An Athearn “Blue Box” tank car, Part 4

In previous posts on this topic, I have been describing a project to model a Shell Chemical high-pressure tank car, starting with an Athearn “Blue Box” tank car. Athearn has usually labeled this as a “chemical” tank car, though that term conveys nothing specific. The background and prototype photos for the project is in the first post of the series (you can view it here: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/07/reworking-athearn-blue-box-tank-car.html ). 

In the previous post, Part 3 of the series, I showed how I modeled the tank hold-downs, with their distinctive turnbuckles (that post is at this link: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2024/08/an-athearn-blue-box-tank-car-part-3.html ). Meanwhile, I was also adding wire grab irons at each corner of the tank, using brass wire. The tank has already received a coat of blue-gray primer.

Next I turned to the Athearn underframe. As I showed in the first post in this series (see link in top paragraph above), the extraneous extra outlet pipes have already been removed. Now I reworked the coupler pockets, which I modify so that the coupler box lids are separate from the underframe, and are fastened with screws (see, for example, this post: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2019/05/fixing-athearn-tank-car-coupler-pockets.html ). 

The Athearn power hand brake arrangement is wrong for nearly all transition-era tank cars. I fill the hole in the running board meant to accept the Athearn brake stand, and drill a hole to insert a brass wire with brass brake wheel soldered to it (as shown in previous posts, such as: https://modelingthesp.blogspot.com/2023/05/small-project-replacing-brake-wheels.html ). Finally, I added wire to represent brake rodding, which you can just see below. 

Another part of the project requiring attention was the dome platform, which I confiscated from a Broadway Limited high-pressure tank car. This required several modifications, the first of which was to enlarge the opening in the platform to accommodate the diameter of the Precision Scale brass valve bonnet part. Here is a photo of the platform temporarily in place, prior to painting.

Next the two halves of the tank body, and the platform, could be painted. I used Tamiya “Haze Grey” (TS-32) for this. The paint has a semi-gloss finish, quite suitable for decal application. Below I show how they look at this point (the dome platform parts other than the deck will be hand-painted black later). The frame hasn’t had its black paint touched up.

With this work complete, all parts are ready for assembly and lettering. I will turn to those topics in a future post.

Tony Thompson