Tag Archives: CB&Q

Running board details

Aaron Gjermundson has been busy working on a few models. He sent information illustrating techniques to make a common detail.

While building an HO scale Sunshine Models CB&Q XA-11A boxcar kit, I was unsure how I wanted to mount the lateral running boards. After looking at prototype photos in Railway Prototype Cyclopedia (RPCyc), Volume 12, I noticed they were similar to those on a car I had photographed at the North Dakota Railroad Museum in Mandan, North Dakota.

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Building a CB&Q FM-11 flat car

Bob’s Photo from the collection of Jerry Hamsmith

George Toman sent photos and information on his latest model. Here’s George with the story.

While attending the 2019 RPM Chicagoland, I caught up with Jerry Hamsmith who showed me the latest resin kit he and Ed Rethwisch produced. I was fortunate to get one of the three kits remaining for sale at the RPM Meet. Ed Rethwisch made the gorgeous patterns and the parts were cast by Westerfield.

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Workbench Wednesday

CB&Q freight cars

Jerry Hamsmith sent an update on his growing CB&Q freight car fleet. Here’s his report.

I thought I might share some of what I have been working on in terms of rolling stock for my circa 1955 Chicago Burlington and Quincy – Beardstown Division layout. This division linked the southern Illinois coal fields with the major metropolitan areas in northern Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota, among others. In 1955, the Q coal hauling fleet, consisting of 2- and 3- bay hoppers and composite drop bottom gons, was still about 40 percent gons.

Here is another group of drop bottom gons I am currently working on. I do them in batches as I need a large number of them and that speeds up the process. Both steel end and wood end cars are in the current batch. I currently have a total of 33 finished composite gondola cars on the layout.

Here is a photo of one of the already completed cars on the layout. Jerry offers kits for these CB&Q coal gondolas. A PDF of currently available kits and decals can be found on the RCW blog Helpful Links page.

What’s on your workbench?

New email discussion list

A new email discussion list has started and modelers have been sharing their work. Here are a few of the posts. A link to the group will be offered at the end.

On my workbench is an HO scale Speedwitch Media kit K111, a 1.5 door, single-sheathed automobile boxcar built by the Pere Marquette in 1926-27. Mine reflects their second group of cars, which rode on Dalman Two-Level trucks. I lettered one side of the car for the PM and the other side for the C&O, their final owner. I built the model 2-3 years ago and in the intervening time started improving ladders using 0.010 styrene rod to replace the ladder rungs. I did the same for this model before painting using my preferred Badger “Modelflex” paint and my reliable Badger 155 Anthem airbrush at 20 lbs. PSI. I have started adding chalk mark decals and will add reweigh and lube date decals.

Bill Welch

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