A couple of upcoming projects

 I've been pulling together a couple of projects that I plan to offer to the model railroad community in the next few months (essentially sometime in the first half of 2024). Thought I'd mention them here in case anyone is interested. 

The first is a long planned project - decals for Central Vermont freight cars. For example, there's been several resin kits offered over the years for CV freight cars - especially the boxcars - and even a number of injection molded plastic cars (such as Accurail) that while certainly completely accurate models of CV cars are decent stand ins. The one thing the resin kits and the plastic cars have in common in that there's something (in some cases a lot of somethings!) wrong with the lettering. And to the best of my knowledge no one has ever done lettering for the "as delivered" boxcars. 

Several years ago I started working on the art work to develop more accurate CV lettering. That project frankly sputtered along for years so a few months ago I asked Bill Brillinger at PDC to pick up the ball and carry this one home. 

Last night I reviewed the final artwork for the boxcar decals. Essentially there will be three variants of this lettering. One will be the as delivered scheme for the 40,000 and 41,000-series boxcars. (the single line lettering will work for the 42,000-series cars as well). 

I also plan on a set for the post-1940 stacked Gothic lettering (with the post-1963 "pregnant tapeworm") for the 41-, 42-, and 43000 series boxcars. 

This first group of decals will be limited to the boxcar lettering for the 1920s built cars. I already have plans for a second series of decals that will include lettering for the flat cars, and MofW equipment. 

While I'm doing these mostly for my own use, I'd be glad to offer them to anyone who is interested. Please let me know in the comment section if you have any interest in these - and if so which set(s) you'd be most interested in. 

The second project are a couple of new books I've been working on. 

As many of you know, I've given my "Modeling the October Scene" clinic a number of times over the years. This book pulls together the content from that clinic, along with a lot of other items I don't have time to cover in a 45 minute clinic, into one volume. 

The second book, tentatively titled "Modeling Steam and Transition Era Rolling Stock" (I know, truly riveting!) is a compilation of modeling tips and tricks. It will address topics such as getting ready to run models truly ready for the layout, adding details to some simple kits, and more advanced projects such as mixed media and resin kits. I may even include something on scratchbuilding cars - but that remains to be seen. Finally, I plan to include chapters on painting, lettering, and weathering cars. 

I'd like to gauge potential interest in any of these projects. If you're at all interested please leave a comment in the comment section - letting me know which decal set(s) you'd be interested in, and/or which of the planned books. 

I should add that I have no idea what the cost of any of these may be at this point - for the decals I'd assume somewhere between $5-$10/set (which should include decals to letter at least a couple of boxcars). If I self-publish the books, which is my current plan (I haven't spoken to any publishers at this point) I trying to keep them around $20. None of these estimated prices include shipping of course! 

Thanks in advance!