NS Coal Hoppers

When finally deciding on the Norfolk Southern as my railroad of choice, I quickly noticed the lack of both rolling stock and locomotives compared to other railroads, especially compared to the model I had been working on.  While my father planned on running it during the transition from Missouri Pacific to Union Pacific, I had been purchasing rolling stock and locomotives to run it in a more modern era.

Since I am devoting a good portion of my future layout to a coal branch, the first priority of rolling stock has been coal hoppers.  I have acquired many of the modern RD-4 Hoppers from Fox Valley Models with private power company names (Alabama Power, Alliant Energy, Union Electric...) but I wanted some NS lettered coal hoppers as well.  While I did find a few NS coal hoppers available from Atlas, I wasn't overly impressed with them, so I started the process of making my own.  The 3-Bay 100-ton hopper from Micro-Trains was going to be my undecorated of choice and after an email Midwest Model Railroad (a shameless plug for a company run by a friend, if they don't have it in stock they always get it for me), I now have 12 of them on my shelf at home. After a little research, the best choice for NS decals seems to be Shell Scale Decals.

Creating the NS Coal hopper

I failed to take any pictures of the Micro-Trains hoppers before I put any paint on them and now I am back out on the road so I don't have the opportunity to take a picture of one of the other 10 that I have not done yet.  The Micro-Trains undecorated rolling stock is excellent to work with.  The only thing I had to attach was the brake wheel and trucks.

1. Cleaning - Before doing anything with the model it is a great idea to wash it.  I use a tooth brush to remove any oils that has been left on the hopper from the factory, or myself handling it before I put on the gloves.

Once the hoppers had been cleaned, I made sure to not touch them anymore without wearing gloves.

2. Painting - Micro-Trains undecorated cars always seem to vary what color they might show up in, so depending on what that color is will affect your choice in priming and painting.  My hoppers were molded in black and I choose to spray with Engine Black.  I have a portable small airbrush booth that I set up on my workbench and do my painting inside.  Here are the two hoppers after a single coat of engine black.

Before applying any decals, the hoppers needed to be sprayed with a gloss coat for the decals to adhere correctly.  I don't remember what type of gloss coat I use but they are available from many different sources.

3. Decals - I would now suggest never starting a decal project like this late at night...

For some reason I began this project late in the evening, and once I started I didn't want to stop till I was done, about two in the morning I finally put down the knife and tweezers and called it good.

Applying the decals was a longer than expected tedious process.  There are a few errors, slips of the knife, edges of other stuff that have snuck in to parts of the deals that I am not perfectly satisfied with, but for a first attempt at doing these tiny numbers in N-Scale, I'm happy with the result.

Micro-Set and Micro-Sol should become your best friends!  The are very simple to use, apply Micro-Set to the area of the model where you apply the decal, and then Micro-Sol with go on afterwards to soften the decal and get it to form closer around detail elements, or ribs in the side of the car.

Also, because this is not the exact hopper that the decals are for, there wasn't enough space for all of the lettering on the end of the car that should have been applied. I ended up keeping all of the decals on the end and left of the cars road number.  I have good eyes and it was difficult for me to read, so im not to concerned about it.

4. Dullcote or Matte Finish - Once all of the decals have been applied it is time to seal them.  I use a Krylon matte finish vs Dullcote because for the same price I get a standard size can, and it seems to work just as well. 

5. Finishing the Hopper - Once everything had been sealed I went ahead and swapped out the plastic wheelsets that came with the hopper for 36" metal wheelsets from Fox Valley Models and install the trucks.