Model Railroading > Syrian Railways LDE 1500 (ChME3) model

Finally made some progress on this backburner project to make a Syrian Railways LDE 1500, which is a ČKD T669/ChME3, a widely used locomotive across the world, primarily in ex-Soviet bloc countries. The model is by Roco and came painted for European railway I'm forgetting, with a scheme of maroon and a light grey roof.

Perhaps this is the only model of a CFS locomotive, but despite how unusual it is, it was pretty easy, as the prototype appears to differ little from the commercial model. I used vallejo paint to paint the entire unit, then I masked off the front and rear to add the striping. Weathering is in progress, and so far it is more vallejo acrylic and chalk powders. I have kadees installed in the existing european-style swinging coupler pockets. I would prefer to body mount them and make the pilot look right, but this model happens to work extremely well on a 4 x 8 railroad that has steep grades and sharp curves, and I think those swining couplers help.

The two photos below show the prototype. The turntable photo is from a recent article that seemed to be about railways reopening, some other recent content showed a grain facility reopening to rail service. The second (found) photo is from 2009.

It would be neat to get the 3D relief lettering recreated somehow, but I'm not quite sure how. I have access to a 3D printer and laser cutter (through a library) but I wonder if both can do something that fine.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/12/19 14:10 by inCHI.

---

---

---

Wow - nice model of a cool engine!  Saw a bunch of these in Lithuania.