The hopper class of April 23 consists of 11 hoppers, mainly L&N and heritage cars
It’s time to introduce another “class” of hoppers graduating from the workbench to the layout. Looking back I see the last class of hoppers graduated in April of ’22, so I guess I’m averaging about a dozen hoppers a year… got a ways to go! This class was fun because most of the cars are for the L&N trains on the layout. Previous to this, most of my L&N cars were of mid-’70s paint and markings, so I focused on some cars to represent the mid-’60s to early ’70s including four PS3 70T cars, a PS3 50T car, and three ex-Monon two-bays (ok, I don’t need 3 Monon hoppers, but they came as a set, and I got them for cheap so…). The three remaining cars represent Southern prototypes including two ex-Central of Georgia 70T cars and an old 50T offset in red with Roman lettering.
This Tangent PS3 2750 hopper received a new number, corner tow loops and roller bearing trucks to represent a later series of cars
The easiest cars of the bunch were the 70T PS3s which are all factory-painted Tangent cars with excellent detail. The four cars all came lettered in the 73000 series, and after looking through pictures, I decided they’d also be good to represent the 150000 and 153000 class cars that were also delivered in the “DIXIE LINE” paint scheme. For hopper 152067, it was as simple as changing the number and build dates. I scraped off the old lettering using an X-Acto chisel blade–it leaves a little shiny spot, but this is easy to disguise with weathering. Hopper 153708 was a little more involved because this class came with the later style tow loops at the lower corners of the car and roller bearing trucks. I snipped off the modeled loops, cut new corner tow loops from .015″ styrene, glued them on and painted them. A set of Bowser roller bearing trucks and metal wheels fit well and kept the car at the proper height.
This L&N PS3 is a factory painted Walthers Trainline kit that’s received new ladders and other details
The 50T PS3 is a factory-painted Walthers Trainline kit which is an updated version of a VERY old model kit that’s been around since probably the 60s and has pretty clunky detail. I remedied the worst of the detail issues by cutting off the ladders and replacing them with DA ladders and added new scratchbuilt heap shields. A new Kadee brake wheel and some new wire details like brake gear piping, grabs, cut bars and train line hose finished the detailing.
These three hoppers came in a single box from Atlas–they’ve had their details enhanced and have been extensively weathered but are otherwise stock
The Monon 50T hoppers are pretty much stock, factory painted Atlas hoppers. I used my favorite “grab narrowing” trick where I carefully cut away the back of the ladder grab irons with a sharp No 11 X-Acto blade. This makes the detail look much finer from any distance and is easier and quicker, in my opinion, than completely replacing the grabs with wire. I did add some wire grabs on the lower ends along with some cut levers and train line hoses.
Southern 50T hopper in Roman scheme weathered as if it’s seen a few miles
The Southern 50T offset hopper is a factory-painted Athearn model from a set of six (more of these to do). The roman lettering was common in the early ’60s and was almost entirely phased out by 1970. I wanted to model it in its last year or so of old paint. Detail-wise, it got the narrowed grab treatment, a new Kadee brake wheel, and a few wire details.
These two ex-Central of Georgia hoppers started as Roundhouse kits but are full of added and modified parts
The most work-intensive of the bunch were the two ex-CofGa 70T hoppers. These began as factory-painted Roundhouse kits (one used, one “new” but very old stock). Up to this point, I’ve been content to use the Atlas Trainman version of this car which is a pretty good stand-in. I also use the Atlas cars for my “primary” Southern 70T hopper fleet, and in reality, the Central of Georgia cars are 14″ shorter in length (40’6″) than the Southern’s big 70300-73749 class of cars (41’8″)… crazy me, I thought “wouldn’t it be cool to have the ex-CofGa hopper be noticeably shorter in a lineup?” Let’s just say these cars need a LOT of work to bring them up to modern standards and to correct the most egregiously noticeable detail faults and missing details. Lots of styrene, cuts, and extra details later, these cars emerged. Perhaps I’ll do a whole write-up on them [see the full write-up here], but they do, indeed, look cool and distinct in a lineup of Southern 70T cars… was it worth it? Only to a hopper freak like me.
I spent more time than normal weathering the interiors of these hoppers using a combination of airbrush, washes, and dry brushing
Most of these models represent cars that were already 10-25 years old when I’m modeling them, so they got some pretty heavy weathering. I did some dry brushing of rust spots on the exterior. The Monon cars got some car-colored dry brushing to fade portions of the big “MONON” using pictures as a guide. On several of the cars, I masked off portions of the data (LT WT and LD LMT) and shop markings with rectangles of tape–when peeled off after the airbrushing, it looks like re-stenciled data which is appropriate for cars this age. I airbrushed them all with a light spray of flat tan to fade them a little and add some dirt, especially around the trucks and bays. I also airbrushed some flat black into the interiors–the older the car being represented, the more black it got. Next I used a wash of black with a little tan on the outside to darken the seams and corners and dull things down. On the inside, I used a wash of Vallejo “orange rust” and water and dabbed it on heavily with a big brush, letting it dry in splotches and in the corners (some got a couple coats). For the oldest cars, I drybrushed the interior with orange rust, particularly along edges and panel lines. Finally, I put dabs of Vallejo “dark rust” into the centers of the orange spots to make it look like an old but growing rust spot with fresh orange rust along the outsides and dark rust in the middle.
Overall, I’m pretty happy with the additions, and it’s fun to have a few “rust buckets” running around in the trains. Can’t wait to load ’em at the next ops session!
L&N RS3s 108 and 100, highly modified Athearn RS3s in original black and cream and early gray and yellow paint schemes
Standard diesel power on the L&N Cumberland Valley Local (CV Local) that served the St Charles Branch was a single RS3 until around 1974 when they were replaced with a single C420. The RS3 was the quintessential L&N mine run power of the ’60s and early ’70s, and these units sported a variety of paint schemes through the years. While the Phase III RS3s with rectangular carbody filters, prominent number boards and gyralights were more common, the early Phase IIs made regular appearances as well. I picked up two factory painted Athearn models a couple years ago to become CV Local power. I’ve been noodling on them for at least the last year, and the combined Southern Railway Historical Association (SRHA), L&N Historical Society (LNHS) and Railway Prototype Modelers (RPM) meet at Chattanooga, TN in October 2022 gave me the impetus to get these across the finish line.
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing some of the pilot and cab details
The Athearn models are decent, especially the body shape (old MDC shell), crisp paint, and fine handrails. The detail level, however, especially on the pilots, left a lot to be desired. I ended up scratchbuilding a ton of parts for these models which was actually a lot of fun and very rewarding! First things first, the black locomotive came as 102, and it had the original parallel exhaust stack these units were delivered with. I wanted 108 because it actually served as CV Local power in 1964 still in its original paint, so I scraped off the “2” on the long hood, scraped off the number-board decals, and replaced them with Microscale numbers from an L&N set. I also replaced the stack with a transverse stack from a spare shell and filled the old holes. For L&N 100, I “faded” the red L&N herald on the cab sides with a little wet sanding to make it look as though the red paint was wearing off and leaving the yellow underneath, something evident in many photos.
On the body, I scraped off the hood-door latches and replaced them with pieces of bent wire. I added some scratchbuilt lift rings to the long hood as well, and I bent new long grabs to curve around the hood ends as the factory grabs did not adequately capture their curves. I replaced the factory horns with some Overland 5-chime forward Nathan M5s as the factory horns were either incorrect or oversized. For unit 100, I scratchbuilt the antenna conduit and base from brass wire, eye bolts, and styrene with a DA whip antenna on top along with a scrap round cab-top vent from the scrap box. I also scratchbuilt the oil cooling coils under the right side (long-hood forward) from wire and styrene, and a piece of styrene rod completed the piping along the right side of the hood. The L&N units also had a rectangular hole below the third step on all corners, so I carved this out of the shell by drilling holes and cutting out the rectangle with a sharp X-Acto blade.
Step 1 of canvas sunshades is to bend the rod and attach a piece of tissue paper
One fun detail was the cab sunshades. The L&N used simple canvas sunshades that rolled around a bracket. My friend Stuart Thayer showed me years ago a canvas radiator cover for a switcher he made from tissue paper, so I tried that here. I bent the bracket from .015″ wire with the horizontal section about 5 scale feet wide. I cut a strip of tissue paper (Kleenex brand, to be exact) about 4 scale feet wide and very long for the canvas. There are 2 windows on the engineer’s side of the RS3 and 3 on the fireman’s side, but the bracket and sunshade appear to be the same size. To adjust for the window spacing, I centered the canvas on one bracket and shifted it toward the rear of the cab for the other to cover the third window. After attaching the end of the “canvas” to the bracket with CA and letting it dry, I rolled the tissue tightly around the bracket a few times, cut the end off, and secured it into a roll using CA. A little black paint for the bracket and sand-colored paint for the canvas finished the project.
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing pilot details including copper-wire MU hoses and scratchbuilt pilot steps
The pilots on the model are very bare with grabs in the wrong spots and no MU detail. The first detail upgrade was to scratchbuild some simple MU hose boxes and the angle on top of the coupler box from strips of styrene. This left the footboards too short, so I made new footboards from some brass roofwalk material and styrene. For the MU hoses, I decided to bend my own using one of my favorite modeling materials, copper wire from some old Cat 5 ethernet cables. I simply drilled holes into the pilots, bent the MU hoses, cut them to length, and glued them in with the ends in the hose boxes except for a few hanging out which I cut a little longer and pinched with pliers to simulate glad hands. The coupler cut bars are also a first for me. Rather than the U-shaped bracket over the coupler I’m used to, the L&N’s RS3s had a single long rod extending from the pilot with an eye bolt on the end. I scratchbuilt an impression of this from eye bolts and bent .012″ brass wire. Some formed wire and an eye bolt also formed the safety grab across the top of each pilot. The final pilot details were an MU cable receptacle (scrap box parts from Proto GP7s/9s) and scratchbuilt drop steps. The drop steps on 108 are solid pieces of sheet styrene cut to shape and rounded with a file. The see-through steps on 100 were made from brass roofwalk material.
For the underbody, I added the equipment boxes on the fireman’s side next to the fuel tank. For 108, I scratchbuilt this detail using several pieces of sheet styrene. For 100, I recycled a piece I’d cut from an ancient Athearn U33C shell when I’d narrowed it to make an L&N U30C. For the trucks, the biggest detail was the speed recorder on the fireman’s side. I scratchbuilt this detail using a piece of sprue for the main cylinder, styrene rod to attach it to the truck (after pulling off the journal box and exposing the square hole), and styrene rod filed to a rounded point for the center piece. The cable is copper ethernet wire bent to shape and held to the sideframe with an eye bolt.
The tight quarters inside an Athearn RS3–the decoder is under the cab to the right side
Perhaps the most challenging detail modification was the end railings. The factory railings have MU stands that were easy enough to trim off, but the L&N used squared-off outer railing supports instead of the angled versions on the factory model. Engineering plastic is notorious tough to work with, so I hemmed and hawed over just leaving the factory angle before deciding that the squared look was distinct enough to warrant the effort. I started by using the corner of a file to notch out the 135-degree angle I would need to bend to 90 degrees to make it more pliable. Next, I cut the lower attachment spot of the angled support and cut the angled piece slightly shorter so it would bend to 90 degrees without overlapping the stanchion. Next, I roughed up the side of the stanchion so it would better take CA and glue (it doesn’t really “take” glue well even with roughing, but it does still better than leaving it slick). Finally, I cut a small piece of styrene to wedge alongside the stanchion and hold the angled piece at 90 degrees and secured everything as best I could with CA and liquid model cement.
On the inside, the toughest thing was adding sound. There is hardly any room at all inside the shell, so I had to make several compromises. I chose a 21-pin Soundtraxx Econami decoder because it’s very small, and the Alco 244 sound it produces is pretty decent. There is only one ideal open spot inside the shell, so I decided to use it for the speakers, a pair of LokSound 11x15mm “sugar cubes” wired in series with the small LokSound baffles installed. This meant the decoder needed to go in the cab section. This required me to cut away the center section of the body within the cab to allow the decoder to sit on top of the truck assembly and extend into both the long- and short-ends of the hood. This is not a 21-pin model, so I made a custom 21-pin harness by soldering short bits of wire that fits snugly into the decoder holes onto the locomotive wires.
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the right side
Once all the details were in place except the handrails, I touched everything up with black paint on 108 and gray paint I mixed to match 100. For 108, I was weathering to pictures of 108 on the CV Local in 1964 (see Ron Flanary photo here)–the fading on the roof is apparent, but the paint is otherwise fairly intact. I weathered 100 to pictures of it at DeCoursey Yard in Cincinnati in 1972 (see Brian Woodruff photo here), and it’s filthy! The first thing I noticed was 100’s factory paint was too dark. To “fade” it, I used a lighter gray and airbrushed it to lighten it up significantly. I wish I’d taken a picture of this step so you could see how much lighter it was–the weathering darkened it back up again, so I’m really glad I lightened it beforehand! I also sprayed a little dark gray onto the top of 108 to simulate fading, and I sprayed a little dark rust color onto both roofs and in front of the stacks and drybrushed some streaks under the battery boxes. Next, I gave them both a good black wash to grubby them up a bit. 100 also got some “oil stains” along the bottom of the carbody and in some of the hood door louvers. I’m happy with the lower oil stains but not the louvers–in retrospect I should have continued more layers of wash rather than using a thicker (but still watered down) black as it didn’t wipe off cleanly… my story is someone tried to wipe off the oil, and it just smeared… This model’s weathering is actually “backed off” a little from prototype photos to represent ~1968-70, believe it or not!
L&N RS3 100 left rearL&N RS3 100 showing cab details including engineer and canvas sunshade
After the washes and oil stains, I put the handrails on and added liberal sprays of tan and flat black to weather the pilots, trucks and fuel tanks. I also used tan lightly on the lower sides and top, and I used flat black liberally around the exhaust stack and lightly on the rest of the roof. At this point, all that was left was to reinstall the windows, add wipers, and paint and insert the engineers (two bicyclists from a Preiser kit) which required amputation of the left legs to get them between the cab sides and body sides. They add a lot of interest, and as these units always operated solo on the CV Local, it made sense to add them. The final details were headlights made from bits of fiber optic cable with the end melted into a lens shape and some cab wind deflectors, simple bits of leftover clear styrene packaging cut to size and painted on the back and edges.
So now between these RS3s and C420 1317, I’ve got sufficient L&N power to run the CV Local from about 1962-1977. I still plan on modeling a couple of PhIII RS3s at some point, to include one in boring spartan black (sigh…), but at least the L&N crew on the layout will have some nice-and-dirty locomotives to go with the gurgly and lumbering burble of the Alco 244 prime mover as they shift hoppers around the coal fields of southwestern Virginia!
L&N RS3s 108 and 100 illustrating how much more the gray scheme shows weathering than the black
L&N RS3s 108 and 100, highly modified Athearn RS3s in original black and cream and early gray and yellow paint shcemes
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the right front
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the right rear
Finished L&N RS3 108 showing cab details including canvas sunshades and engineer
Finished L&N RS3 108 showing underbody details including the scratchbuilt equipment box along the tank and the scratchbuilt speed recorder
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the left rear
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the left front
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the left side
Finished L&N RS3 108 from the right side
L&N RS3 100 right front
L&N RS3 100 left rear
L&N RS3 100 showing cab weathering
L&N RS3 100 showing finished pilot details
L&N RS3 100 showing cab details including engineer and canvas sunshade
L&N RS3 100 right side showing heavy weathering and oil stains
L&N RS3 100 left side
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing grab irons and long-hood latches
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing some of the pilot and cab details
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing pilot details including copper-wire MU hoses and scratchbuilt pilot steps
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing cab and antenna details
In-progress shot of L&N 100 showing scratchbuilt piping
Step 1 of canvas sunshades is to bend the rod and attach a piece of tissue paper
Step 2 of making canvas sunshades is to roll the tissue paper tightly and seal it with CA
The tight quarters inside an Athearn RS3–the decoder is under the cab to the right side
The Louisville and Nashville served the end of the Southern’s St Charles Branch via trackage rights, and the train that did the honors in diesel years was known as the Cumberland Valley Local or “CV Local” for short. This train, which also served the mines near Middlesboro, Kentucky, was usually meager in terms of tonnage, and a single locomotive was sufficient for the task. For my eras, the CV Local was usually handled by a single Alco RS3, and after 1974, a single Alco C420. Due to weight restrictions on the “Old CV” where this train roamed, the favorite C420s were 1316 and 1317, two ex-Tennessee Central units that happened to be the lightest C420s on the railroad. Needless to say, modeling one of these units has been on my list since I started building the St Charles Branch. So, meet ex-TC C420 1317 in HO scale!
LN C420 1317 pre-paint wheel slip sensors
This model started as an Atlas Phase 2b C420 in factory-applied TC paint (why not?). While the Atlas details are pretty good out-of-the-box, there were a few things the model needed to be an accurate representation on this particular unit. Most noticeably, the TC units had very narrow, rectangular fuel tanks (part of what made them so light). I simulated this by removing the rounded sections of the Atlas fuel tank, separating the air reservoirs (I’d need them later), and patching the holes. The tank is still about 18″ too wide, but it gives the impression created by the narrow tank and makes this C420 stand out in a line of round-tank Alcos. The drain pipe on the left side is just a piece of Cat 5 ethernet cable with the insulation intact and a few bits of styrene for the bracket.
A few of the details are commercially available detail parts including a DW brass horn and DW air filter (added just before weathering where the bell was previously). Most, however, are homemade from bits of styrene, brass wire, and one of my favorite modeling materials, copper wire from old Cat 5 ethernet cables. The most challenging details were the wheel slip sensors that go over the four truck journal boxes on the left side of the locomotive. For mine, I used bits of sprue filed into a conical shape for the base. Next, I drilled a hole through the center big enough for the copper wire (stripped of insulation). I bent the copper wire so it extends through the truck sideframe to help prevent the assembly from being broken off. From there, the wire bends up and then toward the middle of the sideframe where I bent it into a sagging shape per photos. Next I used bits of styrene to frame the wire on top of the conical housing and then to cap the frame to simulate the portion where the wire comes into the housing. Similarly, I bent bits of copper wire into the shape of sand lines for the pilot end of each sideframe (there’s not enough room on the fuel-tank end).
LN C420 1317 pre-paint cab details
The next most challenging detail was the antenna conduit. Photos are clear that the L&N added a long antenna conduit from the nose to the roof along the cab face. I couldn’t find any roof shots of 1317, so I inferred the rest from other units: 1) conduits are usually paired with a box under the antenna on the L&N, and 2) firecracker antennas in the center of the cab roof are the most common. The conduit was carefully bent from .012″ brass wire and held in place by eye bolts (these happen to be homemade as well from .010″ wire). The base is a cube of styrene, and the firecracker antenna is just a piece of copper ethernet wire with the insulation partially removed (thanks to my friend Stuart Thayer for teaching me this trick). Rounding out the initial cab details are some sunshades out of the spare parts box and a couple of headlight deflectors made from bits cut from the “ears” of a Kadee coupler box.
The roof of the model has molded-on lift rings, and I decided to shave these off and replace them with wire. I used .010″ wire bent around a thumbtack to create candy-cane shaped lift rings–only the long end is actually inserted into a hole, the other side is just pressed into the body a bit. For the pilots, I reused most of the Atlas factory parts including the MU cables, coupler cut bar and long grab. I also used the factory drop steps but added a piece of thin styrene to make it solid instead of a grate per prototype photos. The train line hose, like my freight car hoses, is – you guessed it – a piece of copper ethernet wire bent into shape and crimped at the end to form the glad hand. Finally, just before painting, I noticed that the L&N had removed the hand brake from the front of the cab, so I did the same, replacing it with a square-shaped length of styrene and a hole.
LN C420 1317 painted left front
Before painting, I sanded the TC paint lightly to remove some of the sheen and “3D” nature of the striping, but I left a little of the raised paint so at certain angles you’d be able to still see the faint lines of the TC paint (again, why not?). I still have a lot of Testors Model Master acrylics, so after examining photos, I decided on “light ghost gray” for my base color and “insignia yellow” for the nose. I primed the whole locomotive with black and then masked the pilots before airbrushing the gray. The nose was easy because it’s a separate piece, so all I had to do was spray it gray, mask the rectangle for the top, and spray the yellow. I used a combination of a black sharpie and brushed black paint for the window and number-board gaskets, and a little blue and red paint for MU covers, fuel fillers, and a couple other things on the gray that look red in photos. Marker and walkway lights are just semi-gloss black paint. The final step was spraying the painted shell with Rustoleum clear “high luster” lacquer to protect the paint and make a better surface for decals.
I used the Microscale set 87-823 “L&N Locomotives Gray & Yellow 1970-80” for most of the decals, using dozens of liberal coats of Micro-Sol and Micro-Set and a damp paper towel to help the decals settle in. The numbers on the number boards are from a Microscale SCL diesel set–they’re a little smaller and look better on Alco boards. One detail I added during this step was the cab wind deflectors flanking the side windows. These are just bits of clear styrene from an Intermountain wheel box. I cut a strip the width of the deflectors, masked a strip down the middle, painted the back the gray color of the body, and used a silver Sharpie marker on the sides and around the masking. After removing the masking tape, I cut the deflectors to length, added a little dog-ear, and used the silver Sharpie to hit the cut ends. A dab of CA on the cab secures them in place. This method models an otherwise delicate detail in a manner that’s resilient to routine handling on the layout.
LN C420 1317 finished wheel slip sensors
Weathering on this unit, as you can see, is substantial–these units worked the coal fields, and baths are few and far between. Besides, part of an Alco’s charm is it’s ability to spew oil and black smoke everywhere. Working from photos, I started with the oil seeps on the engine doors–these are mostly around the bottom, but in two photos from 1974, an entire door on 1317’s left side was covered in oil, so I modeled this. I used watered down flat black paint, alternately dabbing paint and water to get the consistency right and wiping in a vertical direction between coats. Next came several black washes of water with some black paint mixed in. I brush it on in a section, wait 30-60 seconds, then wipe in a vertical direction to simulate grime streaked by rain. The trick is to do multiple light coats until you’re happy. A little drybrushed sand color under the battery boxes finished the preliminary weathering.
LN C420 1317 working Mayflower on the CV Local
I left the handrails off until I was ready to airbrush. Airbrushing consisted first of some tan sprayed heavily on the pilots, trucks and fuel tanks (with the air reservoirs now mounted). Next came flat black primarily on the roof–moderate in most areas and thick around the exhaust stack. Finally, I used a little rust on the pilots and roof to give it just a bit of a rusty brown look. All that remained at this point was to reassemble everything, including the cab glass that had been removed earlier, and add a set of A-Line windshield wipers painted silver.
Overall, I’m very happy with how 1317 turned out, though I think I overshot the weathering a little. The unit was repainted in 1974, and I was shooting for weathering circa 1976. I think I nailed the weathering circa 1978, but it’s still a pretty realistic representation of how filthy these Alcos got in the L&N’s coal fields during the coal boom. This is also the first Alco I’ve ever finished, so I also enjoyed the challenge of making so many details from scratch. The unit came with factory sound by Loksound which does a great job of replicating the lumbering burble of the Alco 251 prime mover, so she’s a blast to operate! I’m just happy the CV Local finally has a finished L&N unit to head it up which should make the next ops session more fun.
