FfarquharDeveloper's TrackMaster Customs

[Super]

My, you have been busy F-far

This thread is now just customs and general purchases since I do not feel like organizing and sorting them out.

Elizabeth arrived and had to get the front terminal cleaned of battery corrosion.


I painted Harold's helicopter blades.


I painted Cranky's face, next step is disassembling the entire thing, making the "head" turn 360 and repainting it in green.


George arrived and I painted a few parts black. I intend to make several major modifications to the body at some point such as extending the boiler, fixing the rear cab section, reshaping the face part of his smokebox, and making his front roller actually turn.


Millie was painted up in a base coat of blue, I'll be going in and fully painting her up at a later date.

Nice new purchases. Even though I prefer the more accurate HiT Toys Harold (and mine is still in good condition), I still need to find how to restore the white paint on my small TOMY one without wiping his face, name and stripes off. I don't think I've seen anyone add the tip striping to that version before.

I didn't need to take my Cranky apart when I repainted him (though the clearcoat did mess up the colour of his face a bit), though making the cab turn 360° would be a welcome improvement. I just hope you could put him back together correctly since I've never seen the (whole) mechanism and don't know how complex it is.

First time I recall anyone trying to rebuild the ERTL George. Given he was actually modeled after his shape in The Railway Series, it did end up causing some problems due to no reference material of the TV model back then (1995). Personally, repainting a TrackMaster Buster could've been a bit easier.

Millie, eh? Good job covering the plank texture on Bash/Dash's cab, and it seems like you plan to repaint the OG face like on the (excellent) Rovanite version. Eager to see her fully painted.

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Looking forward to seeing a finished Millie & Cranky. Maybe it would be helpful to others if you made a pictorial of taking Cranky apart, painting and reassembling him.

1/19/2022 Update

You know I always forget if I'm dating these posts correctly to be consistent with the previous posts and then I check and see that it's right. As always Month/Day/Year. Enough of me rambling though lets get onto the actual update.

As my purchase thread's basically become irrelevant because I just use this thread for pretty much everything I do now I post both customs and purchases here, as I've been pretty occupied recently.

Dodge, Millie, Cranky, and Sir Handel:
Now all of these I had planned to finish last week but unfortunately, I caught COVID-19 and wasn't able to do any work on these and still haven't been able to do any work as I am still recovering. But to sum it all down:

- Dodge: fully masked for priming and new green application.
- Millie: literally just finishing the thing after like 4 months.
- Cranky: sticker replication and disassembly.
- Sir Handel: the paint was fully stripped down because I am planning on repainting him fully for a 4th or 5th time now, I've lost count, to hopefully get him the right color after so many tries.

Mavis:
I love the TOMY Mavis but I haven't really liked how insanely massive she is compared to the other engines so I took it upon myself to try having a go at it. Using a TOMY Toby, I cut down the body and filed the side plates down, I have new side plates made already. Most of the custom is going to be built using Polystyrene and it'll reuse the TOMY Mavis Face.
The battery terminal was bent inward to make the loco run on a single AAA rather than a C or AA. (Pictured in BG of 2nd image is Sir Handel currently)


Purchases:

Plarail BoCo:
I bought BoCo for D261's chassis and initially Daisy's face before changing my mind on the latter as I wanted to keep the shell intact. Also included was a TAR Tanker which was also something I was after.

Fun fact: The plastic color on this BoCo (F03: June 2003) has a more yellowish-green color compared to the more pure green color of my 1st BoCo (C07: March 2007).


Capsule Figures:
I got these 6 as I wanted to finally get started with railway staff and having these guys allow me to finally have a constant project I can start if I can't start on another engine project as it's a simple 4-step process mold, cast, repair, and paint.

Pictured (Left to Right):
Engine Fireman, Stationmaster, Sir Topham Hatt, Workman, Tom Tipper the Postman, Engine Driver


Hyper-Dash 3:
Bought to upgrade and hopefully fix the issues Emily has.

*gasp* COVID-19?! I'm awfully sorry to hear that. Great to know you're recovering, and stay strong. When will that blasted, life ruining pandemic just end already?

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Glad some other people (you and ADuckProductions) think the official Mavis looks a bit wrong at the front (not unlike Rusty). I never got why she uses a C battery when she's meant to be slim like the others. Now that I think about it, it would've been quicker to use a Dart with the buffers cut down and some other cosmetic changes. I've been eager to try doing my own provisional Mavis ever since my cowcatcher/sideplate mod for Toby.

I'm a big fan of the Capsule Plarail figures, as much as I like the ones from Tomica World. These have a lot more variety and look just as good (except for the bases). I recall finding some great custom ones from Twitter users, and yours will surely be very nice.

[Super]

Anxious to see more of your Mavis re-work Ffar. I am also curious to see how a Hyper Dash motor will 'Push' Emily if it is faster than stock.

Those Capsule figures must be very small...are they about the size of regular HO/OO people?

She's referring to her custom loco drive Emily that worked for a short time but failed (see Reply #139); she said it needed a stronger motor.

There just happen to be numerous tape measure photos of them (how convenient), and the average ones look to be under 1 inch in height. Here are a few examples:

Yeah COVID-19, not exactly ideal for a guy who uses sharp tools and paints to customize trains as a hobby but what can ya do.

1/20/22 Update

Mavis:
Finally started assembling her, as she is longer than Toby I made sure to make an attempt to extend her by extending the sideplates to make her longer. Additionally I had to stack some polystyrene to hold the battery up so it would not fall loose.