This passenger railbus is being constructed by combining a body from a OO scale classix van and a Kato N gauge chassis to create a type a vehicle which some narrow gauge lines constructed in their waning years as a cheaper way to move a reducing number of passengers than using locomotive haulage.

The body is basically a Classix Morris J body with the rivets drilled out to separate out the chassis and interior. The one further task that I did need to do was to the remove the rivet towers that were part of the body casting, especially the one at the front, as these were taking the same space as was needed by the chassis. Finding something up to the job of grinding these away, whilst being small enough to fit inside the body, made this the longest part of the construction process so far.

The chassis for this model is a Kato 4 wheel tram chassis, however I cut this down quite a lot to fit it under the body. Some slight narrowing was needed, but the main alteration required was to cut a lot of the length of the chassis. Fortunately that outer part of the chassis is plastic so this trimming could be done with a craft knife, and most of what is cut from the ends is the hollow part where the couplers were originally fitted. However due to the very limited clearances within the body I did need to use a file to trim off part of the head of on of the screws which holds the chassis parts together

To complete this model I plan to paint in the same red and cream livery as my 4 wheel passenger coaches, but am waiting for warmer weather as I want to spray the undercoat outdoors. I will then replace the original platic mudguards, which are plastic mouldings, although these may need trimming down to fit. The original glazing should be able to be refitted with no, or only minimal, trimming. Planed: paint red/cream as per passenger coaches, replace mudguards(separate plastic moulding), replace glazing, possibly add a roof storage area.

As a follow on from the model above I decided to try build this freight only vehicle using a Corgi Austin van body and a Kato 8 wheel chassis.

I picked up the Corgi van cheaply at my local model shop, I think this was due to the white and red Ross livery being none too popular but this was no problem to me as I knew I would be stripping the shell anyway. The body was prepared in a similar way by drilling out the rivets and then removing as much of the rivet posts as was need to provide clearance for the chassis. Incidentally to remove the paint from this body shell, and also the passenger railbus above, I used Nitromors. This will remove the paint in no time, but do ensure that you remoive all plastic parts before using it as they will be ruined otherwise - and also read the instructions as you really do not want to be spilling it on your skin!

For this model I decided to use an 8 wheel chassis rather than the 4 wheel tram chassis. This decision was mainly driven by the fact that I had one of these chassis to hand but did not have a spare 4 wheel chassis! Having said that it did all work out well, as I found that by trimming a small amount from one end of the chassis it would sit tightly inside the body with just an interference fit. Although this did hold the chassis well I still decided to as a small ledge of plastic strip at each end so as to ensure that whenever the chassis was replaced the body would always be sat level.

I am not yet sure what colour to paint this model in that I am undecided as to whether to use a period colour that the vans appeared in at the time, or whether to finish it repainted in company colours. For the remaining detailing jobs I will need to cut the lights from the original chassis and also replace the glazing.

This passenger railcar is built from a Parkside Dundas coach kit and a Kato 4 wheel chassis.

The coach sides were cut down to a suitable length for the railcar, making the cut at a point to keep the door positioning symetrical on the body. The ends of the coach, which were originally solid, already had markings on the back for cutting out the end windows so I used these. The floor was cut from a piece of 0.040" plasticard with the outer size to match the coach part and the inner cut to be a snug fit over the Kato chassis. The only thing that was left missing after the sides and ends were assembled on the base was the vertical corner posts at the cut end of the body. I replaced these with plastic strip of a simalr size to the posts at the other end - note that the photo was taken before doing this so still shows these missing at the far end.

The Kato chassis used needed no modification aprt from removal of the N gauge couplers, however before final completion I plan to add sloping dummy side frames to the end to visualy continue those on the chassis to the end of the railcar.

After this model has been painted and glazed I will investigate what level of interior detail it is possible to add, although with the motor being quite low in the body I should be able to a fair representation of seating and passengers.