- USA 30" Narrow Gauge Prototype -

by Tony Richards

This is a series of photographs to showcase some adapted / scratch-built On30 stock, using Bachmann flatcars as the donor vehicles.

The water bowser started life as a bright scarlet Solido fire engine. The cab and front were dented with a hammer and then repainted and heavily weathered. The tank had a valve stuck on the back and it, too, was heavily weathered. The whole was then chained down onto the deck of a flat car.

The MOW car / caboose was constructed from a very simple resin kit and then heavily detailed to make it look more interesting. Sprayed with grey primer, and then weathered, it looks well used. The various tools and the workbench came from the bits box. They make it I feel.

The mobile boiler car purports to be a vehicle which could be taken to wherever steam is required to drive saws, cranes or whatever. Whether anything like this actually existed is a matter for conjecture: there probably was a prototype somewhere in the West, or the North, at some time. Apart from the donor vehicle and the boiler itself [quite a detailed resin kit], everything else has been scratch-built. It's one of my favourites.

Finally, the twin boiler load. This comprises a pair of Bachmann HO/OO boilers, tied down onto a flat car. Both were sprayed black and then heavily rusted. It's quite effective and an extremely simple project.