Kitbashing Santa Fe mechanical refrigerator cars, Part I
scribed next month). The roof was made from left over At- hearn PFE R70-11 diagonal panel roofs spliced to have 15 diagonal panels plus two flat end panels. This was when I found out that the car was too long! (Re- member that earlier comment?) Placing the carbody on its under- frame led to a horrible truth: the sides were three feet too long for the Rr-87. The digital caliper confirmed that the PFE panels were 2½″ to 3″ wider than those on the Rr-87, and those discrep- ancies added up. So, it was
back to
Moore’s book. The Rr-90 came to the rescue. It was, in fact, three feet longer than the Rr-87. However, the doors were now wrong. I replaced them with Details West PD- 147 doors to match the ten-foot wide Camel doors on the Rr-90, trimming six scale inches from the door openings to make it work. Even better, this elim- inated the small ribs that did not exist on the Rr-90 carbody. It was only after the body was com- plete (again) that I made a second ugly discovery. The roof was wrong for an Rr-90! A close look at a construction photo in Moore’s book showed the cars being built with X-panel roofs with no over- hang over the car sides or ends despite the fact the Rr-90 folio sheet said this series had diagonal panel roofs. No way around it: the diagonal panel roof had to go. I settled down one evening to listen to a National League playoff game. Four innings, a Giants’ win, and two sheets of 60-grit sandpaper later and I had a peaked roof with no de- tails. However, 60-grit is pretty coarse, and I needed to use a fair amount of Squadron Green putty to create a smooth surface. This became apparent only after I sprayed the roof with primer, which of course I didn’t do until I had built up all the new ribs. Oh well. The Rr-90 has two straight ribs be- tween each X-panel versus three ribs between panels on other X-panel roofs. Referring to the photos, you can see, from right to left on the roof, the pencil marks where I laid out the locations for the straight ribs between panels; the styrene Evergreen Scale Models .020″×.040″ straight ribs in place; and, at the left, the X-shaped ribs made from Evergreen HO scale 2″×2″’s. In front of the car on the cutting mat are, from right to left, two pieces of 2″×2″ bent in a water wings shape with a 2′- 0″ straight section in the middle; the X- rib glued together at the middle; and the final X-rib with the ends bent par- allel to the center section. The two outer sections each measure about 4′-6″, long enough to add the re- verse bend toward the outer end of the
70
Five pieces make up each side of the class Rr-90 car; the length comes out very close to be- ing exact for this prototype. The doors are 10′-0″ Camel doors from Details West (PD-147), and the roof is two pieces from an Athearn R70-11 sanded smooth. New ribs were made from strip styrene. The completed body is shown with the door track extended (bottom). This car was supposed to be an Rr-87 but came out too long after the panels were re-assembled.
“X” and still have the ribs overlap the roof edges. At the far left are two of the straight ribs, bent in the middle to con- form to the peaked roof.
When all the ribs were securely glued in place I trimmed the ribs flush with the roof ends. It took several thin applications of Squadron green putty to fill in the side and end roof over- hangs, and the photos show the final version of the Rr-90 with the correct plug door and X-panel roof.
The Rr-87
Two more Model Die Casting box- cars donated their ends and roofs for a second attempt at an Rr-87. First, I re- moved all the molded-on details from the A-end of one body and everything
except the high-mounted brake gear- box from the B-end of the second one. At this point the ribs were sanded smooth since it was easier to do with the bodies intact. To cut the sides free I began by using a razor saw just inboard of the rivet strips at the ends. One must be careful here. The insides of the ends are slightly thicker at the top than at the bottom (draft angle to help eject the part from the molding machine), so using the in- side of the car as a cutting guide would result in an end with an angled edge. With the two vertical cuts done at
each end I used a No. 11 blade to score along the tops of the sides to connect them. The construction of the side-roof joint is such that the ends of the roof
MAY 2012
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