Page 120 - 38. MRH13-04-Apr2013

Erie Railroad Boxcars, p1 - 5
Lessons Learned Continued ...
5. Small sanding scratches that are not visible in the master or
in the unpainted casting show up when the parts are painted. I
needed to do a better job at finish sanding. I should have taken
time to get out the 600 grit wet dry sandpaper to polish the
masters.
6. Painting, detailing, and decaling the cars before assembly
worked great. In the end I only had to replace 1 grab iron and 2
stirrups. For me it is a lot easier to decal on a flat surface than
on the raised surface or ends of a boxcar. I can rest my hands
on the work surface, which I find very beneficial. I will use this
procedure with any future craftsman kits I build.
Will I continue with this project; absolutely. Some time away
from this project is necessary. Some of the changes that I will
make are:
1. I will try different casting materials.
2. Learn to control the thickness of my molds by making a back
piece to control the thickness.
3. I am considering remaking the masters and building com-
plete bodies. This would eliminate the problems with different
thickness of the various parts. The drawback, although minor,
is that I would have to learn how to make two-part molds and
how to pour the casting material into a two-part mold.
4. I am strongly considering purchasing the necessary com-
puter programming to have a 3D print, such as Shapeways 3D
printing made for my masters. I don’t think that it would be
cost-effective at this time to generate a 3D print of each car
that I want to model. That could change in the near future.
index contents
MRH-Apr 2013