GE Kitbashes Part II

Phase 3

Not the Rapido B36-7

Now that Rapido has delivered the B36-7 in HO scale, the Phase 3 Bxx-7 frame is a reality. Atlas already covered both Phase 1 and Phase 2 frames with their B23-7 and B30-7 models. So what exactly are the differences between the Phases? The big change is the frame length and truck centers, even though it's a pretty small change as locomotives go.

Michael Eby's Dash 7 Phases page contains a wealth of information. Michael cites Will Davis and David A. Davis' blog for some in-depth prototype information. To recap Michael's data, the Phase 1 frame is 62'-2" over the pulling faces with truck centers at 36'-2". The bolsters in Phase 1 are 13'-0" from the pulling face of each end. Phase 2 kept the same length frame, but moved the rear truck one foot closer to the coupler for 62'-2" overall, front truck 13'-0" from the pulling face, rear truck 12'-0" from the pulling face and 37'-2" truck centers. Phase 3 shortened the frame by one foot overall, bringing the pulling faces, pilots and stepwells six inches closer to each end and and bringing the rear truck in a corresponding six inches for 61'-2" overall, front truck 12'-6" from the pulling face, rear truck 12'-0" from the pulling face and 36'-8" truck centers.

What does the Phase 3 frame do for us in HO scale? Aside from the B36-7, with the Rapido model there is now a frame for late B23-7, B30-7, B30-7A and B30-7AB models. The Southern B30-7A1 is its own thing on a frame different from everything else, but the Burlington Northern B30-7A1B units share a Phase 3 frame with the earlier B30-7AB.

The Rapido models aren't cheap -- nothing in HO scale is at this point anymore -- so who's going to use them for kitbash fodder? Not me I can tell you that! But some folks might be motivated to tear off the shell of their model and replace it with something else to help them model a B30-7A or a late B23-7 or one of the B-unit versions Burlington Northern had. If I were a betting man I'd put money on Rapido offering these models on their B36-7 frame at some point in the future. In fact, when they were showing the test shots of the B36-7 they hinted at these future releases by showing fuel tank variations tooled for Missouri Pacific and Burlington Northern, neither of which had the B36-7. 

So if not Rapido, what's the path to modeling a Phase 3 Bxx-7? 

The Method

Long before I'd ever heard of the Rapido model I worked up some drawings of the various Phase 3 hoods. One thing led to another and I started drawing some Phase 1 and 2 hoods. And fuel tanks. And details. Anyway, Atlas got a few things right with their Phase 1 and 2 models, so I didn't see any reason to reinvent the wheel there (at first). In particular I liked the way the radiator was rendered with cores molded as part of the body and a photoetched metal screen insert with frame that snaps in place on the radiator. Now that KV Models offers an etched part for the Atlas U33C/C30-7 radiator, which is larger and better proportioned than the B23-7/B30-7 radiator, I've begun adapting this etched part to a revised 3D printed radiator section. 

Atlas is to be commended for their B30-7 cab. I covered what makes it good and where it misses in a previous blog. They have also recently started delivering their U33B/U36B model with a revised cab that addresses these shortcomings. I couldn't wait for that so I designed a cab with better fidelity to the prototype some time ago. It comes with numerous options covering the Universal Series through the end of Dash 7 production. I started printing these cabs as flat kits through Shapeways but over the past year or so I've been printing one-piece resin versions.

Now as far as the rest of the Atlas model is concerned -- the hood contour, the heaviness of latches and other details, the fuel tank and reservoirs, the high short hood -- well, not so good. These things are passable in a factory painted model I suppose (nope, not that high short hood), but after kitbashing the Southern Pacific B36-7 above from an Atlas C30-7 body I figured I could do better. This has led to a lot of drawings of Bxx-7 hoods. A LOT of drawings.

GE B36-7 B-unit wreck rebuild, one of many drawings

The Atlas sills are also very nice and they are easy to shorten by cutting out six inch sections near the stepwells. The B36-7 kitbash makes a good case for using the Atlas sills in a Bxx-7 build. The Southern B30-7A1 is it's own thing worthy of its own blog, but was also able to make use of the Atlas sill by lengthening it just aft of the step down from the battery boxes. Phase 3 sills have a "long, short, long, long, long" pattern of access doors on the conductor's side under the cab, compared to the Phase 1 and 2 pattern of "panel, short, short, long, long, long" access doors. This is easy to model using a donor sill to harvest the long access doors. However, this process of cutting up spare sills gets a little old and mistakes can be made, so I've been drawing up variations on the sills to be able to print every version without cutting anything. Again with more and more drawings.

Atlas Phase 2 subbase modified to Phase 3 (moving the stepwells inboard remains to be done)

So if I'm keeping the Atlas sill and radiator part, what am I replacing? Everything else. Well, almost. I do like using the Atlas coupler boxes. But who knows? I might start printing those, too.

The Frame

This is the wildcard that prevents using an Atlas frame. The Phase 3 frame is not only shorter in length, but the truck centers are different from both Phase 1 and Phase 2. I've seen other people scratchbuild frames out of brass or cut up diecast frames and piece them back together with pins, screws or strong glue. I could probably muddle my way through one or more of those methods but I doubt I could make it repeatable. So instead I dealt with custom frames by drawing them in 3D and printing them in nylon through Shapeways. This allowed me to model the B39-8 demonstrator, B36-7 and create a dummy frame for a spare Atlas Phase 1 shell I had. This method also allows me to model any frame with any truck centers, which means models are on the table now that only existed as demonstrators or were built for only one railroad.

Shapeways' nylon is a rough material but it is strong. It also doesn't present an opportunity to show detail so the fuel tank and reservoirs are printed as separate parts to cover the frame much in the way a pretty or exotic veneer wood is used to cover a less expensive and less attractive substrate wood. The nylon material does not offer much weight though so it has to be added somewhere. My first attempts to fill the fuel tank area with weight resulted in the frame sagging, so it became clear the frame would either have to be reinforced or the weight would have to be located in the body shell. The thicker frame seemed to do the trick but it still couldn't support much more weight than the Kato HM-5 motor and drivetrain so I glued lead bird shot into the inside of the body shell.

First generation nylon frame with Life-Like P2K Athearn-clone AAR B trucks designed for Atlas B30-7 fuel tank

The first variation on the frame involved using the laser cutting vendor Send Cut Send. I was able to get thin sheets of stainless steel cut to my dimensions for a good price. I removed a corresponding amount of thickness from the nylon frame model and glued the frame to the steel part. The fit was excellent since both Shapeways and Send Cut Send do very precise work.

Laser cut stainless steel frames from Send Cut Send

Hybrid nylon and stainless steel frame with Athearn trucks and 3D printed B30-7A1 fuel tank from Shapeways

Once I started using MP Scale Models as my printing vendor instead of Shapeways I was able to adapt the frame design to resin instead of nylon. This results in a much smoother appearance. The resin material is also easy to cut, sand, drill and tap. Like the nylon material these resin frames don't have much strength on their own but together with the laser cut steel frame they are quite strong.

Hybrid nylon/stainless frame on top with dimensionally challenged Atlas fuel tank and skinny but too long reservoirs;

hybrid resin/stainless frame on bottom with resin fuel tank and reservoirs

Hybrid resin/stainless frame with resin fuel tank and reservoirs and Athearn trucks with Atlas/Kato FB-2 sideframes

To date all these frame variations are designed to use a Kato HM-5 motor with flywheels, Athearn drive shafts and Athearn trucks. I am working on versions that will use Atlas and Atlas/Kato trucks (such as the AAR B and FB-2 found on the early C424 and U23B models) as well as Atlas and Athearn motor mounts. A-line makes a universal hex drive shaft kit so that is an option if the Athearn hex shafts in various lengths are unavailable.

Trucks

So far I've been working with Athearn and Athearn clone trucks on these kitbashes. They are widely available and the design hasn't changed over the years. Not only that but the Athearn Blomberg sideframes are legendary in their proportions and detail and unmatched by another manufacturer. For SCL/Family Lines/CSX modelers this is great. And for Conrail and Santa Fe modelers the former Life-Like Proto2000 AAR B trucks are a drop-in fit. I'm not certain but I believe Athearn has made their own AAR B truck for the former MDC RS-3, but I have not seen these. Both the P2K and MDC AAR B truck model the longer wheelbase of the prototype accurately whereas the AAR B trucks found on old Athearn U28B, U30B and U33B models are a shortened version of the sideframe adapted to the Blomberg truck.

Blomberg trucks vs. AAR B trucks; Life-Like P2K on top, Athearn on bottom

The FB-2 trucks commonly found on most of the Bxx-7 prototypes have been made in HO scale by Atlas/Kato for the U23B, Atlas (China) for the B23-7/B30-7/B40-8 and now by Rapido for their B36-7. Smokey Valley made FB-2 sideframes designed to fit the Athearn Blomberg truck, but they aren't much to look at and they did not fit the truck very well. So I set about ways to correct this problem by adapting Atlas and Rapido sideframes to the Athearn truck. Atlas parts are generally available either from Atlas directly or other third party vendors but Rapido does not offer parts to my knowledge. However, Rapido made a mistake with their original B36-7 release and put the wrong sideframe variants on some of their models. To correct this they offered anyone who bought one of these models a full set of replacement sideframes. I was able to buy some of the "incorrect" sideframes from Rapido customers and adapt them to the Athearn truck. While these are good solutions to adapt existing parts the obvious solution is to draw the FB-2 truck and simply print new sideframes to fit the Athearn truck or the older Atlas/Kato truck.

The hideous crime against humanity that is the Smokey Valley FB-2 sideframe in the foreground, Atlas in background

3D printed adapters for mounting the Atlas/Kato FB-2 sideframe on Athearn trucks (these also work for Atlas China parts)

3D printed adapters for mounting the Rapido FB-2 sideframe on an Athearn truck

The Hood

The long hood and nose are the other parts I'm replacing. These are intended to fit the Atlas sill and (until recently) reuse the radiator parts. As I mentioned above an improved radiator part is now being tested to fit the KV Models etched grille.

When I originally started printing through Shapeways I learned quickly the way to get the best results was to design everything as a flat kit. Flat kits were these awful flash-filled ill-fitting things from the 80s that required more work to get usable parts than it did to actually assemble the kit. But the flat kits I've designed and received from Shapeways are nothing like that. If I must heap praise on Shapeways it's for their ability to deliver parts printed exactly the size and shape designed. When I've found a part that didn't fit as intended it turned out I made a mistake in the design. The flat kits I've printed at Shapeways go together exactly as designed and the parts fit quite well whether it's a caboose body or a B30-7AB shell. 

Where I've had a bit of trouble with Shapeways is printing large flat parts. There is a tendency for larger parts to warp so I found that breaking flat kits down to smaller interlocking segments helped keep things square as the kits were assembled. 

B30-7A1B body kit printed by Shapeways

B30-7A1B body kit printed by Shapeways assembled on modified Atlas sill and custom frame

The other problem has always been the price. These kits are not cheap. And after printing in resin the Shapeways acrylic material leaves a lot to be desired in terms of the finish. So the natural progression of the flat body kit is the one-piece resin printed body shell. 

B30-7AB body shell printed by MP Scale Models on modified Atlas sill and custom frame

Like the Shapeways kits some effort must be made to avoid warping but the ease of construction and quality of the finish makes that trouble worth the effort.

With GE models in particular there are so many detail variations within the different phases that it's cost-prohibitive to make every detail for every prototype. Rapido found themselves embroiled in a controversy over a stepwell variation specific to Seaboard when they promised accurate B36-7 models but ignored that variation because tooling up a separate sill part was too expensive. This doesn't have to be a concern with 3D printed parts. In fact, ifwhen there's an error or mistake made in the model it doesn't have to be forever. It can be easily corrected and new parts printed. No expensive tooling must be thrown out and replaced at a great cost. I have made my own share of mistakes (and then some!) but when I catch them I fix them. 

This B30-7A1 nose looks great against the cab, but it's too short and forces the cab too far forward. No sunk tooling costs to absorb and no errors to live with. The CAD file has been revised and a replacement is headed for the printer.

B30-7A1 cab and nose printed by MP Scale Models on modified Atlas sill

...but why male models?

You serious? I just told you that a moment ago.

For somebody who's not reinventing the wheel, it sure seems like there's a lot of reinventing going on. There may be something to that. The fact is, the more I looked at the Atlas Bxx-7 model the more I found to improve. There's no need to address the drive or the trucks, the cab is pretty good and the sill, steps and handrails are just fine. And the Rapido model, while it's an improvement in many ways over the Atlas model, it's expensive and doesn't give many options for modeling other Dash 7 variants (yet). 

But probably the biggest motivator is the cost. If I want to build any of these models I have to start with a powered Rapido model plus a pile of 3D printed parts or I can start with a pile of Atlas parts and a pile of 3D printed parts plus a motor and some trucks. Atlas parts are still cheap but the cost of the 3D printed parts is coming down while the quality keeps coming up. There's not much I can do about the cost of motors and trucks, but it's easy to find good deals on used models on ebay, train shows, swap meets, Facebook and so on. There's no reason why the guts of those used models can't be adapted to a new model.

So that's the future for now: keep on making drawings, making better parts, adapting the 3D printed parts to the good stuff that's out there already. I don't see myself making ready-to-run models out of this adventure. I may not even be able to offer complete kits. But the concepts behind this mess of cut up models and printed parts are viable, repeatable and scalable so that anyone with the right tools could do it.

Low-cost LED Lighting for HO scale Locomotives

Like many of you I have both old and new locomotives in my collection. The newest of these models have (literally) all the bells and whistles, headlights and warning lights that the prototypes had. The old ones, not so much.

Factory-installed incandescent bulbs in Athearn RTR SW1500 (foreground) and SD40-2 (background)

It would be nice to have enough money to just purge all the old models and replace them with all new models so the entire fleet would have lights and whistles and bells. But even then many of the models I have simply aren't available in a new version, and many more I've had to build, detail, paint and weather myself.

Custom built and painted diesels ready for headlights

A better solution than complete replacement of the fleet is to add those lights to the older models. I won't get into the debate over sound vs. non-sound decoders, which brand is better than the other, or whether incandescent bulbs or LEDs look more like locomotive headlights.

I like the NCE decoders I have because they work well, they allow the lighting functions I want and they are inexpensive. As far as lighting is concerned suffice it to say I've chosen LEDs. There are many companies who sell prewired LED lighting kits made specifically for HO scale locomotives and many of them are quite nice.

With few exceptions they are also not cheap. So if you're like me and you put off installing lights and decoders until you had forty locomotives, the prospect of spending all this money is anxiety-inducing. At first it was looking like I was going to be on a five-year plan to get lights in all my diesels.

A fellow modeler recommended the LED lighting kits sold by a certain railroad-modeling YouTuber (YouTubing model railroader?) on ebay, so I decided to try some for myself. They were inexpensive compared to every other option I could find and were well made if very simple. I installed the LEDs in one of my models and decided the concept was solid.

LEDs from ebay installed in a custom built and painted Athearn SD40-2

For $29 you get 15 LED assemblies with resistors (you have to solder them to the wires). So for the mathematically challenged of us out there, that's $1.93 per light and your run-of-the-mill locomotive needs four.

They worked great so I figured this is how I would solve my lighting problem. But after a couple friends experienced customer service issues with the ebaying YouTuber over these lighting kits I decided to make my own rather than roll the dice and end up with product I couldn't use. I figured I could get the cost lower than two bucks per light and I was right.

The raw materials are simple:

• prewired 3500K warm white 0402 or 0603 LEDs
• small diameter heat shrink tubing
• 1.5mm / 0.06" diameter fiber optic rod
• 820ohm 1/4 watt resistors

I bought all these components on ebay and spent just over $70 for enough LEDs, shrink tubing, fiber optic rod and resistors to assemble and install 200 LEDs. $72 ÷ 200 LEDs =  $0.36 each. $1.93 vs. $0.36 might not be much if you're only going to light one or two diesels, but it adds up quick, especially when you have Seaboard and Frisco or Southern Pacific diesels with multiple lights on each end.

The process to make the LED lights is very simple. I bend the wires so they point "behind" the face of the LED and twist them together (it makes handling the LED easier). Next I place the LED against a 1/4" length of the fiber optic rod and slide them together inside a short length of shrink tubing. Then I hold the assembly over a candle until the tubing shrinks to hold it together. I use fingernail buffing sticks to sand and polish the end of the fiber optic into a lens shape. I tried doing it with heat from the soldering iron or candle and the results were just too inconsistent. Here's a bundle of them after putting them together:

Completed fiber optic LEDs ready for installation

Before installing the lights in a model I solder a resistor to one of the leads of the LED. This is not required if the decoder is set up for LEDs and is equipped with resistors, but the majority of my decoders are NCE DA-SR or D13SRJ/D13J.

Installation is simple: from the inside of the body shell insert the fiber optic rod into the headlight opening. I use a no. 53 drill bit to create or resize the headlight opening so the fiber optic rod is a press fit. I secure the headlight with a tiny drop of CA. If you're not comfortable using CA other less permanent adhesives will work fine.

SP B36-7 shell showing LEDs with resistors installed and soldered to NCE DA-SR decoder

Once all the LED assemblies are fitted to the shell, solder the leads to the appropriate pads on the decoder or locomotive's circuit board if you're using a plug-in decoder. Before I attach the shell I test the lights to make sure everything works. If I am satisfied I reattach the shell and program the lighting effects appropriate to the locomotive.

Upgraded Atlas B40-8 with new headlights installed in nose

One thing I like about these lights is the ability to customize the installation. The bundle I showed above works well for 90% of the installations I encounter. But sometimes the light opening is in a tight spot. The GP60 demonstrator below is one example of this. The cab headlight is mounted in the roofline, so the fiber optic has to be bent to fit up inside the housing. I accomplished this by using the candle to achieve the desired bend, then shaped the lens and cut the rod to length. Then I assembled the rod and LED inside the shrink tubing and heated the assembly together. Once I had two identical LED assemblies I installed them in the headlight housing.

Headlights installed in 3D printed cab and nose housings

Upgrading Model Die Casting's Gunderson 4700cf Covered Hopper

I grew up in the shadows of some of the largest grain silos in Texas. Back then they bore the names Union Equity and Far-Mar-Co, Continental and Louis-Dreyfus. Everywhere in Fort Worth were grain trains, some with hoppers all painted alike and some with cars in a rainbow of colors. Railroad owned cars were pretty boring to me then. What really caught my eye were the light blue, brilliant yellow, bright pink and deep orange elevator-owned cars. My first custom painted model was an Athearn ACF Centerflow covered hopper I painted baby blue and lettered with Herald King PR-43 in the Farmers Co-op scheme.

Eventually the railroad owned cars would grow on me, especially those of Burlington Northern. BN had a large fleet of covered hoppers from the pre-merger roads as well as several purchased new in the late 70s and early 80s. As the 80s wore on BN acquired covered hoppers from several co-ops and elevators as well as some castoffs from Conrail. The additions to the covered hopper fleet couldn't be painted fast enough, even without the large name and logo applied to the sides of the car.

As I was seeing the fleet change in the late 80s I only knew there were two different types of covered hopper: the ACF Centerflow type and the ribbed side Pullman-Standard type. I knew this because Athearn made models of both (a crude PS 4740 and an even cruder ACF 5250). I really didn't start to dive deep into the differences between covered hopper cars until I started modeling the Bottineau grain train in the early 90s. As I described in the blog on Bottineau, I quickly became aware of the many different prototypes out in the real world and started collecting models of them from Intermountain, Accurail and MDC Roundhouse when I could.

Original MDC Roundhouse Gunderson 4700cf Covered Hopper

The Gunderson 4700 covered hopper kit from Model Die Casting's Roundhouse line was something of a transitional model between MDC's earlier less detailed kits and the more detailed models that would be released later in the 90s. Compared to say MDC's open hopper or boxcar kits, there was a real effort made to create a kit that built into a fully decorated model that looked complete. This model didn't have an unpainted underframe or brake details. Everything was painted and the lettering was crisp. The molded on stirrups and ladder rungs compared favorably with the Accurail ACF 4600 covered hopper released around the same time. The model had good bones, but soon it was surpassed by better models of different prototypes.

Like the Accurail ACF 4600 covered hoppers, I managed to collect a handful of these MDC Gunderson 4700 covered hoppers through the 90s and early 2000s. By the time Athearn had released the Gunderson car in the RTR line it was heavily upgraded with etched running boards, new trucks with metal wheels, new brake details and fine stirrups and end ladders. When you put the RTR model next to the original MDC model the difference was obvious.

Original MDC Roundhouse model (left) compared to an upgraded MDC model (right)

Athearn RTR model (left) compared to upgraded MDC Roundhouse model (right)

Rather than dispose of these older MDC models I decided to try upgrading them. Again, Plano Model Products came to the rescue with their etched running boards. Changing out the molded plastic running boards for the etched stainless steel part from Plano is the easiest thing you can do to improve the model. Unlike the Accurail model there's no carving or filing or sanding required, though you will have to fill in the holes where the original running board attached to the model. The Plano running board kits include brass supports that you bend and install on the model. The running boards can be installed later if you choose to paint the carbody but leave the running boards unpainted. The prototypes I'm modeling had the running boards painted the same as the carbody so I installed them before painting.

The stirrups can be replaced with A-line's Style B metal stirrups, but I decided to make some using 0.019" flat wire. Once the stirrups were bent to shape I drilled them for 0.012" brass wire pins and soldered them in place. The pins double as bolt heads visible where the stirrup mounts to the carbody.

Like the Accurail cars, I decided to replace all the cast-on ladder rungs with Plastruct 0.010" styrene rod. The grabs were replaced with Detail Associates parts on the first of these upgrade projects before I switched over to BLMA drop grabs. Since that time BLMA was purchased by Atlas, so I'm not sure if they are available anymore, but the point is moot since Tangent drop grabs are readily available and every bit as nice as the BLMA parts.

If you look at the sides of this model you can see I've removed two of the ribs creating a 5-4-5 rib pattern on the carbody side. This represents the predecessor to the Gunderson 4700, the 4692. The model pictured above was decorated as C&S 458927:

Still missing a brakewheel!

Besides the upgraded running boards and ladder rungs, I replaced the trucks and added some weight. I also plumbed the brake components with 0.012" brass wire and added some brake levers on the otherwise bare A end using the Athearn RTR model as a guide.

The model in red still isn't finished.... But when I finally get going on it again it will become BN 456438, a car I've managed to photograph twice:

BN 456438 in fresh paint on the right, Bottineau, ND July 1991

BN 456438 looking a little worn in Saginaw, TX May 2006

When Athearn finally offered these models upgraded in their RTR line, the plain green scheme wasn't available. Not being one to wait around for them to do it for me I repainted one myself:

I'm glad Athearn chose to take these cars to the next level. I've purchased several of the RTR models since. But I'm also glad they gave me a target to aim for as I tried to bring the older MDC Roundhouse version up to date. With a little work, these older models blend in quite well with the superdetailed models from Tangent, Scale Trains, ExactRail and Athearn Genesis.

Upgrading Accurail's ACF 4600cf Covered Hopper

For many years the only option to model an ACF 4600cf covered hopper has been Accurail's model. This model came along between the "shake-the-box" era of well-designed but marginally detailed models from the likes of Athearn and MDC Roundhouse and the early superdetailed era of much more detailed but complex and difficult to assemble kits from Intermountain and Proto2000.

The Accurail kits are neither superdetailed nor too basic. Even the molded on details are crisply rendered and can look good with weathering. But sometimes molded on detail just isn't good enough. I'll admit to using several Accurail cars as-is where I'm modeling unit grain trains, but for those cars that will be spotted and pulled from elevators and feed mills I'd rather have something a little more detailed.

Athearn Genesis released a very nice model of the ACF 4600 in several versions, so it's easy to get cars of this type that are already detailed and painted nicely. Arrowhead Models has also announced the ACF 4600 in what promises to be the ultimate fine detail version. The Athearn models can be found between $40 to $50 and the Arrowhead model will likely be priced above the Athearn model.

Accurail's ACF 4600 kit is comparatively cheap at $19.98 and it can be found even cheaper on the secondary market, such as at train shows and on ebay. I already had several of these on hand from many years before the Athearn release or Arrowhead announcement back when they were the only game in town, so in my case the cost was irrelevant. But if you're going to upgrade the Accurail model to fit in with similar models from Athearn Genesis, ExactRail or Scale Trains, keep track of the cost and decide if it's worth it to you. By the time you've upgraded the wheels, stirrups, grabs, running boards, paint and decals, you'll end up pretty close to the cost of the already upgraded Athearn model. So it's helpful if you already have the models on hand or can get them less than retail.

The worst part of the Accurail model is the molded on running board. It's not horrible, but it's solid plastic so no light shines through onto the roof. Fortunately, Plano Model Products has designed some products specifically for this model. And you can use Plano's part no. 119 with any of those running boards if you want to model an earlier car. I did exactly that for one of my pre-BN merger cars below. Even if you only replace the molded running boards with the etched Plano parts, you've made a huge difference to the model.

So the first step to replacing the running boards on the Accurail model is removing the molded parts. It's pretty easy to trim off the vast majority of the running boards using rail nippers. But you're still going to be left with the portion of the running boards that's in line with the trough hatch at each end. There's no easy way to remove that part except by sanding or filing or a combination of the two. I don't recommend carving this part off because you can easily gouge the roof. Instead, remove the trough hatch and set it aside, then start sanding taking care not to damage the end cage. You'll want to check periodically as you sand that you're following along with the profile of the roof as seen at the end taking care to match the contour under the trough hatch. Best practice here is to sand a little then check the model. Adjust where you're sanding and repeat. If you go too long you might find yourself having to build up the roof.

After the heavy work is done, clean up the rest of the roof where the supports were trimmed. Use the drill template from the Plano kit and install the supports. I like to attach the running board to the supports from the inside working outward toward the ends. I have always used Loctite liquid super glue, but lately I've started using DAP RAPIDFUSE. Either one works fine.

Another area you can address using the Plano kit is the crossover platforms. I like to carve the molded parts up into supports for the etched crossover platforms that are included in the Plano upgrade kit. A sharp no. 11 blade makes quick work of the solid crossover platform.

The ladder rungs on this model aren't as heavy as on some other models, but these are also easy to upgrade. First, using that sharp no. 11 blade, slice off the grabs taking care to run the blade along the inside of the ladder stile. Once all the ladder rungs are removed, cut Plastruct 0.010" styrene rod to length and attach using liquid plastic cement. Make sure the styrene rod lines up with the remaining ends of the molded ladder rungs still on the stiles.

It's also a good time to replace the cast on drop grabs at the corners with wire parts (I like the drop grabs from Tangent) and the stirrups with A-line's Style A part. If you like, plumb the reservoir using some 0.012" brass wire bent to fit between the reservoir and control valve.

For these Burlington Northern cars the paint and decals are pretty straightforward. I damaged the BN logo on mine, but that's not really a problem since the cars I'm modeling were pretty well worn by the late 80s.

The Accurail ACF 4600 represents a late production model. Since Fort Worth & Denver is my home road, I also wanted to build one of their cars. This was made difficult because they are all of the early type with a single triangular stiffener rib on the carbody. The pressed plate that's present just under the car eaves on the Accurail model is correct for the late production model but it must be removed to represent an early model.

After those modifications were made, building this model was just like the others. I substituted the early style running board supports (Plano no. 119) for the supports included in the Plano kit. 

It's worth mentioning that I swapped the Accurail fiberglass type trough hatch with one from an Athearn (ex-MDC Roundhouse) Gunderson 4700 covered hopper. The hatch from the Gunderson hopper represents one of the early stamped metal trough hatches these cars were originally equipped with. 

The model was painted with Model Master Flat Gull Gray then lettered with Microscale decals. I haven't found a good match for the red-orange lettering and frame around the Burlington Route logo, but when I do I'll paint out the weight data and replace it per the prototype. 

I have a few more of these cars that are going to need similar upgrades. Santa Fe's ACF 4600 hoppers had Gypsum expanded metal running boards, which are thankfully available from Plano. I'd like to avoid repainting those cars, so I'll have to find a good match for the paint. But if that doesn't work out the one color dip paint job certainly isn't difficult to recreate.

Next time I'll go over some of the upgrades and modifications I made to MDC Roundhouse Gunderson 4700cf covered hoppers. MDC Roundhouse was acquired by Athearn, who later released these models as upgraded RTR versions and they are quite nice. It doesn't take much more effort than shown here to upgrade the older MDC Roundhouse kits to match Athearn's RTR model.