Original Homemade Thomas the Tank Engine Halloween Costume

This Homemade Thomas the Tank Engine Halloween Costume began as an idea many of us had, and upon the suggestion of my wife, decided to carry out the idea of the wagon transformation in earnest. I must explain that I am an architect by trade, and so designed and drew the costume first on AutoCad, then spent a few hours at Lowe’s looking at pieces and plumging parts, then of course had to adjust to fit while cutting and piecing it together in the garage.

General construction is 11/32″ Plywood and 1x2s and 1x3s in pine, beginning with a base piece to fit over the wagon proper. The front wheel well and the main boiler cylinder are a 12″ sonotube, with plywood discs cut to fit and reinforce the interior. It is all held together with a series of wood screws, wood glue, pneumatic trim nails, and gorilla glue. My father and I spent an entire Sunday assembling the main body.

I then spent the following evenings fitting the PVC funnel, sanding, and priming the whole thing with KILZ. I then used Rustoleum pre-mixed exterior grade paints in red, blue, yellow, black, and white. I custom mixed the blue to match pictures, then masked and painted the stripes and number 1. I used a picture reference to pencil sketch the face, then paint multiple shades of gray to try to match and get some depth to it.

I must say my 2 1/2 year old son loved it, but upon first inspection, looked at me and said “Where’s Spencer?” I built it to last out of construction grade materials because I didn’t want to put the effort into cardboard.

Overkill? Sure. Why not? It was great fun to build. Now he wants a fire truck this year.

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