Juneco CNR Caboose project


CNR Glen

Member
Years ago a Canadian company called Juneco made several Canadian road craftsman kits. so far I've managed to track down and build several and awhile ago I found their CNR wood sheathed caboose at a swap meet. Someone had started it and lost intrest, possibly because of the True Line Trains version came out that it ready to run and probably a cleaner model. A week or so later I found a completed version to go with it.
Well I'm more intrested in building than just buying a ready-to-run model and placing it on the track. Anyway This is what i had to start with:
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The basic walls were up as well as most of the underbody details installed. Unfortunetly the builder hadn't added any weight before closing up the body so I drilled a hole in the roof where the cupola sits and poured some lead shot in, followed by some white glue to hold it down.

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I re-started assembly by installing the windows and doors. I plan to spray the caboose in CN Morency orange. I'm using a liquid mask on the window glazing.

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The Cupola is made up of metal castings for the sides and a cardstock roof. I glued the four sides together,


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Then glued them onto the roof of the caboose.

My next step is to fabricate the cupola roof, then probably paint the body, before I have to start work on the end platforms.
 
I finished off the cuplola. Being a 'parts kit' it was missing the cupola roof and grabs so I fabricated those. The roof made of styrene and the grabs out of brass rod. I had some old handrail eyes from another project that I substituted for the originals.

The green on the windows is the dried liquid mask. I'm going to spray the orange on the sides before I continue with the assembly.
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Nice work. It is nice to see what they look like built.I have a half dozen or so of those kits plus a number of other cars and structures. They are still making some of the cars including the caboose I believe. The nicest kit I have found from Juneco is their engine house.You can pick them up pretty cheap on ebay and they come with about 2 lbs of detail castings as well. The castings do have a fair bit of flash on them but look great after a little cleanup.
 
I'vr built a number of Juneco kits including two 36' truss rod boxcars, 36' truss rod gondola, CNR 45' express reefer. One of the boxcars I built while I was backpacking through Wester Europe one summer! I just received their CPR caboose kit from another modeller and I have their CNr icehouse in the box to build one day.

I've been airbrushing the orange on the caboose today. It's probably going to take several light coats to cover the castings but leave the detail visible.
 
I painted the orange on the caboose yesterday and today. It took about 3 coats of Floquil CN orange to cover the castings without covering detail. It color looks pretty vivid right now but when I add the roof color (weathered black) and some light weathering it'll be toned down.
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Next I work on the end platforms.
 
Thanks Will, That's good to know. Could you tell me how to get ahold of them? I'm missing one set of steps for this caboose.
 
Interhobbies should be able to help you, but if you are looking for parts for structure kits you may be out of luck. They are only making detail parts and a few different car kits. The caboose is still in production. Yours is looking really good now that it has some paint on it.
 
Thank you for the kind comments. Will, I sent an email to inter-Hobbies and hope to hear back soon
 
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I painted the roofs and underbody yesterday. I used Folk-art Licorice of the roofs and end platforms and Folk-art Wrought Iron for the underside. The wrought Iron looks alot like a mix of floquil's weathered black and grimy black. As I mentioned befor the colors will have a weathering wash ver them to tone them down, probably after the decals go on.
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I had to d a quick fix on one of the end pieces. part od the handrail had snapped off and went into la-la land so a quick bending and gluing of some brass rod:

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Another update on my progress. I decalled the caboose, using CDS dry tansfers. Some very small parts of the transfers did not stick down but that's not a big worry. I'm just considering it pre-weathering. I also painted the side grabs white, as per CNR's practice. Again I plan to add some washes or other weathering to tone the colors down just a bit, especially the roof since it's a bit too black in my opinion. The trucks are athearn cabbose trucks.
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I finished the end platforms, less the steps. I added the railings and brake rigging castings and measured and cut the ladders. The ladder in the picture isn't crooked, it's just the camera angle.
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As far as the steps go I'm hoping to get a replacment casting for the step stringers from Juneco (the kits are still being made) but instead of unsing stripwood for the steps themselves I'm planning to use brass strips instead since they're considerably thinner.
 
Just a quick update on the project.
After taking the summer off of modelling I managed to make a deal with a fiend to split the cost of steps from Sylvan. Sylvan sells both the steps and the ladders together but not seprately. Since all I need are the steps and my friend needs the ladders it'll work out well.

Pictures are on the way but while I've been waiting for the steps I started to lightly weather the car, fading the paint by spraying very thinned white over the roof and arange walls. After that dried, I sprayed a bit of polly-s dirt on the bottom of the carbody. I also sprayed the polly-s dirt on the trucks, later I'll dry-brush burnt unber and sienna on the trucks to replicate surface rust. More to come....
 
Sorry it's been so long but I finally finished the caboose project this afternoon.
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I ended up using Sylvan photo-etched brass steps but they didn't have the CN steps so I had to settle for CPR one instead. This Caboose was an exercise in compromising.
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I weathered the caboose by spraying the entire car with a very thin flat white to fade the orange and black down. Then I used a black wash to show the separate boards on the the sides. The roof is painted in Folk-art Licorice with Folk-art wrought-iron drybrushed. The marker lights are old Walthers castings
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The previous builder drilled the hole for the smokejack way too close the the cupula so I had to move to forward. I uses a small piece to shim brass to patch to hole. The Smokejack it from Minitures by eric (probably the nicest part of the model!)
If I had to do the model over I would scribe the cupula castings deeper since a couple passes with the airbrush almost covered all the detail.
 
Very NICE! Luv those Juneco kits!

You may want to switch to Tichy caboose trucks as they're more in keeping with this van's vintage. (CN woodies never had roller bearing trucks)
 



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