Tag Archives: railway

Building a Eastern Road Models “CNR Double-Ended Transcona Shop Snowplow” in HO Scale: PT 1

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Steve Hunter’s very own Double-ended plow, built from his own kit. Photo and model by Steve Hunter.

It’s been a busy and just plain overwhelming summer and fall, which has not left me with a lot of time or capacity to build.

But, with things calming down and signs of winter starting to appear, I figured that it might be an appropriate time to build the Eastern Road Model’s CNR Double-ended Snowplow kit I’ve been sitting on for a few years.

For those unfamiliar, Eastern Road Models was the moniker Steve Hunter used for his PEI prototype-focused Shapeways 3D printed model shop.

CN built a small handful of these Double-ended plows at the Transcona shops in the 1930s, and while they could be seen elsewhere in the system from time to time, I am all but sure they were built with PEI in mind; they could be seen on the island right up until abandonment.

The body and cupola are shown as primed before any detailing. Yes, my bathroom has the best lighting in the house once the sun goes down.

The body and cupola are supplied as separate purchases, and the rest is up to the modeller to source and more or less figure out.

Assorted photos showing the progress I’ve listed below.

Sparing a novel, essentially up to this point in the build, what I have accomplished is as follows:

  • Prepared the Shapeways parts by leaving them in an ultrasonic bath filled with a mixture of Simple Green HD and water.
  • Sanded the body of print lines and removed any excess wax material from the printing process.
  • I drilled for the grab irons and other necessary holes.
  • I primed the body and cupola.
  • Applied Micro-Mark rivet decals to the body and cupola (has to be closing on 1000 rivets).
  • Bent all grab irons from scratch, including the drop grabs, using .010” PB wire.
  • Installed the brake wheel and staff.
  • Installed the wire, receptacles and snow shields for the snowplows power connections with the locomotive.
  • Installed hinges on the journal box access hatches using Grandt Line reefer hinges.

All that remains is the installation of the roof grabs around the cupola, stove stack, horn, headlights, paint, decals, couplers.

Hoping to get this finished off before Christmas.

Calvin

PEIRwiki.ca

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Well, to put it simply: the time has come.

The time has come for the PEIR (Prince Edward Island Railway) to have its own collaborative, indexed, searchable and accessible corner of the internet.

After a few years of on and off thought and consideration, and after seeing one previous attempt: I have taken it upon myself to follow in Steve Meredith’s footsteps (DARdpi.ca / DARwiki) and start a PEI Railway wiki website entitled the “PEIRwiki.”

With the PEIR, I’ve always found that while there is a vast amount of information out there, it’s all quite scattered. When I was new to the interest of railroading, I found this scattering of information daunting.

I want to change that.

I want anybody with even a passing interest in this railway to access detailed, accurate information. I also suspect this will augment my own research in the railway.

So with that said, I present to the world PEIRwiki.ca.

Anybody who is interested in or knows somebody who would be interested in contributing, please get in touch.

I dedicate this effort to Steve Hunter.

C.M.