After a quick scan through the instructions it seemed the best option was to build the kit as a set of sub-assemblies, with some intermediate steps for painting, and then putting the sub-assemblies together towards the end. I also noted that most of the parts had locating holes that passed completely through the part they were to attach to, so wherever I could these were filled after the part was glued in place.

Step 1: Tracks & Base



The base consists of two bed sections, two end caps and four rails with accompanying joiners. I am not a big fan of the base as supplied by Hobby Boss. It looks chunky and the ballast rock is too large, too uniform in size and too rounded in shape for my liking. I discarded both end caps, the connectors, one of the base sections (the remaining center section is seen above) and two of the rails. I then cut the the top off the remaining base section, sanded the rough edges and glued on a pair of the rails in preparation to adding it to a wood base. The kit's ballast would eventually be covered with my own material to break up its uniformity.

Steps 2 through 8: Undercarriage/Chassis pt.1

I pretty much followed the instructions as laid out for steps 2 through 4. At Step 5 the wheels, wheel connecting rods and the flywheels were removed from the sprues to be added later in the build. At this time I noticed what appears to be an error in the kit's connecting rods versus those found on surviving examples of the WR360 (see picture below).

After adding the front & rear deflectors (part B23) to their supports, the small depressions left on their faces were filled. The small depressions were also filled in Steps 6 & 7 after the addition of the buffers, the rungs (part B25) and the hydraulic lines (part B7). Adding the hydraulic lines here was a mistake since they are quite delicate and I snapped one off later trying to attach the deck to the undercarriage.

The following detailing was done at this point: Added missing bolt heads to the support plate for the flywheel axle Scribed a center line and added an axle end to each flywheel as per pictures on the walkaround [reference 3] Added sand dispenser pumps, pipes and pipe clips Added return springs to the front brake pads. As far as I could tell there were no return springs for the middle & rear pads so none were added. Added return springs to the brake lever and a top cover and piping to the brake cylinder

At this point I paused for some painting. According to reference [1] the inner surface of the frame and all parts inside the frame, the wheels, connecting rods and flywheels were painted red. After applying the red paint I weathered everything with some washes and dry brushing using black, tan and grey paints. I also took the opportunity to paint wood floor a light tan as well.


At Step 8 the first thing to do was fill the plethora of elector pin depressions on the underside of the deck (part A1). As it turned out, most, but not all of them, were eventually hidden by other parts. The pressure cylinders (parts B13, B18) were assembled and put aside till nearer the end of the build. The storage box (part C22) had hinges added and then it was glued to the deck.

Here I deviated some from the instructions, first attaching the cabin bulkhead (part C7) to the engine cover (aka bonnet), then glueing that assembly to the top of the deck. Missing detail was added to the engine cover: Pull handles to engine cover top access panel made from bent wire Door stops to the top access panel from plastic strip Lift hooks from scrap brass Brass wire for the electrical conduit to the horn and lead strips for straps Cover latch from plastic rod I now added the headlights and their supports. The headlights were drilled out to accept lenses. The stanchions and ladder were also added here. Hobby Boss has the exhaust pipe already drilled out which is nice. I would have replaced the molded on engine access panel handles with some wire substitutes but there wasn't much room in which to work so I just left them alone.