I was reading the Diesel List (D-List) this afternoon. A member entered a post advising he had attended a model railroad meet in Cleveland yesterday. He said Athearn was there with a pre-production sample of a HO Genesis EMD FP7. The Athearn guy said the first road released would be Reading. A Genesis FP7? Ah yes, that would be nice! The Intermountain FP7 is OK; A Genesis would be super. Ken
Reminds me of my college days in the late 70's. Fall of 1978 at UT Arlington to be exact. I rather annoyed my roommate, carving up and sanding on two Athearn F7 bodies at my desk, to make an FP7, based on an article in a recent RMC. The article was about a Reading unit as well.
John - I remember that RMC article on the FP7! I still have a copy of it in my "stacks". I was working on a Frisco FP7 then based on the old Atlas HO FP7. It didn't work out well at all, and is long gone. Ken
The article detailed how to extend the Athearn frame. I did see one several years later, that used the Atlas shell, on an Athearn GP9 chassis, turned backwards. It seemed to fit just fine, but I don't remember how they handled the air tanks.
John - I found the article that I think we were both talking about: "EMD Phase I FP7, as modeled in HO scale", by Richard Steinbrenner, RMC, October, 1978. It does show how to make a FP7 by cutting up and modifying an Athearn F7. It also discussed the then new Atlas FP7, which I was interested in as I had just purchased one - a black PC version. I remember taking this issue of RMC along on a business trip back then for airplane reading. I kept that Atlas FP7, still in PC "colors", until about 1992, when the pot metal frame suddenly cracked up and fell apart. I still use bits of it as weights for freight cars! I sold off the Atlas body shell, trucks and motor at a swap meet. The same RMC issue also had a feature article profiling "EMD's FP7-FP9" locomotives, which is why I kept it. It has a roster of FP7's and FP9's, plus a lot of pictures and some good drawigs of the two locomotive types in their various phases. I recall being upset that none of the pics showed a SLSF unit - RMC showed us Katy and Cotton Belt, but no Frisco! Ken
I think the big difference in the article kitbash and the Atlas model was the upper side grilles. The Atlas had the "Farr" grilles, which weren't appropriate for hardly any road.
Upon checking the Intermountain site yesterday I noticed that the FP7A and F7B in the O&W paint scheme due to be released this month has been delayed. The estimated arrival was changed to TBD status. This change also affected almost all of the other road names scheduled to be released in July, not just the Frisco ones. The second release of six more road #'s of the PS 5277 Boxcar was put into TBD status a couple of months ago. I will watch and keep everyone updated. Bob Hoover FriscoFriend
