The Cibola Lumber & Mining company

Time to start a new project. This one will be the Yard office and tower combine. This build is inspired by a project done by my friend John Passaro. You can find his page and build notes here: http://saintfrancisrailroad.com/secondpages/yardoffice.html

Here is John’s most excellent build. Note the detailed interior and lighting!!!

He based this structure on a pair of articles that appeared in Model Railroader magazines November and December issues from 1958 (authored by Jack Work and Jack Lemming). Then added his own creative flair.

John’s construction was based on a Bachmann Jackson Sharp combine and boxcar with some considerable scratch-building thrown in.

I was so impressed that I wanted to recreate it in 1/20.3 scale with an interior just like John. As a tip of the hat to his great model I have dubbed this the “Passaro Tower”.

For basic kit-bash fodder I acquired a coach and boxcar in 1/20.3 marketed by Vance Bass and long out of production.  They are in pretty rough shape and somewhat incomplete. Good thing because I would not have wanted to trash such excellent wood models otherwise.

The boxcar is mostly intact but the details are beat up or missing. The coach is what you see plus the resin roof ends.

Here is “green-man” along with a section of Accucraft J and S coach wall for scale. In addition to the wood models I will be using some doors and windows from A-Z Garden Trains

Time to put the victims to the saw blade. After stripping the models of detail I cut the ends off that will be joined together.