Custom painting an F unit

I didnt find an answer after searching the forums last night so I'll start a new thread.
If one were to custom paint a b/y f unit, how would they go about putting on that dulux gold cigar band and striping? Is there a decal set out there or even a stencil of some sort?
Thanks

 

Hello Ethan!

I'm not aware of a nose decal for either an EMD F unit or FA1. They shapes of the painted nose curves between the two are different. The EMD F's come to a slight point, the FA's do not. Both use different curving to attain their respective shape, too.

In the dateless past, I used a sheet of paper to create a reusable template for my Stewart F's. I would then use the template to trace the nose shape onto tape, carefully cut out the mask, and apply it to the yellow painted car body. Once all the masks for the yellow portions were in place, I hit it with the black paint.

Good luck!

Andre

 

Forgot to mention at the beginning, I'm working on an f7. I'm scraping the steam gen and db detail off right now, then its going into some running alcohol overnight.
There was a part of my mind that knew there was a decal out there, I just couldn't come up with the name oddball last night. I'll pm you about those decals.

 

Athearn RTR. Think its still the same shell casting as the BB models

 

I'm hoping to use a similar process for this project.
Tbh, the fp7 had a longer wheel base so i never understood the idea of putting the generator detail on a regular f7

 

Ethan:

Steam generators on F7A's...

So the F7A can be used in passenger service as was the case on many railroads.

Andre

 

If the steam gens fit in a regular f7a, why have a separate fp7 model?

 

The F7A had limited boiler water capacity. Some railroads had boilers in both A and B units, some in just B units.
EDIT: F3s were the same.

The FP7 had a larger water tank for more capacity.

 

Thanks for clearing that up for me

 

The "problem" of small water capacity with steam generators in F3A and F7A's also equipped with dynamic brakes didn't become evident until after they were in service for a while. After the issue was more fully understood, EMD's answer was to add 4' and increase the steam water capacity.

Andre

 

Several railroads tried F3s/F7s in passenger service, usually the western railroads. UP had water tanks in the F3As and both a water tank and a steam generator in the B units. My understanding was the ATSF had an early order of F7As and F7Bs for passenger service that all had steam generators, and that is what the Athearn (Globe?) shells were modeled after, but soon changed to the same as the UP--most ATSF F7A units did not have a generator, just a water tank, and were connected to B units that had both. More northern roads, such as the Great Northern and Northern Pacific, had steam generator equipped F7A units, but they could easily run out of water in the winter, so some baggage cars had water tanks in them for extra boiler capacity.

The FP7 had the same size water tank and generator as a E unit, but by then cab units and passenger service were in decline. EDIT: close to. See below.
But was a useful engine on secondary routes and branches.

Getting back to an Athearn F7A shell for Frisco--remove the steam generator details, the dynamic brake details, and the water fill port for the non-existent water tank, and you're in business.

 

Just for comparison, the Frisco steam generator equipped locomotives were equipped as follows

GP-7: One Vapor Clarkson 2500 lb Steam Generator; boiler water 800 gal
FP-7: One Vapor Clarkson 2500 lb Steam Generator; boiler water 1750 gal
EA-7: One Vapor Clarkson 3000 lb Steam Generator; boiler water 1600 gal
E-8: Two Vapor Clarkson 2500 lb Steam Generator; boiler water 1930 gal

At sea level 970 BTU are require to generate 1 lb of steam (not to be confused with steam pressure which is measure in PSI)

 

Thanks for the info Karl.

 

Look what I found with a little Googling:

http://users.fini.net/~bersano/english-anglais/EMD-F7.pdf

 

Getting the thread back on topic, I think I came up with my own stencil last night for an EMD f unit. I took a side and front picture of a Stewart F3 I have in my collection and stitched them together to make a single picture that I could cut out the band to use as a stencil. It took some trial and error to get it scaled right, but I think I've got it "close enough". I've gotta wait for warmer weather to come back before I can test it out. I can't share the word document that I made to get the size right, but I'll share the JPEG, and if you drop it in a word document and change the width to 2.2" it will be about right. I'll attach an additional picture that shows where to enter that measurement.