Athearn Rotary Snowplow

[doctorwayne]

I've decided to include this boxcar with the rotary plow project, simply because it's being done at the same time (it's being built for someone else).

I started with a Train Miniature model of the proposed USRA steel boxcar, favoured especially by the New York Central, along with Pennsy's version, which was the X-29.  It's a fairly low-height car, many of which lasted into the early '50s.

I shaved-off the moulded-on brake details on the underside of the floor (except for the triple valve) then cemented the frame, minus the coupler boxes, to the floor.
While it's difficult to see in the photo below, I added a Tichy brake cylinder with piping, and the piping between the reservoir and the triple valve. I didn't bother with the trainline or other piping, simply because it's not noticeable when the car is on the track.  I also added the rods and levers for the brake gear, as it is noticeable from trackside...



The moulded-on grabirons were removed and replaced with wire ones, and the original doors replaced with modified Athearn doors.  I removed the working door feature, which allowed me to remove the oversize door tracks, making the car look more prototypical...



The too-thick sill steps were replace with metal ones from A-Line, and likewise for the brake wheel, which is now a more-to-scale version from Tichy.  As you can see, the car also acquired Kadee couplers in their own draught gear boxes, affixed with screws...



I have dozens of these cars on my layout and all of them have had the roofwalk/running board either modified by using an autobody file to thin it, or had it replaced with individual "boards", the latter being my choice for this car...



The boxcar, along with the rotary plow and its tender have all been painted, the tender in order to apply rivet decals and to cover the multitude of bare metal grabirons on the plow. 
The boxcar has been primered, using some of my last stock of Floquil grey primer.  I'll post photos later, as the grey primer should show the boxcar details better.  However, black paint on the plow and tender has really diminished the visual impact of all those metal grabirons.

Wayne