New Haven #121 Budd RDC to WES #1711


catnippertom

catnippertom

That Oregon Guy
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This is my first attempt a creating a custom loco. This is the second locomotive I have purchased since coming into the hobby and I am a bit nervous about creating a custom loco but I think I have to start somewhere. So far I have masked off a lot of the body so I can spray-paint the white on the window section. I popped out the window insert for painting. I am going to try my best on this. Hopefully, nothing will go wrong. I almost tried to use vinyl tape to create the decals but I couldn't quite make it work so spray-paint it is. Should be awesome if this comes out the way I want it to!
 
One of the funny things about this is that NH #121 is in reality WES #1711. It was changed from NH #121 to Alaska Railroad #711 then to WES #1711. I thought it would be fun to pay homage to that heritage in my own model by using NH #121 as a base point when creating WES #1711. It would feel more realistic that way. I hope to maybe recreate the entire WES fleet at some point. Hopefully, I can get working on creating the Colorado Railcar Aero DMUs(once I get better quantitative data on them). I need to go in person to get some measurements from those before I can start mocking up the 3d models of them. I am quite the Trimet stan even if in reality it sucks to ride any Trimet transportation😅
 
Update:
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Just took the masking off after letting it sit for a little over an hour. Everything seems to be looking great! The white side stripe looks pretty good. There are a few really small bits that are out of place but man does it look great otherwise. Next is to spray the blue portions of the loco.
 
Be very careful, you don't say what type of spray paint your using, but obviously your going to tape over the newly painted white stripe, when removing that tape after you've sprayed the second colour it's very easy to peel that white paint off with the tape unless you've protected it by using some kind of varnish or lacquer (dull or clear coat in the US)
 
Update:
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Okay, so the blue went on well. The paint dried overnight then I tried to apply the wasp stripes to the front and rear. I had it all masked off and once I let it set and everything I took off the masking and it turned out like crap. This is the third time I have started over on them. I have been using Sharpies to correct everything and even black out the windows which probably isn't the best idea but it is okay with me. The current photos are looking a lot better than I used to by a long shot. Without an airbrush, I would say I am doing pretty alright for my first custom. I am not happy with it in its current state but I am making progress on making it look decent enough.
 
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Final Update!
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I was able to touch up the wasp stripes and they came out a great color! I also put on the final decals to wrap the whole thing up. I learned a whole lot while doing this. I made quite a few mistakes and it isn't perfect but it is good enough for my liking. I'll show some running footage once I get some more work done on the layout.
 
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