the through routes. I don't think a Grand Union Junction could be any tighter.

 The overhead wire geometry is next to impossible to make out. It's easier to see its shadows. Is this four contact wires converging on one frog!?! 

Construction Photo ca 1927.

My intersection is downright luxurious in comparison. The curves are very broad and yet still very tight for HO scale (my left turns are 7 9/16" radius or 55 scale feet). 

Anyway- I thought I would share this interesting piece of construction. Yes sir! Thought I would share!

Dandy

For Justice and Glory!

 Anybody Remember the Keystone Cops?

I thought it would be funny to model them.

The Keystone Cops (often spelled "Keystone Kops") are fictional, humorously incompetent policemen featured in silent film slapstick comedies produced by Mack Sennett for his Keystone Film Company between 1912 and 1917  -  Wikipedia

After the demise of Jordan Highway Miniatures vehicles I started looking around for other period models. This Model T Ford is a 3d print from Robert Sprague 3D Designs on Shapeways. It's not as fine of a model as Jordan but I wanted to see what I could do with it.

Tru-color paint was used for the black.  But the Floquil metallic paint used on the radiator and other details turned out too glittery for my taste. It works fine on tiny details like the hubcaps, but the broad expanse of the radiator and even the marker lamps is too much. A brass colored paint would look a lot better for this.  As is typical of 3D prints the model has some visible strata from the printing process and some details are oversized to meet the 1mm minimum thickness.  

But truth be told- I'm trying to get G scale results with HO scale models with this ultra close-up photography I'm doing. But really the model looks just fine when observing the scene when standing next to the layout.

So it is what it is.  When it comes time to populate my layout with automobiles I'll reassess this model to see if I'll use it or not.  And then I called the Model T project finished for now.

Then, while researching something unrelated, I came across this production still from a Keystone Cops flick.  "Hm! I wonder if I could model that" I wondered to myself . "Well... I do have that Model T model and covering it with cops would hide most of it defects" I replied to myself. "Ah- but what about all those cops" I countered, "nobody manufactures HO scale cops like that". Darn! I was right. I was defeated. Until I came across this:  

 

Preiser Unpainted Firemen. The uniforms are really similar and they even have those helmets like the Keystone Cops! Well what do you know?  Everything fell into place. This is a feasible project after all. Well I gotta do it now!

Trying out different figures to see where and how many I can fit.

The 12 selected figures were primed with Tru-Color grey primer.  Then they were painted with FolkArt craft paint. Not as nice as model paint but effective. The buttons and badges were painted with the same Floquil Brass glitter paint as the automobile. 

The Walrus Moustaches are a must!  Now its time to see how many of these guys I can fit in the auto.

I really didn't expect to fit them all in- but they all fit in! Well technically the 12th one isn't IN the car but is running to catch up.

Here is the photo set-up. My phone that I'm taking the pictures with doesn't fit under the overhead wires. So it is laying on a cardboard tube cut to length to keep the phone just above the wires. Under the camera lens is a First Surface Mirror set a 45 degree angle aimed at the scene. A flashlight is illuminating the "sky".

And voila! The completed scene.

I might revisit this at a later date. Add some billy clubs to their hands. I'll see if I can introduce the appearance of speed. Maybe turn those front tires so its making a hard turn and introduce some lean to the suspension. I'll take a look at those Artitech Model T's when they become available again.

But for now I'm satisfied. I think this photo is hilarious.

Yes sir- hilarious!

"Good job Dandy"

"Awe thanks Dandy"

Dandy