December 19, 2015 A different way to Kitbash

Pictures added Dec 27, 2015

I recently bought two Model Power E7B shells that had been kitbashed from E7A shells.  The fellow that did the work was very good at kitbashing.  In looking closely at his work I was very impressed with the way he modified the shells.

He used several shells for making small pieces to insert into the kitbashed shell.  The insert seam or splices are perfect and required very little filler to remove the edges.

He added the circular goody (Sand Filler) on the right, the seam where he joined the two shells is barely noticeable.

These pictures are as I received it from the seller.  I will need to do a bit of cleanup before painting but not very much.

He added a different door on this side and another Sand Filler on the left, again the splice is barely noticeable.

I was very impressed with his work so I give it a shot on my newest kitbash project using his technique.

I'm going to kitbash the Athearn Vista Dome above into an SP ¾ Dome/Lounge car (SP3600) using the Bachmann Full Dome as a sacrificial lamb for the dome.

The picture above shows the vista dome removed.

After removing the Bachmann dome and shorting it to fit the Athearn shell I cut the Acrylic window glass to fit the new dome.  Next I fit it to the shortened Bachmann dome to the Athearn shell then primed the entire shell.

I filled in the windows that are not on the SP prototype, sanded and primed the shell again.

I tried making an insert to fill two lower windows using some of the corrugated siding from the Bachmann shell but it didn't match.

I decided to buy another Athearn car off eBay to use as an insert that would match the Athearn corrugated siding.

I was able to pickup two Athearn diners for $8 to be used for parts.

I cut up this shell to get parts to fix my ¾ dome car and make a coach out of the other diner I bought off eBay.

I cut out the entire corrugated section from the kitbashed shell and I spliced in the section from the diner.  After a bit of sanding the ¾ dome/lounge will be ready for paint.

I proceed to cut up the Northern Pacific diner to convert the New Haven diner into a coach.

I used a steel ruler as a straight edge to make the cuts with a new #11 blade.  I held the ruler in place with two small C clamps.

Here the New Haven diner has the small windows removed and the replacement larger windows ready to take their place.

I cut the New Haven slightly smaller and the Northern Pacific windows a bit large and sanded them for a tight fit.  The replacement windows are ready for gluing.  I overlapped the window joint a 1/16" to make a better transition between to New Haven diner windows and the replacement section from the Northern Pacific diner.  The fit turned out perfect and won't require any sanding.

In these two pictures the car has a single unsanded coat of Rust-Oleum Sandable Primer.

With a little sanding this car will be ready for SP Daylight paint, a successful conversion from a diner to a 44 seat coach. 

There is a moral to this post, Never Ever toss anything that you might think is a piece of junk!  It can be used for kitbashing something sometime somewhere.