Heavy Metal

     All during tonight's call-in Model Rail Radio show, when I wasn't typing, talking, or going out for a burger, I was happily filing away at the steam chest on my new engine kit. What was a lump of dull gray metal with flashing and mold marks all around is becoming smooth, bright, and shiny. In fact, it's hard for me to believe that Zamak (the zinc alloy used by Mantua) polishes up this brightly with just a file and a brass brush, but here's testimony. It's good, solid, metal that takes filing very well. And I'm even happier to find out that this alloy is immune to "zinc pest," which plagues and destroys early zinc castings. So three cheers for the New Jersey Zinc Company for their contribution to quality die cast trains! And if you should be thinking about bidding on older Mantua kits on eBay, I recommend them highly, based on this experience.

     Here you see a close-up from the original picture I took of the pieces. The sole plate is next on my list, especially the flat surface where it mates with the chassis. Brass bearings drop in, and everything gets bolted together . . . but I'm getting ahead of myself. Then again, I'm already thinking about how I want to paint it! Engine black? Faded, weathered, gray? Or do I want to go the rust route?

     I saw a picture in one of my magazines (and I'll find it again someday) of an engine entirely done in bright orange rust, as if had been polished bare, then left out in the rain for a week. The effect was amazing, and I'm tempted to try it. The metal on the sides of the boiler and tanks shows some surface imperfections that I cannot file down without razing rivets, and they look a little like corrosion marks that rusting might make. Besides, it would be fun to have a "forgotten" old soldier from a competitor railroad alongside the regular company engine.

     Bottom line: if everybody does it a certain way, then I'm strenuously tempted to do the other thing. Since I was a kid, that's how I roll. And anyway, for me it's all about having fun. But can I bring myself to do it? Build a bright polished engine, then rust it all up?  We shall see.