Athearn F7A/B Detailing


B

brad.p

Lost between ATSF & BNSF
I recently got my hands on a set of the old Athearn F7A & B units. I decided that the locos looked very plain and needed some extra detailing so I purchased a Walthers dress-up kit for the 2 and got to work. After doing quite a bit of research and some very fine drilling, I think the locos look much better now. On the prototype, there were also climbing irons up the one side of the A-unit's nose, but I am undecided whether I to add those or not - the dress-up kit does not show this detail.

The other items which I did to match the prototype was to extend the silver of the grill along the side and paint the silver kickplates on the doors of the locos. The horns on the locos are not true to those which Santa Fe had, but I have not seen any other models with the correct horns, so decided to stick with the horns which were supplied. I still have to fit new lights inside and the DCC decoder, etc. before the units are complete. I am also looking for some suitable diaphragm kits to add to these locos, so any advise would be appreciated.

Info on the below photos.
1. The Athearn F7A unit as it comes in the box.
2. A side view after detailing - note the extended silver grill on the side.
3. View showing more of the nose
4. The F7B unit with the dress-up kit fitted.
 
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Brad, good job on adding the detail kit. I think the very first detailing I ever did was back in 1967 or so when I used exactly the same same kit on a pair of UP F-7's. Walthers has been selling that kit for a long time. :)

I don't ever remember seeing a Santa Fe F-7 with grab irons going up the side of the nose. It was fairly common on E units with a piece of angle iron that led from the top step of the door to the first grab on the nose but never on F units. Don't know why the difference but I guess Santa Fe didn't want employees climbing around the nose of an F unit. I could be worng, of course, and probably will be proved to be wrong by someone who finds a picture that contradicts everything I just wrote. :D

Unless I'm missing something, shouldn't those two units also have road numbers?
 
Hi Jim, thanks for the feedback. I was not aware that the detail kits were so long in the tooth as I only bought mine recently - they are still available from Walthers. :eek:

According to the photographic material, the ATSF F7's all appear to have had the grab irons on the nose. There are some differences in the colours which the irons were painted on the various locos. The F7A which is currently preserved at Sacremento (347C) seems like the colours are inaccurate to what the majority of them were when in commerical operation. The other things which has deterred me for now with adding these is the extra little step which needs to be added - I am concerned this may foul the trucks. I have attached photos of both 347C and 342C showing what I refer to above.

You are correct about the road numbers, but I am still trying to work out how to do the number boards as I would like to back-light them as in the prototype, but this is quite an intricate task! Also, need to find a way to make the numbers to allow for back-lighting.

I do not know about the road numbers on the B unit as I have only found a few decent photos on the net which show a B side view - they normally all concentrate on the A-unit and the B is somehwere in the background. Any info on the B-unit numbering would be appreciated.

By the way, one other small problem I had with the standard Athearn F7 was that the rear brake cylinders on each truck fouled against the steps causing derailments on tight curves. I found this same problem detailed elsewhere on the net and had to trim parts off the cylinder to sort that out. Fortunately, it is not really noticeable unless you are aware of it and specifically looking for it. This is not due to the detail kit, but a problem with the Athearn parts kit.

I also want to replace the wheels with NWSL wheels as I find them much better for smooth running.

Anyhow, most important is that I had fun doing these units and look forward to doing the next A/B set to complete my A-B-B-A consist for the Super Chief train I am putting together. Once these are done, it is on to the streamliners - they need to be weighted correctly and some tweaking done on their trucks and wheels, etc.
 
Brad,
See, I knew I was wrong! :) OTOH, and this is from my memories of the Santa Fe F units in service from the mid 60's to the early 70's, I just don't remember the nose side grabs as being common and especially don't remember that stirrup type step extending down over the truck. Any idea when that photo of the 342C was taken? I'm wondering if the nose side grabs were added to satisfy some FRA or OSHA requirements late in their careers.

The numberboards I can help you with. If you have a Dremel tool, drill a small hole in one end of the numberboard inside the raised area. You can then use one of Dremel's smallest router bits at the slowest speed to remove the plastic from the inside of the numberboard. The numberboard glass was actually pretty deeply mounted in the numberboard box. You can use some clear styrene about .010 thick and decal the numbers on the styrene. You'll have to touch them up with some black paint between the numbers but the light only showed through the white numbers anyway. Clean up the holes with a fine mill flat file and then mount the numberboard lenses from the inside of the shell. Use some non-fogging CA glue for this. You can either run some LED's from the existing wiring or use your DCC board to power the LED's to light the numberboards.
 
Hi Jim,

Thanks for the info on the number boards - I don't know if I can see numbers that small to fit in the hole left after cutting out the number board :eek: .

I cannot find the original source of the photo on 342 C so cannot give the date. I checked Railpictures.net and all of the photos I can find dating back to the 60's show the grab irons on the nose. Unfortunately, the only photo of ATSF F7's from the 50's shows the other side and you cannot tell whether they were there. I have included some photos in the posting for reference - both have their dates on.

I also found a photo of 2 B units and could not find the numbers on those - the 2 are facing opposite ways and neither has a number so it is not that they even numbered those on 1 side only.

Hope I'm not breaking any copyright posting these photos here.
 
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Dang, Brad, I guess I was always standing on the wrong side of those F units. :) The last time I saw them in road service was about 1975 so that goes to show you how 32 years will play tricks on your mind. From the research I've done, it appears they started to add the nose side grabs in the late 50's in response to union pressure so the crews could get up on the nose and clean the windshields more safely. I don't know how they did it before that but it must have been a balancing act from the side ladders to the eyebrow grabs.

You will be able to see the numbers quite well if they are illuminated. If you don't care to go to all the work to cut out the solid number boards, you can still apply decals to the solid surface of the existing numberboard panel.

On the warbonnet scheme, it's really important that you get something in those numberboards since there were no other numbers on the engines. The freight F's in blue and yellow had a cats eye reflectorized number panel on the nose but the warbonnet engines only had a small plate on the rear of the A and B units to indicate the engine numbers. There were apparently no easily visible numbers anywhere on a B unit, which is why you don't see them in your picture. Some of the very first FT's had an illuminated numberboard on the side of the engines but the story is that the Santa Fe brass though they ruined the look of the stainless steel panels and they were removed. After that, the warbonnets never had a number painted on the outside. It must have made it a lot of fun for hostlers to run around and look for those little number plates on the B units when they were making up A-B-B-A sets but that's apparently what they had to do.
 
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