Lionel O Gauge James the Red Engine (Ultimate James Custom)

Here it is. The ultimate challenge. The impossible has been done. Fixing the Lionel James.

This was, without fail, the HARDEST model I have ever customized. The challenge was daunting. Lionel's O gauge model of James is unanimously mocked for how inaccurate it is. Shall we compare?

Let's see...

Lionel's James has hilariously undersized and under detailed buffers. Inaccurate yellow lining and dome as opposed to bronze/gold. A short and squat look. An incredibly long face. And the most egregious of all: the super wide boiler. James is depicted on Lionel's model almost like a saddle tank!

First off, I wanted a challenge. I wanted to make a version of James that improves upon the official Lionel model, but still "feels" like a Lionel model (flaws and all). So, I wanted to stick with the chassis he came with. 3 rail.

The only 3D printed part on this entire model is the lamp. That's it. Everything else is actually customized off the original Lionel James! The body shell is original! Just heavily modified! The running board is the same as the official release, but the boiler and steam chest were chopped off and completely made from scratch. The splashers were widened as well. Plasticard and smoothing putty became my friend during this project!

Sanding, sanding, sanding. I sanded and smoothed this model probably 10 or 12 times! Boiler was a cut down PVC pipe. Once painted, James was attached to his chassis and was ready to go!

I decided to use the 2019 Lionchief chassis of James. So this custom model is actually Bluetooth controlled and has the actual voice lines of James from the show!

This was a project I attempted in 2014/2015. It was horrendous. But, that did not stop me from wanting to try again. James is my favorite character and he always had to be done justice in O gauge. Clearly, Lionel will never make the necessary changes. So I was up to the challenge! This is not perfect. We live in an age where people are 3D printing exact replicas of the models from the actual Thomas & Friends show. But I am happy with it. And that is truly what matters.

Comments

Narrow Gauge - not Narrow Minded!

Let me tell you about one of the most confusing scales in the world. Every time I explain it to someone they just cannot wrap their heads around it! Let me introduce you to a scale called "O-16.5" scale." This scale was designed specifically for narrow gauge track and locos/rolling stock to fit in scale with O gauge locos/track/rolling stock. Take a look at this picture here. If you work in O Gauge and have a Lionel Thomas but wanted to make a custom narrow gauge engine that was in scale with Thomas, you would have to use O-16.5. What you see here is a custom Skarloey model in O-16.5. Notice how he sits and runs on HO/OO track... yet his is significantly taller and wider than literally any HO/OO model train on the market. O GAUGE NARROW GAUGE MODELING IS NOT HO SCALE. It just so happens the rail width between O-16.5 and HO/OO scale is exactly the same. But if I wanted this picture to look more accurate and realistic, I would have to swap out Bachmann's black EZ Tr

O Gauge Duck the Great Western Engine Custom

Here he is! An O scale model of Duck! Making an O gauge Duck was always something I have wanted to do from the minute I began modeling in O scale. But, what I wanted to avoid was getting a super detailed O gauge pannier tank model and just painting it green. I wanted to make a Duck that still looked fanciful. And so comes my inspiration: Hornby's OO scale model of Duck, released all the way back in the 80's. I have always liked this model over Bachmann's HO version. Bachmann's is absolutely fine, but I liked Hornby's nice mix of "realistic" but still looking like an engine from Thomas. A happy medium. I found an old O gauge shell of a pannier on eBay and it looked just great! I had to find a green paint that matched Hornby's version of Duck which proved very difficult. But once found, I got to spraying the body (after letting it soak in a liquid that dissolved any glue or rust from the shell). The chassis is a lima 0-6-0. And here are the two model

Diesel Review

And here he is: The Sodor Troublemaker. Diesel is a model that was released in 2007/2008 and was discontinued sometime around the 2010's. Diesel was then reintroduced in 2014 with Lionchief controls and stayed in Lionel's catalogue for a few years before being silently discontinued again in 2016-2017. Luckily, in 2019, Diesel along with Thomas, Percy, and James were re-released (again) with Bluetooth Lionchief controls! What a wild ride! So why don't we get started? Diesel is perhaps one of the best models in Lionel’s “Thomas & Friends” range. This may not be saying much, but there is more to Diesel then meets the eye. Much like the other models, do not go on Google and look up a picture of this model, photo-shops and poor quality photos do not do these models any justice. When you physically see the Diesel model you notice a lot of unique details. For one, unlike many of the models in this range, Diesel cosmetically is near perfect. Proportionally, he looks great

Search This Blog