fer the dimensions with it. Again, I drilled holes in the corners, cut the in- terior rectangle free and cleaned up the interior edges.
The Santa Fe Rr-91 model uses the Athearn PFE R70-20 carbody with the roof, door and 18″ of the original sides adjacent to it, as well as the last panels on the sides, left intact. Six pieces of a second Athearn car side were cut apart and rearranged for each Rr-91 side.
The Rr-91
I began this project with the newest of the cars I eventually modeled, the Rr-91, because it seemed the simplest. I started by cutting the side panels of two Athearn PFE R70-20 cars free from the ends and roofs. I left the doors, the 18″ panels adjacent to them, the ends, three feet of the sides at the B- (brake wheel) end and four feet of the sides at the A- (non-brake wheel) end attached to the roof of the car that was to become the future SFRC 55611. I cut the sides apart into sections of panels so they could be swapped around to obtain the correct spacing of the exterior posts, removing the two narrow panels from each side in the process.
The sections were cut so the mating ends could be sanded down to the riv- ets on one panel and the exterior post on the next. This was time consuming and required a lot of use of the digital caliper, but necessary and worth it. I glued the panels in place, adding strip styrene between the tops of the panels and the bottom of the roof to make up
for the plastic removed by the saw kerf. The photos show the modified side panels. Styrene splice plates behind the joints added strength.
Removing the molded-on details on the ends of the car, except for the tack boards and the low-mounted brake gearbox, came next. On the A-end’s right side I carved the plastic screen off of the sliding access door. (To do this, drill holes in the corners and use a “mi- cro-saw” to cut from hole to hole.) I cleaned up the car ends and the door frame with files and sanding sticks. I sanded the A-end’s left side smooth to remove the plate and rivets there. Next up was laying out a rectangle on the left side for a new vent, as shown in the photos. Measuring with the digital caliper, the rectangle is .315″ wide ×.710″ tall; it starts .420″ from the bot- tom of the car side and .470″ from the rib closest to the end. The scale meas- urements would be 2′-6″ wide and 5′-3″ tall, starting 3′-0″ from the bottom of the car side and 3′-3″ from the rib clos- est to the end. I used the digital caliper because it was easier to set and trans-
The Rr-90 Let’s start off with the truth about how I got here on this one. Originally, I had no intention of doing an Rr-90 reefer. This was supposed to be a model of an SFRC Rr-87. The idea was to kit- bash the sides of the Athearn PFE R70-11 with the distinctive slanted ex- terior posts next to the doors and end up with an Rr-87. It turns out the indi- vidual panels of the PFE car sides are about 3″ wider than those on the SFRC Rr-87 series cars, but I proceeded any- way (more on this in a moment). I also needed new ends to do an Rr-
87. Details West used to offer suitable 4/4 Dreadnaught ends, but they are no longer available. Scrounging around, I found several Model Die Casting 50- foot boxcars that I had set aside for up- grading to current standards. Instead, they just sat, until now, that is, and the ends looked usable for this project. Problem solved. Not only that, the spare doors from Accurail’s 5630-series plug-door 50-foot boxcar kit could also be used for an Rr-87.
The side panels from two R70-11 cars were cut apart and rearranged to create the new car sides. This was easier than working with the panels for the Rr-91 since there are no rivets next to the ex- terior posts. I added the Accurail plug doors, glued splice plates behind all the butt joints, then let everything cure. Going back to the ends, a pair of the MDC boxcar ends were liberated from one of the boxcars. I carved off every- thing except the ribs and rivets. Their inside edges and the matching surfaces on the car sides were carefully beveled to 45 degrees and the pieces mated to- gether. As before, right-triangle gus- sets were cut from styrene and added to the top corners of the body for strength. A 6′-9″ tall by 3′-0″ wide hole for a new screened vent had to be cut into the A- end’s left side; the photos show its place- ment. The right edge is against the in- side of the car end, and its top is .30″ (2′-6″) down from the top of the car side. For the vent on the A-end’s right
side, the hole is just under 3′-0″ wide; the left edge is against the inside of the car end, and its top is 1′-6″ down from the top of the side. It extends 9 scale feet downward.
The left and right sides, respectively, of the A-end of the Santa Fe Rr-91 show the work needed to revise the vents for the mechanical refrigeration unit. Only the lower grilles were sanded off on the left side, while all of them were removed on the right side.
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN
One of the photos shows the right side before the door track was removed and the hole cut. The vent holes were made slightly undersize so they could be sanded to allow a tight fit for the vents when they are installed (as de-
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