Nice! Thanks Bill, Ebay acquisition?

Well, I’m back at this project again. There have been a lot of holdups with some MIA detail parts that are not readily available, coupled with some minor body corrections and finally other deep thoughts about this build that have been figured out. My biggest headache was the SMV GP7 handrail stanchions which have not been available for the past couple years. Good news is Smokey Valley is recasting their stanchions and my direct order is in. With body corrections made and getting the stanchions that I need, I’m moving forward again.

I learned a few things with the KV details. For one, they are nicely done details without a doubt. Two, the unfortunate thing for me was the front grille made by KV doesn’t work with the Details Associates fan housing frame. The KV grille was made for the Walthers/Proto series frame. There is a size difference between the Proto and the DA part. If you decide you’re not going to replace the frame, you’re good to go with the KV replacement.

The DA part is accurate according to scale drawings in all phases. The Proto casting is off on the height, width and depth. You can fix the depth on the Proto shell by adding strips of .020x.020 styrene around the top edge of the frame. I did do this procedure with my SW900m and the SW1200 that is currently in progress. The pic shows what I did to raise the depth of the frame on my SW900m.

As far as the body corrections goes, sometimes procrastination is a good thing, at least for me it was. My procrastination provided me with a fresh look at photos which made me see details I overlooked and even found a small oddity with the EMD rebuild of 2707.

Good overhead shots are too far and few in between for older models. The only overhead shot I have of these units I posted earlier in this article. It’s a bit grainy and I was recently cleaning it up for no apparent reason, and while reviewing that photo again, I noticed something on top of the hood where EMD made a new sheet metal connection between the Baldwin and SW hood. I’ll refer this as the slope sheet since it does slope slightly towards the EMD hood. I realized I made an error with my version of the slope sheet by a scale foot. This was a complete oversight for me. But fortunately, I was able to correct the slope sheet without too much trouble.

The first pic shows what I thought was originally correct for the hood construction.


But what I discovered was the access hatch on top of the slope sheet rests up against the exhaust hatch. This meant that the slope sheet was longer than I originally thought.
To correct this, my first thought was to cut the slope sheet off the hood and just rebuild that area. But I decided to see if I could just make the edit without rebuilding. So I milled across the EMD hood in front of the exhaust hatch as close to level to the edge of the slope sheet. Then I carefully sanded the area smooth and flush. It worked; I didn’t have to rebuild the slope sheet and I didn’t lose the EMD hood radius on each edge. I cleaned up a new Cannon toilet hatch, sanded the bottom down to about .012 and glued in place.