Large Scale Central

Austrian-izing my Roundhouse Fowler

Whilst I love my Fowler, being all black is well…boring. And looks out of place with my mostly Austrian rolling stock and battery powered 0-6-2T. So after seeing some pics of someone else doing this to thier’s. I decided instead of playing musical engines again, to work with what I have and save up for a RH Billy kit next year. I started on the easy part, the tender. Taken apart and cleaned, scuffed, primed and painted red were the frame, apron deck and trucks. I baked them for an hour in the oven like I do with any metal or brass train I paint. After cooling, I reassembled the tender. Looks pretty good I think! Need to source a pair of Regner lanterns, one for the shelf on the rear of the tender and one to replace the ugly solid box headlight casting supplied from Roundhouse. I will light the front one with a bulb. I installed a RC power slide switch in the factory supplied opening in the front of the tender to control the light and eventual RC. A SPP Slo-mo is on order for delivery next month to make her more stable and safe running on my raised mini railway. I am going to start the not so fun part now, tearing the locomotive down to the individual frames and cross braces so I can degrease and prep for painting. Cylinders and motion will remain black and unpainted respectively. Frame will be red, internal braces will be red and the trailing truck frame and maybe the wheel centers will also be red. Mike

Here is a couple pics of todays progress. I got the engine tore down last night, frames cleaned and painted before bed time. I put them in the oven to bake first thing this morning whilst I enjoyed my morning coffee. Just finished getting her back together. I reassembled the chassis to the point of the first picture and tested on air to make sure all was good before reinstalling the boiler/cab assembly that was all cleaned up and ready. She was very dirty and gritty, so a good cleanup was needed whether she got repainted or not. Mike