My current N Scale project is converting an Atlas Western Maryland GP35 to Frisco 704 so I can have a torpedo boat on my layout. I remember seeing a drawing of the reservoirs on the roof with all the air line routings. For the life of me, I can't find it anywhere on the net. I'm about 1/2 way complete with the repaint, finishing up the black detail of the handrails now that the yellow is finished I have small strips of styrene to cover the tank mounted reservoirs to simulate the 3,000 gallon fuel tanks. Can anyone help me with tube dimensions and a crude sketch of the air line routing so it would look good from five feet away? I'm not into prototypical perfection, just something I can enjoy. Thanks so much guys!!! John Moore
Ken Wulfert posted this: http://www.frisco.org/shipit/index.php?attachments/slsf-gp35-roof-tanks-piping-jpg.18689/
Very nice photo at the end. http://www.frisco.org/shipit/index.php?threads/torpedo-geep-roof-pics.6656/
Thanks guys. I kept looking and found the sketch but the photo is awesome. One thing the Frisco pushed was safety (what company wouldn't), but it always surprised me that rotary beacons ended up so dirty with diesel soot. Maybe I should weather my locomotives and I won't have to worry about lighting after all! JFM
Well, done with the handrails for now. Starting on the fuel tank and torpedo to best thanks to you guys...
Once the air reservoirs are plumbed, I will add cab details (horns, beacon, antenna, shades), finish the decals and then weather it. This will be my first weather attempt...
Well, I found, and bought quite a few things today. First, relating to this thread is my purchase of a near black GP7 TT by Atlas. This locomotive will serve 2 purposes. I will remove the torpedo tubes from the top of the GP7 along with the air lines. This locomotive has 4 tunes, so I have enough for 2 GP35s? The air lines are all wrong so I will probably use bent wire per the above diagram. It looks like the fuel tank will work (hopefully) so I won't have to fab a 3000 gallon tank. I just have to find a regular Atlas GP7 tank to go in its place. After pulling the brake fluid trick to eliminate the lettering, the GP7 will become Frisco 572. I found a photo which I will soon post of the 572 that my father took. Now for the other two things. Second, I found DCC equipped Frisco U25B 808 factory painted by Atlas that I didn't even know existed. I bought it. Last, I've been looking for Seaboard Coast Line EMD engines to simulate the pooled power arrangement with the Frisco. I bought an SD35. Quite happy. Thoughts?
Looks as if you are making good progress, and that you have your course mapped out. Nice work from what I see. John, do me and the rest of the old guys (they won't admit it) a big favor. Make your photos with contrasting color in the foreground and background. Taking a photo of a black subject with black in the foreground and background makes it a little difficult to see the details. Keep up the progress.
Certainly no apology needed, John. Actually - once I enlarged the photo - It looked much better. Am looking forward to seeing how your "tank" modifications come out.
John, I been working on the same GP-35 project just not as far along as you. You might try using Atlas SD-24 rooftop piping. There's a lot of it and it's cheap direct from Atlas. I was thinking a little heat and bending and bending the piping to shape. Ed
I think I'm going to use a pair of calipers on the GP7 TT to get the diameter of hard wire and I'm going to bend my own from the same diameter and much smaller wire to represent the coiled wire used to protect the rear air reservoir line around the rear most GP35 fan. Do a YouTube search for Frisco GP35 N Scale to get a feel for where I'm going... JFM
This video is for those who can hopefully see this video better than my pictures. Let me know what you think... John Moore
I also couldn't wait to run 704 in a GP38 consist. Forgive me if the decals, air reservoirs, horn, beacon, etc aren't on her yet... JFM
Busy night tonight. I'm stripping the black and ??? locomotives down to black and getting them ready for Frisco's Black and Yellow scene. I also, with 2 exceptions, finished DCC conversion on my entire Frisco fleet, painted the white Atlas B30-7 cab shades orange and painted the handrails white on 2 of my Atlas U25B road units. I bought 2 GP38s that were allegedly DCC Ready, but the 1997 Atlas frames will need milling to accept Digitrax's decoder board. Work for another weekend... JFM
Well, I finished stripping off all the lettering and added all the yellow handrail paint in addition to Frisco long hood decals and numbers just so I could keep the DCC numbers straight in my head. I will add all the appropriate decals to the short/long hoods and frames as time allows. One accident - I dropped my little GE 44 Ton switcher just as I finished it and it doesn't run anymore. Now I have to try to find out how to tear into this little Bachmann DCC equipped loco to troubleshoot. Next up is a beacon for the GP35 and then the torpedo tubes. Thoughts? John Moore
Well, I lied. Torpedo tubes first. I had air reservoirs off a GP38AC from Life-Like that I used as a guide when I cut 3/32nd styrene tube to length. I decided not to use the GP7 TT torpedo tubes as they were the right length but too small in diameter. I have shown them both on top of the long hood here as a comparison and the GP38AC reservoir is laying beside the shell.
Next, I rounded the ends off of the two styrene tubes and threaded them onto a small gauge stainless wire. I glued one tube onto the wire, bend the forward air line into 2 90 degree angles so the distance between tubes fit the locomotive. Once the gap between the tubes was finalized, I glied the second reaervoir in place and bent the sharp 90 degree angle down and cut off the end of the wire.
Since the other end of the wire was very long, there was plenty of wire left over to bend the remaining air line to match the sketch referenced in an above post and cut off the remaining straight wire.
