Eastern Car Works 40' Airslide Covered Hoppers

Eastern Car Works 40' Airslide Covered Hoppers 2 Eastern Car Works 40' Airslide Covered Hoppers...
Eastern Car Works is no longer in business, to the best of my knowledge. Their kits however are floating around at train shows and on eBay. I picked up two of these kits for this project. This is a flat kit, meaning each side of the car is its own piece. This will require a little more work than an Athearn or Roundhouse kit, where the whole car body comes as one piece.

Each of the three roads had cars almost identical to this kit. The B&O cars came in numbers 242391-245174 (HC-6 class) and 830000-830184 (HC-8 class). The C&O cars came in numbers 2250-2374, 2380-2385, and 2550-2599 (all HC-8 class). The WM cars came in numbers 5551-5557. To the best of my knowledge all were delivered in grey predecessor paint jobs and some got painted in Chessie colors (as seen below).

Below is a pic of a real 40' Airslide in Chessie colors. I chose to do one Chessie B&O car and one speed lettered WM car.

George Elwood photo

How to:
1. Get two Eastern Car Works kits. Choose the two cars you want to do. I chose one Chessie painted car and one WM grey car.
2. Paint the WM car with Tamiya Light Grey (XF-19). Spray with dull coat when the grey is dry.
3. Paint the unassembled parts of the Chessie car with UP Armor Yellow. Painting these before assembly will allow for easier paint coverage on all the little parts on the ends of these cars.
4. Assemble the cars (my WM car was bought secondhand and came partially assembled). Paint the wheel faces rust colors.
5. Add weight if needed to the two cars. My Chessie car needed weight.
6. Apply CDS dry transfers to the WM car. No one makes decals for this car, but CDS does make dry transfers. Dry transfers require a rough surface to adhere properly, so you spray the car before transfering with dull coat not gloss coat.
7. Touch up the Chessie car with more UP Armor yellow after assembly if needed.
8. Spray the Chessie car with gloss coat. Apply Herald King H-143 or 141 decals. Also Champ's Chessie Jumbo Covered Hopper set would work.
9. Seal the decals with dull coat.
10. Overspray the two cars with roof brown. I used very little on the Chessie car, as it looks quite clean in the pic I have of it.
11. Weather the two cars. The WM car has a rusty roof and several repars on the ribs. I used black paint to make the repairs. I used white chalk to simulate a spilled load.
12. Seal the weathering with dull coat.
13. You are done, enjoy your cars.

Below on the left is a pic of the kit I got second hand. It came with the body assembled, but the roof unattached. The other photo is the second kit that came completely unassembled.

Below left is a pic of the WM car painted Tamiya Light Grey. Below right is a pic of the Chessie car painted yellow.

Below is a pic of the car assembled and ready to be touched up with yellow and the bottom painted blue.

Below is a pic of the Chessie car with the weight added. I use BBs in white glue. Note how warped the far side is. I added a cross beam support in this car to keep the side straight.

Below is a pic of the car with the CDS dry transferred lettering applied. The top 1/2 of the pic is a scan out of the Western Maryland Color Guide by Morning Sun Books. I used it as a reference for this project.

Below is a pic of the finished WM car. It is ready to earn its keep.

Below is the finished Chessie car.