Kitbashing the #173 - Part 2

Right, so, now that the first part of the kitbash is completed, it's on to the nitty-gritty. The painting! The paint of a model can make or break a look, regardless of how good of a job you do with the actual modeling. When working in smaller scales, detail is nice, but trying to create a sense of detail without their being much detail at all is a key part of it as well.

First, I began applying lettering decals. As you can see, they cracked a bit,
but this is fine as the black is a very easy touchup. I had these custom printed
using Testor's Inkjet Decal paper.

Here's what it looked like after the headlight and tender lettering
was applied and touched up. Spiffy!

I continued applying decals and detailing, adding more and more as I went along.

Then it came down to something I wasn't looking forward to, which was painting the 

boiler and Russia Iron bits. When it comes to real metal finishes, like brass and polished iron, it's very very difficult to get a good, realistic finish off of paints. Especially when you're on a budget, and can't afford a lot of expensive supplies. I have a trick for gold-banding, which is to paint one side of clear plastic using a brush-on gold leaf, and then cutting the gold banding out of the plastic in strips and using the side I didn't brush on as the outer face. This allows for no visible strokes!

Luckily, after receiving a tip from some fellow modelers, I began looking into Testors Buffable Gunmetal Metalizer. It is this neat paint, that once dry, you can buff to a light-gray metal sheen. The more you buff it, the shinier it gets. Unfortunately I didn't buff it as much as I should've, so it's a tad on the dull side on this model- live and learn!

I have to touch up the guides for the rods, the silver paint has scratched off during the course of working on it.

Next up is some freight cars. Although, yes, I am modeling the Central Pacific, I'm going to have some Southern Pacific rolling stock included as well, so I'll have an SP boxcar to go with the consist. The consist I'm aiming to replicate is this one:

Although this isn't an image of #173, it is a photograph of a locomotive patterned after the 173, showing what I can only assume is a typical freight consist for the class. The engines were created as heavy freighters, so I hope to show that in my model.


I'm waiting on the boxcars to arrive in the mail, and I have some railroad roman decals on the way from Microscale for lettering as well. Here's hoping it all goes to plan! The next engine project is going to be a CP 4-8-0 based off a Tyco model.