I made my window channels with .010 x.020 styrene. I pre-painted the facing side and edges with Tamiya XF-16 Flat Aluminum. The paint dries within 20 minutes to touch. I cut 2 sections of the painted channel to .320. On some models that used these windows, the channels and window supports were painted Pullman green to match the body. I also seen pictures of these painted safety yellow, RDG Yellow and some stayed their natural steel color. My rails and supports will be Pullman green.

I brush painted the top and bottom halves Pullman green and will weather the channels to look worn from years of exposure before I attach the all-weather window. I left the channels off until after the paint was applied and dried, then I’ll glue them in place and weather them with the rest of the model. The first photo shows the rails before I weathered them, the 2nd picture shows the weathered rails.

Really nice Ron...can we get some full profile pictres of the model? The weathering looks well done in the last two pics.

Thanks Chris, I have pictures of the completed model which will be posted when I'm done with the build. Hang in there, almost done.

My newest version of the all-weather window was made using Evergreen clear .020 sheet styrene.

To make the window, I cut a template out of .040 sheet styrene a hair bigger in both directions than the .330 x.310 I needed. I squared the template up using my NWSL true sander and checking my dimensions with my calipers.
Next I used double sided tape and attached that to the bottom of the template and trimmed the tape up even. Pressing the template on the clear styrene, I Used a new #11 X-Acto blade and made my cuts clean through. The clear styrene cannot be scored and snapped, it flakes the edges. With the window cut free I dropped the whole part into 90% alcohol until the tape let go of the glass, this also cleaned the glass of any residue.

With a 400 grit sanding stick, I cleaned up the edges of the window. Next, I used a toothpick and painted the window edges with Tamiya XF-16 flat silver. Now to get this part to look like the all-weather window, I added a post down the center of the window to represent the split in the window. I did this by cutting black decal sheet to a width of .010. A metal straight edge and a sharp #11 did the trick. Before applying the decal, I brushed on some Pledge Future floor shine, which is a water base acrylic. After letting the Pledge dry for 30 minutes, I applied the black decal down the center of the window and used minute amounts of setting solution over the decal. After the decal dried, I trimmed the excess decal off the window ends. Looking at the reference photos, there appears to be clasps keeping the center window sections locked. With a very small brush, I painted on both clasps on the center post with flat silver.

Once again looking at references, there are two fold out windows that are secured in place inside the window. I did add these outer windows to my original window, but for this new version, I’m not. All I got from this was additional thickness to the window and you really can’t see them anyway. My plan is to create the illusion of these fold outs. This plan falls into place with the edges of the fold outs themselves.

The folded in ends on those are a wider aluminum almost looking like straps and for the most part, very discolored when not painted. For my discolored look, Pactra 1/16 masking tape was a good color and thin to begin with, but not thin enough for my needs. I cut off a section of tape longer than what’s needed for 2 straps and placed on a sheet of glass. I trimmed the one edge off to get a straight edge and made a second cut about .015 wide and cut in half two give me 2 pieces.

I turned the window over to the backside and applied the two pieces of tape to either side of the center line while looking at my pictures for placement. I gently burnished these in place, trimmed any excess and over coated this side with pledge to lock the tape in place.

Weathering the window was next. I didn’t want a real shiny window and I didn’t want a window that was too dirty, either or would clash with the weathered or aged model. It had to be mix match of both to look as natural as possible. What I came up with is done in steps. I sprayed a thinned light coat of Model Masters acrylic flat to both sides of the window. This would flatten the gloss of the window and give me a base to work with. After drying for 20 minutes, I took a cotton swab and dampened it with 70% alcohol and with gentle strokes, wiped from top to bottom the window in between the straps on both sides. This didn’t remove all the flat finish but what it does is blend the grainy spray mist and remove just enough that it was still flat. Now with the black post out or the front of the window, I brushed on a thin coat of Pledge on either side of the center post, not over the post, I wanted that flat. When the Pledge dried, I had just enough haze that made the window look more natural. Since my model was completed, I used white glue to attach it to the slides on the S1.

Adding DCC sound

Now that the body work and frame is done, I’m going to go over my installation of the sound decoder. My Proto was a first run model as I mentioned and even though they state the model is DCC ready……bull crap! The major problem was that the motor isn’t truly isolated from the frame, but that was an easy fix. Adding the sound module takes a little more work, but it’s not an impossible task. I read the posts on line how other modelers did theirs, not many attempted to add sound to their models. The posts I seen on adding sound didn’t impress me at all and talked about the difficult task ahead. Some modelers tossed the steal weight and added the speaker inside the cab. That works if that’s your only option, but for me, I wanted to add a cab interior and I really didn’t want to reduce the weight of a small switcher. So I began to figure out what was the best solution without giving up cab space and not have to sacrifice allot of weight.

Milling the weight was important to gain the space needed for the sound components and to keep some of that weight. If you don’t own or have access to a mill and you’re intentions are to make an attempt with a Dremel, please be careful, safety first!

When I posted the frame portion of this build, I talked about milling some clearance on the frame to isolate the motor, so that part is complete. As for the steel weight, I need to make room for all the sound components to be nested in one place. Below is a list of items I used.

#8270011 Micro-Tsunami, TSU-750 sound decoder for an Alco 539 Non-Turbo.
TDS Supersonic small speaker and their enclosure.
Electrical tape or Kapton tape.

You can use any sound decoder you want, as long as it fits, but the key to making this a success was the speaker. The TDS Supersonic is small and is one impressive little speaker with allot of good sound qualities and bass, I’m impressed with them. You can find them at Tony’s Train Exchange on the internet, I don’t know if anyone else sells this brand.
The pic below shows the steel weight after milling and how the components will be set in place.



My milling dimensions.



The yellow you see in the one corner is Kapton tape. If you never used this electrical tape before, it’s thin like scotch tape and isn’t bulky like regular electrical tape.

Let’s talk about the speaker for a minute, buying the enclosure that is made for the speaker; is worth the extra money. The speaker is set into place by press fitting with the speaker facing down inside the enclosure. But first before doing this the enclosure has to be shortened in height to .300. If you mill the weight as I did, this fit’s perfect under the hood of the S1 with some room to spare. Once I got the enclosure to size, I press fit the speaker until it seated. I used double sided tape to keep the speaker in place.

One of the most important things about this sound setup was to constantly check how everything was going to fit in the hood. It was important to this before the body is painted. If you added grab irons and didn’t cut them flush to the inside of the hood, you need to fix the problem parts.
Setting up lighting was an adventure also. Again not allot of room for your LEDs, I changed up mine from the original pics and went to SMDs which gave me more room. I didn’t take pics of my change over.



Once everything was set up and test run, I dismantled everything and prepped for paint.

The final chapter

For starters, I’m not going to get to deep into the process of painting and weathering. Everyone has their preferences of paint and how they like to apply weathering. The weathering process I use takes about 7 days to complete once the paint has cured. It’s a difficult process to write down because it’s not always the same. I use many different techniques to get the results I need. So my weathering is rarely a repeat process from one project to another. The way I approach it, the prototype doesn’t weather the same, so my models shouldn’t be weathered the same either.

Below I have a group of pics that somewhat show the paint and weathering of the S1. I also tossed in a couple of pics of the interior I upgraded before putting the cab on. The engineer was added through the window after the cab was on.