Question about GP15s

[UPJohn]

I was looking at the soo line's unofficial diesel roster (http://sooline.dieselrosters.com/) and found a picture of a GP15C. The loco appears nearly identical to a standard GP15 except that the roof of the cab extends above the number board a few inches.
http://sooline.dieselrosters.com/details.asp?ID=902

Here is a good picture ^^

I can't tell if the number boards are lowered for some reason or if the entire cab has been raised a few inches. If anyone knows about these locos could the please shed some light on this subject. Would this be a difficult loco to model in N scale using a JnJ GP15 shell as a starting point?

[Anonymous]

If you click on the link you posted and read all the notes under the photo, you will discover that the Soo GP15C is not a conventional EMD GP15-1 at all, but a rebuild of a GP9 with a Caterpillar engine. The Cat engine caused the hood to be build higher, along with the cab.

Where in New Jersey are you from? I currently live in St. Louis, but I grew up in Bergen County and my parents currently live near Flemington.

[UPJohn]

Thanks I had read that caption but did not realize the new engine would have caused a higher hood. I first thought it would have been new electronics.

I am from Burlington County near medord and moorestown in a small township called Southampton.

[Anonymous]

It appears to me that the hood itself is a standard GP7/9 height. The walkway and the cab roof were raised (the numberboards are in their normal location), and a bunch of other details were changed.

A JnJ GP15 shell is NOT a good place to start. For N-scale, you need to start with an Atlas GP7 or GP9, and it will require a bit of modification. The fuel tank is the same, you'll just have to modify the skiirt. For the cab, you will need to start with a cab from an Atlas GP38 or GP40 (available separately on their parts website), and use styrene to build up the higher cab roof, and the steeper roof angles.

The tricky part is that the cab needs to be moved forward a little. If you compare an engine like a GP38 to a GP7/9, you will notice that the cab on the GP38 is farther forward. On a lot of GP7/9 rebuilds, their cabs were moved forward so that the nose was as about long as a GP38s, and that appears to be the case here. So first you will need to "chop" the nose, then install the modified cab in the forward position, then extend the hood to meet up with the cab. From that one picture, it appears (although it's hard to be sure) that all you would need to do is get a second GP7/9 body (also available from Atlas), and cut out a section to fit. Then you would need to change the forward grilles to match (if you want to go that far), and any roof details (like replacing the standard dual exhaust ports with the single Caterpillar "bouncy flip-top" lookin' thing).

Lastly, if you want to go that far, you would need to raise the walkway accordingly, redo the handrails (it's not as daunting as you would think, just takes some time), and change the battery box arrangement under the cab. If I were going to put this kind of effort into such a project, I would hunt for a picture of the other side of the engine (or a similar build) to get that walkway and grille detail correct.

For more details on how I chopped a nose and changed the fuel tank skirt on a different prototype, check out this thread (it's on another forum): http://www.rockinghamjunctionmodels.com/forum/index.php?topic=1357.0

---jps