Workbench Wednesday

Having a couple days off from work, and picking up a few models at my parents place last night I still found time with the sunny weather to do some inside work this afternoon.  Living in an apartment has its challenges for modelling, but with a small piece of plywood, I can have a small mobile workbench of sorts thats easy to keep clean, and also keeps my wife happy content.

Apartment workbench.

I had picked up a Proto 2000 SD60M a few years back that didn't run well at all, but I got it used for a very good price, so I decided to hang onto it and see what I could do with it down the road...  Fast forward to a few days ago and I got thinking about the SD60M again, and figured it was time to try to get it working. My initial plan when I bought it was to use the chassis for a Kaslo SD60F shell in the future.

The previous owner had cemented the shell onto the chassis on one end which resulted in much frustration as I tried to pry the shell off.  By the time I had the couplers unscrewed and off, I was able to pull most of the shell off...with the plow details etc still cemented on nice and tight to the front of the chassis.  I noticed the fly wheels were stuck and rotated them a few times with my fingers, stuck the engine on my test track and after a couple hiccups she really purred.

Back up to my workbench I approached the daunting task of figuring out how to effectively remove the plow and steps.
With a lack of patience comes great frustration (or something like that). Upon attacking the plow, I absolutely destroyed it which I could care less about as I wanted a somewhat clean chassis for my future Kaslo shell.  It took some serious beating at with a screwdriver and an awl and finally my rail nips to get the cursed thing off, but alas, she's ready for a new shell!

Ready for a new shell.

That pile you see in front of the SD60M?  Thats the remains of the plow, steps, and other details that are now all in the garbage.  Alas, I was able to save the MU hoses, and some handrails off the front of the unit.

Detail debris.

You may have noticed my SD40 shell in pieces in the background on my "workbench".  Stay tuned for updates in the near future on that, as it is progressing along slowly but quite well.

SD40 project progress.

Two posts in one week...wow!

- Caleb