Katzhagen modeling department
RhB ABe 8/12 3501 "Allegra" - Willem Jan Holsboer
About the Maerklin/LGB serial model's potentials
Interior design and small parts
Maerklin apparently left most of the interior's detail design as an exercise to the friendly customer. Given scarcely anybody will have a prototype in his yard, this is a time-consuming and not entirely easy project...
Interior design
In order to remove the middle car's inner floor, the four little screws hidden below the covers on the face sides need to be removed.
Having dismounted the inner floor, seats and tables were removed to lay the flooring. This may cause some of the seats' and tables' fastenings to break off. This can easily be repaired using brass rods (2.5mm for the seats and 1.5mm for the tables).
Remainders of glue need to be removed from the floor after having dismounted the seats and tables. Grind the floor in these places if necessary.
Applying the "cushions" to the seats and the maps to the tables is nothing but a mindless task. While it's just cutting out the patterns and putting them into place with the "cushions", the map decals require a semi gloss clear coat from the airbrush gun after drying.
The flooring was layed, the seats were remounted and some of them were cushioned. The result looks promising.
The Preiser family engrossed the coaches after all of the seats had been "cushioned". The tables were put back into place then and last but not least the "Info retica" und "Viadi" magazines were added to the scenario.
It turned out to be a dead right idea to fake the bases to the seats lacking them. It's almost imperceptible after having reassembled the model that there are areas without real seat bases.
Procedure reloaded in the 1st class compartment. First the flooring, then the seats, the cushions, the figures, the tables and at last the magazines as an additional decorative detail.
The original driver had somewhat of an American touch and hence was dismissed. Instead an alien employee was hired (whose legs had to be shortened a bit).
The doors missing inside are made of clear polystyrene on which a clear decal is applied. The new parts get a glossy clear coat after the decals have dried. A piece of polystyrene or ABS matching the ceiling's shape is glued to the doors' upper edges.
The white plastic parts were covered with grey self-adhesive film. Mounting the doors in the interior is done with Ruderer L530 glue on the ceiling only.
The doors between the units got correspondent decals as well which also were sealed with a glossy coat from the airbrush gun.
Polystyrene or ABS being 1.5mm thick can be used to make the displays and boards which are mounted on the inner face and compartment walls. Ensure the edges are smooth and flat...
Paint the edges semi gloss black after having applied the decorations.
Door, display and info board in a 1st class compartment. The displays and boards need to be mounted approximately 1mm above the seats.
The model also is lacking a door between the 1st class area and the driver cab. Due to the design in this area it's barely possible to make a real door without redesigning the complete septum. A doors insinuation can be achieved using a piece of polystyrene or ABS being equipped with the prototypical pictographs.
First step designing the interior walls: Wooden paneling
Next up was applying the paneling between the windows and on the face sides. After that the doors had to be reinserted.
Having placed all of the wall panels, the details come into focus: Seat number plates, emergency call stations, tip-up seat dummies, door emergency openings, etc...
Further pictographs and info boards
What Maerklin thought here remains a secret. The exculpatory statement from Goeppingen is "A screw coupling would mechanically interfere with the bottle opener".
Disproof of the exculpatory statement: Elongate the mounting pin of an original Maerklin screw coupling as it f.i. is used with the Rp-w or B2282...
... using a 3mm-L-profile and some methacrylic 2-C glue.
Paint the elongations semi gloss black after having ensured they fit into the corresponding holes.
Quod demonstrandum erat.
A tractive unit's entrance area: House rules, extinguisher and waste bin.
The middle coach's entrance area
A further insight. It looks like all the work would pay off...
Info boards, pictographs, cushions and figures make for a significant change of the model's appearance.
Welcome aboard !
It's almost imperceptible now that there are no real seats in some areas.
Is this really Maerklin's model ?
First ride outside in the garden - four months after its delivery...
can be obtained for personal usage by sending a related request.
About - Paint work - Electrical & mechanical issues
