Making a Replacement for a Missing Coupler Box Cover

A couple of months ago, I bought an old Walthers "meat reefer" kit at a train show. This week when I took the box out to assemble the kit, I found one coupler box cover was missing. The first thing I thought of was call Walthers customer service, but the copyright on the kit directions is 1995, so I think the likelyhood of getting a replacement part is low. Also, I was in a 4 year old mood (I whanit NOW!! ), so I decided to make a replacement.

The coupler box cover is held on with a flat head screw; the kit did have both screws. I started by tracing the existing cover on to 0.030 a piece of styrene, which is the same thickness as the original cover. The machinists angle block from MicroMark is a handy tool for holding things steady.

I cut the styrene with a razor saw, filed the rough edges, and checked the size of the styrene against the original cover. I noticed that the original cover has a recess around the edge to keep it from turning around the screw. I marked the width of this on the styrene, and glued Evergreen scale 1x4 to the inside of my marks. (The original cover is the black one.)

I traced the location of the screw hole from the original cover to the styrene, and measured the diameter of the hole by trying different size drill bits in the hole of the original cover. I drilled a #47 hole in the styrene

This cover uses a flat head screw, but I do not have a countersink. I used a 1/4 wood bit, carefully rotating it with my fingers, to make a countersink hole. (This is not necessary for a flat head or round head screw.)

I test fit the new cover on the reefer before the glue on the 1x4 set up hard in case that adjustment was needed. All that is left is to paint the styrene cover and the original cover with Floquil Roof Brown and finish assembling the car.

This covers some other conditions:

• If you do not have an existing cover to measure, measure the length, width of the coupler box on the car, and cut styrene accordingly.
• If you do not have a screw for the cover and do not want to glue it, use a 2-56 screw. Drill a clearance hole in the cover (#50 drill), drill out the where the screw would go in the couper box (#43 drill), and tap the hole with a 2-56 tap. Kadee sells a set with all 3, part number 246
• If the coupler box  has a solid pin that you can not drill and tap, cut off the pin and drill out with a 1/8" drill. glue in a piece of Evergreen #224 1/8" styrene tubing, then drill and tal as above.

What if there is no coupler box? How to install a Kadee box? This is for another How To. I have a Tyco Swift reefer that needs updating...