RDC-M, Part 1: Samurai Sectioning

Top: Athern's RDC box-stock body shell  | Bottom: After sectioning and gluing

RDC-M =

RDC-Mini ?

RDC-Micro ?

RDC-Munchkin ?

???

In the last instalment of the Desert Dodge series I hinted I needed to overcome my reluctance to use my saw to create a miniature RDC; an RDC-M of sorts. Spoiler Alert: Reluctance Overcome!

I had 2 RDC shells by Athern I bought back when I was working on my Le Grand Defi entry in 2024. These are the old RDC models they made of the RDC-2, the combination passenger and baggage vehicle. A complaint I'd hear about the Athern model was it was considerably shorter than the prototype and not too detailed. I have one that runs that is quite decent, but sure, a modern-day Rapido version is far more prototypical and sophisticated. 

I bought these shells because I had an idea for a radically shortened RDC, but my hesitancy about ruining a perfectly good shell got in my way of doing anything.

Shimomura Alec Hyper Cut 0.15 Pro-C saw

Before I got started though I thought I needed a much better razor saw than I used to section the Desert Dodge. I used an Excel saw blade in an X-Acto handle. It was new and sharp and worked fine, but I thought the blade would be too thick for sectioning an HO scale body with any kind of precision. After a bit of searching I found what I was looking for at a local hobby store that specializes in Gundam and related kits, not model railroad stuff, so this was new territory for me. I bought a Japanese Shimomura Alec Hyper Cut 0.15 Pro-C saw and it's fantastic. As we'll get to, I made some screwups while sawing, but they weren't the saw's fault, they had to do with me misplacing the cuts. 

Building Plastic Railroad Models has excellent material on sectioning and kitbashing.

Also before starting I read through a few of my old model building books looking for some words of wisdom about sectioning a shell. I found the most useful one to be Building Plastic Railroad Models by Robert Schleicher, published in 1979. If you can find a used copy I highly recommend it. It's still quite relevant on fundamental techniques even today, and it's presented in the high quality style that Kalmback Books was known for.

Cuts are marked with Tamyia tape. 
White gloves optional :-) The dry air this winter is playing havoc with my hands. I had some hand cream on them when I took the photo.

Well, a good saw and good advice aside, I still made a silly error right from the get go. I decided to make the end cuts through the corrugated roof as I thought I wanted fairly wide ends. Later, when I was cleaning up the cuts with sand paper I realized I'd never get the roof to look seamless over the corrugated section. 

An end section re-marked to cut off the corrugated stub.

So, I re-marked both the end sections and cut off the stub with the remaining corrugated roof. Under the tape is the smooth roof. I though cutting off that remnant would be tough, but the saw is so sharp and thin it cut through like butter; no problem at all. 

Elastic bands were used as clamps to hold the pieces together while gluing.

After cleaning up the cuts with some sanding sticks and blocks the three pieces were glued together with styrene cement.

Photographed right after the elastic bands were removed.

And there it is. It needs to be cleaned up a bit before priming, but it doesn't look too bad at this stage. There's still plenty of work left on this project, but at least the major psychological hurdle is behind me.