Scrubber Car No 15 in "O" scale part 5

I have been finishing off what will be the visible interior details on the car. That is the items that go in the two motorman's cabs. They are ready except for painting and in the photo they are from top left, the built in tool box and built in clothes locker which are at one end of the car and in the next row the air compressor and air tanks that are at the other end. Between them are the two controllers and in the bottom row are the goose neck handbrakes, air valves to control the grinders, the valves to turn on the water and finally the air brake valves. Everything is made out of styrene except for the goose necks. As per my usual way of doing things these are only a representation of the real thing. As everything inside the cabs is painted in drab brown none of the items are going to stand out and they should look ok.


The photo in part 1 of this thread was taken in 1965. When you tell people you are building a particular model additional information often turns up unexpectedly and this was the case here. Four photos turned up showing it's transportation to the Tramway Museum in 1968 and the photo below shows No 15 being unloaded at the museum . Here the Coke Cola ad is different from the 1965 photo. Obviously soft drink started to appear in cans sometime after 1965 but before 1968. In Australia at least.


This seemed a more interesting ad for my model so I have been working on the new signage and the result is in the last two photos. One for the sides and the smaller one for the ends. I leave the ads this size and do the final sizing in Paint Shop Pro when I print them.


I really can't do any more on this car and No 71 until I at least get the side frames back from the caster. Hopefully my next post will be back building my layout. I hope!

Advertising Car No 71 in "O" scale part 2

Time for another progress report. The pieces all went together without too many problems. The photos show the progress so far. Now I'm at about the same stage as I am with No 15. I'm waiting on the side frames and the trucks before I can go on with either model. These are great little trams to build as there is a minimum of interior detail so construction goes quite quickly. And not much to go wrong. There is still some work I can do in finishing off especially around the headlights.

The photo in part 1 shows a different ad on the car from the one I intend to use. As the trams were operated by the Brisbane City Council, I thought it appropriate to use a City Council Loan ad. Al Brisbane trams had flag holders above the motorman's door and when a Brisbane City Loan was open the cars flew flags which said just that. The flag photo started off as a photo from an existing one at the museum and like the ad for the car side it has been heavily worked on with Paint Shop Pro.

Advertising Car No 71 in "O" scale part 1

My scrubber car has come to a halt at the moment as I can't finish the body until the power units and side frames arrive. And as I have only sent the Brill side frames off to the caster this morning it could be awhile yet.

I'm still not well enough to get back onto the layout for awhile and as I have ordered two power units I have decided another 4 wheeler is in order. Looking for something that ran in the 1960s and a little different as well I chose to start building Advertising Car No 71 as seen in the first photo. This photo was taken in the mid 1960s.

No 71 started life in 1915 as a "Standard 10 Bench" car No 71 as per the drawings below and was converted to an advertising car in 1954. I have been unable to find any drawings for this car in the museum archives but I have a number of photos of 71 and a set of drawings for the original 10 bench cars. It's obvious that as much as possible of the original car was used in the conversion. The original roof was reused along with the two motorman's bulkheads. The chassis was unchanged and I suspect the central eight seats were left in place as well. The front and rear seats had the horizontal part removed but the backs are still clearly visible attached to the bulkheads in the photos. The frames for the signs were stood out from the original sides, obviously to clear the edge of the roof.

I have developed out all the parts by reference to the photos and using the 10 bench dimensions. If I'm not correct no one is going to be able to prove me wrong.




So now to cut out the pieces and start gluing them together.

Scrubber Car No 15 in "O" scale part 4

I felt up to a short visit to the museum the other day so I got into the back of the shed and took my camera inside No 15. I'd say that no one has been inside in 20 years and I had to fight my way in through spider webs and dust. Fortunately all the equipment is still in place and I was able to photograph the air tanks, air compressor, the built in tool boxes and the upright locker. These are the items that will be visible through the open doors. So armed with the photographs I made representations of these items. They are not 100% accurate but everything was assembled from what ever scrap I could find in the scrap box and as the view of them will be limited they will look the part.

The first photo is these items almost ready for painting. The air tanks and the compressor will be black and the wooden tool box and locker will be the same brown as the inside of the car.


The next photo is the body assembled about as far as I can go until I get the mechanism and the Brill side frames done. I've been told that the mechanism could take up to 6 weeks to arrive and I haven't got the side frames ready for sending off to the caster either. I'm reluctant to even work on the steps as these may foul on the side frames. I can work on the controls which are quite complex in these scrubbers and also the roof details. So I still have some work for awhile.


The last photo is the motorman's view of the controls that I need to start on now. These cars didn't have destination boxes so the red handle on the right is connected to a large red arrow outside and the motorman would point to the direction he wished to go by turning the handle to the left or right when approaching a signal box.

Scrubber Car No 15 in "O" scale part 3

The joys of modelling. I decided to start assembly this morning but discovered to my annoyance that I had laminated the side layers together the wrong way round. I needed my open doorway to be at the front left and I ended up with them both on the wrong side instead. I was able to salvage the display boards but I have had to cut out new sides and now I'm waiting for the glue to dry.

In the mean time I have finished working on the advertisements for the model. I have used a free copy of "Paint Shop Pro" for years and upgraded it recently to "Paint Shop Pro 10" when it was also became a free give away for awhile. I did try "The Gimp" as an alternative as it is free and very good but totally different in how it does things. The learning curve was to steep and as I was already familiar with PSP I have stayed with it.


I scanned in the best photo of No 15 I could find and using PSP I cut the ads out, corrected the perspective and then resized them to fit the model. What I ended up with was something rather blurry but by creating a second layer above the first, I redrew the ads. Everything has been totally replaced except for the coke bottles and the glass. These have been fiddled with and enhanced as best as I can but retained. I figure when they are on a moving tram they will look ok.

Scrubber Car No 15 in "O" scale part 2

I always found the layer method of construction a bit on the tedious side. Drawing all those overlaying pieces accurately one layer at a time. That all changed when I discovered CAD software and now I actually enjoy developing the parts for a model. Fortunately Brisbane trams were fairly angular and by drawing each overlay on a different layer and using large amounts of copy and paste the work goes quickly. The first two drawings are for most of the pieces with all the 1mm and 0,5mm pieces grouped together.



To transfer the details to the styrene, I have settled on printing them on to printer paper. To fix the paper to the styrene I spray the back with spray adhesive. When the shine goes off the adhesive I lay the sheet onto the styrene and press it down. Only one surface has been sprayed and the paper stays on long enough to cut the pieces out but comes off easily when I'm finished.


All went well and I spent the morning cutting all the pieces out as can be seen in the photo above.

The last photo shows the pieces after all the overlays have been glued together. It isn't very apparent in the last photo but the display boards complete with the full length hood for the lights are already in place on the sides. This display boards sit clear of the sides by about 2" on the prototype.

Everything has been set aside for a day for the glue to fully dry before I can start the assembly. So to keep busy I'm going to get on with recreating the Coca Cola ads for the model.

Scrubber Car No 15 in "O" scale part 1

I have managed to lay myself up with damage to my ribs for the last couple of weeks so no work has been done on the layout. But I have been able to sit in front of the computer so I decided to start work on a new model.

My choice of a scrubber car might seem a bit odd but I wanted a break from bogie cars and as I'm only building models that ran in the 1950-1969 period I have had to rule out all the old time 4 wheelers.

No 15 started life in 1898 as a Standard Combination Car, was converted to a scrubber car in 1932 and was "modernised" in 1947 into the car as seen in the attached photo. On the closure of the network in 1969 the car was transferred to the museum where it is today.


The photo shows the car in the mid 1960s. The wooden chassis of these original Standard Combination Cars were only 6" wide. When it was converted, the wider passenger body was removed, and the new body is only the width of the chassis. This makes it and it's sister (scrubber car No 14) the narrowest cars in the Brisbane fleet.

The central area between the bulkheads will conceal the Bull Ant motor and I will attempt to model the air cylinders, air compressor and lockers etc in the exposed areas. All together a neat little tram that shouldn't take too long to build.