You might try Craig Bisgeier's Housatonic RR site...

http://www.housatonicrr.com/

Craig models an 1890's railroad and so he's found a need for mass producing his own stuff.

btw The Les Halmos interview of Craig appears in Issue 6 (Mar/Apr 2010) of MRH (available on the Back Issues page of this website).

Charlie

Do a Google search for resin casting model railroad. There is a Yahoo discussion group for casting also. I use to belong there.

Search for resin casting

http://groups.yahoo.com/

There are many sites on the 'Net with loads of info. You will have to do some homework searching but the links are there.

Rich

I have been watching this thread hopping for more replies.  I'm sure Mike is looking for ways start his line of custom cars but I was looking for input on casting small pieces and parts.  While looking for more info on how to to do this without having to spend more money than the part is worth I found this thread.  http://modelingmadness.com/others/features/hamm,joel/hammcasting.htm.  I thought I'd pass it along for others looking for the same. I'll try to get to Walmart tomorrow and see if I can give this a try this weekend.

Steve

Thanks for the link Steve.  I am interested in just making parts.  Specifically I would like to make two things to start with.  One is a funky oval shaped waffle seen on SP B-100-39 boxcars.  David Hussey of Cannon & Co. scratchbuilt this car with fantastic results www.pbase.com/dh30973/image/117568362.  I emailed him to ask about the waffles, and in his case he made them with a cnc machine. I don't have access to one (obviously) and the thought of trying to whittle the 2 dozen or so waffles necessary out of styrene is unappealing.  One thought I had was to have a machine shop make me a custom punch I could use to just punch out correct shaped oval waffles from a styrene sheet.  Then I could jig them up and sand the bevel into them.  I haven't looked into this, but my guess is it's cost prohibitive as well.  The other item would be a 52-06 x panel peaked roof.  This is not as important, as one can be fudged from splicing 50' roofs, but would still be cool.  For both I would need a two-part mold, I think.  My biggest hesitation with trying resin casting is the issue of all the flash that needs to be cleaned up.  Most examples I've seen on the web have a ton of it, and it looks like a nightmare to clean up.

Mike

Mike does not say what he wants the casting for - here's my experience buliding cast resin cars many years ago -  The process is simple - the best way is to just jump in.

I  used materials from Micro-Mark - different numbers now but the same idea.  On page 26 of their spring 2010 catalog buy 82083 RTV rubber $36.80 and 82057 casting resin (the slow version) $32.95  I did not use a parting agent - follow their suggestions on that.  I made six s-scale boxcars with this much material and had enough left over for a couple more cars.

Read their instructions and practice with something simple that you can afford to mess up.

Here are my pictures. (before digital cameras - apologies for picture quality)

That's pretty good Artarms!  Like you said, I'll have to give it a try.  One question.  Your mold was a one part mold.  Was the back (inside non-detail) of the part smooth or lumpy?  I am interested in casting a part to mount on a boxcar, but need it to be smooth and flush.  Will a one part mold be adequate, or do I need to make a two part?

Mike

All my casting was flat cast - I never got into two part or double sided molds.  If you want a flat back the instructoins will say to put a flat surface on top of the poured resin while it cures in the mold - forcing excess resin out.(this is why a slower cure is a good idea - more time to fuss around)..  If you don't force the back flat it may mound up which  you don't want.  You can use another rubber mold (flat on back) to do this.  You may need some parting agent.

Art Armstrong

If you don't force the back flat it may mound up which  you don't want.

How does this effect the part? I would not have expected that it would matter what happens to the back.

Chris

For a flat back part the following works with Micro marks resin.

1. level surface to put mold on and pour into.

2. Next use a plastic bag cut into a sheet, lay this on the poured resin and mold.

3. now put a flat piece of plastic on top of mold the plastic bag will protect the styrene or other plastic surface as the resin will not stick to the bag. now the last step will be to add a weight that will squeegee the excess resin and produce a flat back to the casting.

The DVD is very informative and covers both 1 and 2 part molds techniques.

Here are some more suggestions I've found usefull in the past:

http://www.alumilite.com/howtos.cfm

Laurie Green's website  : Making Your Own Castings:
http://www.lauriegreensweb.com/Casting/casting.html

http://www.cccrow.com/main-pages/how-to.html

hope helps

Enjoy

Enzo