I'm working on a quick-and-dirty conversion of a couple of Athearn bluebox 57-foot mechanical reefers into the UP ARMN 760000 series of rebuilt former UPFE reefers. These have a roof panel removed over the engine-refrigerator compartment and a reefer truck style unit installed on the inner bulkhead. It looks like several makers have detail parts that might be used. Has anyone else done one of these conversions and identified the best part for something like this?
I sort of did a half-heiny fantasy conversion, using a 50ft[!] Athearn Mech Reefer as a starting point (in reality, almost all 50ft Mech Reefers had been retired from refrigeration service by the mid-1970s, decades before the ARMN rebuilding program began in earnest). It doesn't make a lot of sense to do the (real) 57IL reefers, since they are rather plentiful now in model form (I could see it, if you have some old Athearn blue-box R70-20 lying around)Anyway, I cut out the roof panel over the refrigeration unit bay (drilled lots of little holes around the edge of the panel to remove, knocked out the waste panel, filed all edges square with a mill file).Made a bulkhead to fit the interior crosswise from plain styrene sheet.Attached a paper copy of a Carrier refrigerator unit to the middle of the bulkhead, a little lower than the roof. The unit was made by scanning a real BLMA Carrier unit model (each side in turn) - the actual refrigerator unit model is to be used for a different project.I left the fuel tanks as is (did add some piping), since that is what the prototype rebuilds seem to use (no tanks mounted on the end under the refrigerator unit, as seen on TrinCools and the like).Added cushion draft gear because I had a set lying around...Yes, I should have cut out the louvers and grills from the sides, and replaced them with photoetched mesh...but I didn't feel like it - this little project was more for practicing (well, playing with) some kitbashing and finishing techniques rather than a real prototype project (since, as I stated, the 50ft reefers had been retired anyway, and would be far too small for such a conversion). Ironically, this car is among the best runner I have due to me getting the weight to NMRA specs, using a truck tuner to ream out the axle pockets, and getting everything balanced.If you haven't seen these already (you probably did), these prototype images will confirm the conversion is fairly straightforward, but will involve some cutting:ARMN 76508ARMN 76564ARMN 76629ARMN 76706ARMN 90204
I haven't done any. Most of my reefers still use ice
I'm familiar with the units because I used to work in a heavy truck garage and we had lots of both Thermo-King and Carrier refrigeration units. As chutton pointed out, not much to it, but you can take it to whatever level of detail you want.
Here's a link to what Walthers offers in HO. The Herpa units are very current, IIRC from just seeing similar new models out on the road. There is no illustration for the Alloy Forms one, but I suspect it's an older model of one or the other or maybe just generic. The Custom Finishing Carrier unit looks to be 70s/80s maybe, but the pic isn't clear.
http://www.walthers.com/exec/search?category=Part&scale=H&manu=&item=&keywords=refrigeration+unit&words=restrict&instock=Q&split=30&Submit=Search
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Since mlehman posted the Walthers search results, I found it interesting that the BLMA ones were not listed in the results.It's because they are cataloged under Reefer units. Of course, lovely.I'd say stick with BLMA's offerings if you're going to model the current crop of ARMN rebuilds running around, they look closer to the prototype than the Herpa ones.Also forgot to mention, if you look at the Athearn model I linked to in my post (might be N scale), the plastic looks a bit thick where the louvres and grills were removed - which is no real surprise. The problem here is the "one weird trick" to make a visible plastic edge more scale thickness - sanding the edge of the plastic to a thin tapered, may not work since the inside of the refrigerator cabinet is visible from various angles, and the tapers may show.
Yes, I saw that over the Walthers BLMA listing. I've taken a lot of shots of ARMN reefers, many from my favorite location at the Pepper Ave bridge in West Colton, where I can look down on the roofs. Unfortunately, up to now, I've never thought to stand directly over the track in question as they go by and shoot directly into the reefer compartment. As best I can see from the partial views I can see in my own photos, there may be two or three styles of unit in service. I will probabvly order these https://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/176-4554 to finish my cars.
By the way, there are variations in how much of the screening is cut away on the rebuilds, and I don't plan to do anything special to the Athearn bluebox screen-louver detail.