GERMAN RAILWAY GONDOLA TYP OMMR

GUN TECH - Thanks for those comments and good too hear you like.

WAYNEC - Sounds like you have a lot going on at the bench.  Think the railbed looks good and your Baureihe 52 looks GREAT!  Thats the locomotive I have but in 1/35 will use your tips when construction begins on it.  It looks to be quite intense in the box.

CARL - That's alright too say "You like my wood"  Thanks buddy.

ANDY - Quit drooling on my wood, you'll make it swell.

Have not had much time at the bench lately but have done some here and there.  Will start with the Flak gun.  Painted and some light weathering may go back later and weather a bit more, dont know, but will see how the rest of the build progresses first.

After the gun went ahead and attached the car sides onto the bed.  I now know why maybe you do not see many people finish these Gondola kits.  The sides did not go on easy and actually had to remove all of the side beams, bend some and manipulate them into position once the wood section had already been glued onto the bed.  Also had to cut off all the locating taps from the beams.  It was a real challenge to get the sides erected and attached.  They came out all right but not as good as I had expected.

Any flaws that may be there I'm not to worried with because the weathering that is to come should cover any that may be there up.  I figured that these cars are actually really dirty.  In the picture above you may have seen some stuff going on in the inside of the car.  The frame work for the "gun deck" has begun.  Here some views from the inside of the car.

Back too the problem with the sides giving problems, well that made them not square with the bed and the tops bowed out something awful.  To fix this had made the beam seen going across the car and it had a notch cut out on each end and that would hook onto the sides of the car pulling them together.  There was too much pressure for the thin styrene and it was bending / warping the beam and it's ends.  To fix this had made some aluminum end caps and fixed them to the ends of the beam, that solved the problem.  Can see the end caps in this picture:

Thats it for now.  Will get some more pictures up soon.

Thanks to all for looking.

Man Rob.....very cool : )

TREAD - Thanks buddy!  Good to "see" you.

OK, a little bit more.  Painted the gun deck frame work.

This was just a simple frame sense it would not really be seen but have had so concern with the deck possibly sagging in the middle with no support.  Have added a center support beam.

My original idea was to put the front side cross bracing on both sides but after some thought had decided to leave the side you see on the right open.  My thought process is if there was a crew in the car on a long ride....were would they stay to relax and get out of the elements?  Leaving the cross members out allows access under the gun deck and figure this space can be used for crew quarters and gear / stowage.  Not sure how realistic that would be but that was the thought.

Good griefe Rob thats comin out great !

Beat that sucker into shape Rob! Nice fix on the framing and the gun platform is shaping up nicely.

Just love that wood detail.

Your work reminds me of a lodge I stayed in Maryland years ago... floors and walls were made of wood.  You did GREAT!  Keep it coming...

DAM NICE WOOD......Nuff Said

Rounds Complete!!

CARL - Thanks buddy   I had to build this train car so that I could move you and Andy's around.

WBILL - Good to hear you like the frame work.  Question for you or for anyone who may have a suggestion: This is for later on when I get around to the flat cars.  Have 3 flat cars that will be attached to this gondola and each car will have a Pz III on it so what would the numbering on the tanks be?  Meaning would they be in sequential order or what / how would they be represented?  I'm assuming the Pz's would be leaving a factory or a unit would be moving to a new position at the front so the tactical numbers would would have to represent them belonging all to the same group.  Any suggestions?

ERIC, REDLEG - Thanks guys   Have the gun deck left to get the wood treatment and then will revisit the car as a whole and give it some heavy grim to finish off the wood / car.  Stay tuned, it's great to have yall along for the ride.

ANDY - Are you sure it was Maryland or was it on your way to the Eastern front   Glad you like.

The update does not look to busy but a little time was put in to cut and texture all of the gun deck boards.  Wanted to of course try to match the kits supplied boards and what I had come up with is:  Used some Evergreen .015 x .188" strips, that measures out to 3/16" wide and that is the exact same width of the kit boards   Then used a razor saw and drug it across the styrene strips to give it texture.  After texture then cut 21 boards and made the deck. 

In order to get the proper board placement and spaces between the boards, had taped down a small carpenters square and placed tape with the sticky side up to the bench.  Now took the boards and laid into position and used a razor for the spacing between the boards.

Now that all the boards are in place had then used .022 x .066" strips and glued 2 of these at equal distances on the bottom to hold the boards together.  Let dry and this is how it came out.  Not sure if you will be able to see the wood grain in the pic but it's there and should show much better once painted.

The deck has now been prepped and a coat of MM wood has been applied.  Will let that dry overnight then it will receive the same wood technique as the rest of the wood has.

Can now get a better idea of how things will look with the deck temporally in.

Until next time

Nicely done Rob . I'll remember your wood graining technique .

Hope you find a refrigerated rail car to hall my beer ..............you can leave Andys beer out in the sun .

Great scratch building result!  I am going to call that space the 'penthouse'... isn't that normally the best room in the building?  

Aw crap, now you got me wanting to do one of    these......

    .........and I'm still working on my 4502.

        Now THIS is what inspiration is about.

             Some really superior woodwork and detail here.

                   You go man.........

Rob,

Your question has a two-part answer....if it's a "factory depot" setting where the tanks are shipping out for delivery to units in the field, they wouldn't yet have any tactical markings applied as that would be done by the units in the field. If you want to show an established unit on the move, then they would all have the same divisional/tactical markings but different turret numbers. The turret numbers would likely all start with the same first digit (like 3 or 5) for example to denote they belonged to the same company (you could even go further and have the second digit match as well to show they were from the same platoon) as it was common for units to entrain as entities to make it easier when they offloaded to stay organized and move together as a unit. HTH!  

Man, this is just STUNNING.

That wood is just a home run outta the park! Great work!

A very unusual and compelling project, for sure. You're doing some awesome detailing and painting here!!!

CARL - Working on the wood graining now for the gun deck.  Taking pics of each step and will post in case anyone is interested.  Figure pictures are better than words.  When I had first explained the process, had forgot one step   That will be corrected with the picture show.

Will see what I can do about the refrigerated car...........

ANDY - "Penthouse" it is.  Almost ready for you to move in.  Thinking I should come up with some gear and what not to put in there before putting the overhead deck on, will see?  Glad you like the scratch work.  This work was not too difficult due to I already had and used the correct shape and size of Evergreen styrene.  Just had to cut everything to the correct length and attach into place.

DISASTER - I'm surprised at how much feedback I'm getting with this build, was not sure if there was going to be much interest not truly being an armor piece.  Happy to hear that I could inspire someone who inspires so many.  It would be fun to watch you work your sprue juice magic one one of these railcars.  Thank you for the great comments.

How is your 4502 coming along?  Knew you were working on it, is there any pic's out yet?  I don't want to miss it.

WBILL - That answer helps indeed, just the answer I was looking for.  Many Thanks   I now just have to decide what the scenario of the scene will be.  The overall plan with the train is still real early in the planning stag but it's out come will largely depend on what / how the Pz III's will be represented and since they will dictate  the theme so much, I really appreciate you filling in the answers

DOOG - It's great too have you stop in.  Thank you very much for the comments.  This is my first exploration into these railcars and I have to admit, have been enjoying working on it.  Glad you too like the wood effect.  After playing around with it for a while was surprised at how easy it was to achieve the effect.  As mentioned, will show the process on my next post.

Thanks to all for looking and for your comments

deafpanzer

Your work reminds me of a lodge I stayed in Maryland years ago... floors and walls were made of wood.  You did GREAT!  Keep it coming...

 

Andy , was it a caboose ?

Here is how I painted the wood effect.  All paints enamel Model Masters.

Base coat of MM wood and then gave it a coat of Dullcote, let dry overnight.  On the car bed had also used MM Military Brown in random places, not on the gun deck though.

Car bed had a very light wash, gun deck gave a little heavier wash of Winsor & Newton Raw Umber oil.  It was thinned with Turpenoid (Blue Can), let dry then spray a coat of Dullcote.

(This is the step I had forgot to mention before)  using AIM Products Weathering Powder applied on selected boards Dirty Yellow and Medium Brown.  Used mostly the Dirty Yellow.  Put on dry with an old paint brush.

Next heavy dry brush random boards with MM Light Sea Gray.

Then light dry brush the majority of the boards with MM Light Gray. (I know, crappy pic)

Now the fun part, use an old brush and apply MIG pigment SMOKE BLACK P023 and INDUSTRIAL CITY DIRT P039 in areas and amount of your liken.  Use rubbing alcohol as a carrier.

At this point I called it done for the gun deck but on the car bed I had once again gave the bed a very light dry brushing with the LIGHT GRAY to give a more worn look. 

And here is the Gun Deck temporally in place

WAY COOL, dude! THAT'S what makes this forum shine and thrive--the willingness of modelers like you who take the time to selflessly share their methods here, that we all might learn and become better modelers!

Thanks for taking the time to share this with us!

Glad to be of assistance Rob and sweet little step-by-step on the wood effect!

the doog

WAY COOL, dude! THAT'S what makes this forum shine and thrive--the willingness of modelers like you who take the time to selflessly share their methods here, that we all might learn and become better modelers!

Thanks for taking the time to share this with us!

+!

Well done Rob. 

DOOG - Hey, thanks man.  I tell you, a lot of the guys on here have helped me out and I am just happy to be able to show something in return and hope that it can help someone else

WBILL, ERIC -

Helped you out? I think you have it reversed.

Yup , way cool looking results Rob .

Carl,

Was thinking of a way to help hold the Flak 38 in place on the car.  Liked the idea brought up earlier with using the large U bolts but wanted something a bit more.  Decided to use chain and make some small pad eye's.  The chain is pretty small and was a pain to get into place.  What took longest was had to make tiny links from wire to connect the chain on the front of the gun.  The gun is still dry fit for pics will remove to paint the chain.

Chains are a nice touch Rob, I can't comment as to whether they would be actually used or not but they are a neat feature regardless. The Flak 38 wasn't a light piece of equipment (weighed in at around 400 kgs) and gravity alone would probably have been sufficient to keep it in place.

WBILL - Not sure either if the chains should be there or not, spent all day thinking about it and looking at them and as you see decided to put them on if for no other reason to add a little more something.  I doubt they would actually be on there though.  They can be removed if everyone thinks that would be better?

Been slowly working on some stuff to fill the car.  Have scratch built a large crate and thinking about making some of the smaller, long ones you usually see with German ammo.

Here is the layout of the car I have so far.

What really is needed are more Flak 38 and some MG 34 ammo cans.  Looking through my parts box I have discovered I am finally out of German ammo cans.  Guess I can buy some or I may just wait and collect cans from other kits as I build them and slowly add them into the car.  They would be easy to just throw them in at any time.

Rob,

I think you should keep the chains...I wasn't trying to discourage you from using them by any means. The MG34 on the AA tripod and other goodies look good too...the crew needed some place to "be" when not manning the guns after all, right? Maybe you could use some of the empty space under the platform for the Flak 38 to house the ammo...gives you more options at least without crowding things too much in the car?

Hi Rob. I hope you're going to add some figgies to this piece to give a it some extra pop.

Rob and Bill , i've been thinking about how practical the chain would be and it occurred to me as to ask how much recoil is there from the 20mm ? What with the gun mount sitting on a wood deck i would think the mount would be supsceptible to moving around on those boards from the vibration of the recoil ............

Carl,

Recoil wouldn't necessarily be an issue...the gun itself was designed to be mobile and didn't require any special arrangements to account for recoil when deployed. Generally when the Flak 38 was used in an SPG mount (like the famous "sled" mount in the back of an Opel or on the Sdkfz 10/5) some method was used to secure the base because of the inevitable "objects in motion" physics. That's why I still think the chains are a good idea for Rob to keep...trains did travel at a decent speed and had to stop eventually...and you wouldn't want a heavy object like the gun to decide on its own that it still had a little bit more distance to travel.