I noticed that it was written as “Insulated Heated” on the junk boxcar I got from long ago. It’s a 50 ft CP rail plug-door car made by MDC. Does anyone know what the heater looks like? The 40-foot version was found on magazines and on the internet, but the 50-foot version seems larger. Because the model is a junk, I just want to finish it simply by cutting out a plastic block and bonding it to the underfloor. Why use alcohol instead of kerosene for fuel?
Any information thanks.
New to me.
They used them to prevent produce from freezing, replacing charcoal heaters. Search ebay for Preco Boxcar Heaters
As to why alcohol?
I found this:
I’m not sure why alcohol over other fuels.
Mike.
EDIT: Looks like Henry has it covered.
my guess for using alcohol , would be fumes smelling up produce . wouldn’t you just injoy a BLT that had a kerosene smell to it .
Fumes was my first thought too.
Also, at the time these were developed, we don’t really know what the cost and availability of the other fuels were.
According to a quickie google search, today, kerosene costs twice as much a methanol. If that was true then, it’s not hard to see why they went with alcohol.
Thank you everyone. I understood the reason for adopting alcohol well. The boxcar in the picture is longer than 40-foot and shorter than 50-foot. It’s 45-foot? This allows me to estimate the size of the underfloor equipments and the ventilators. By the way, are alcohol heaters still used? Or have they already been replaced by mechanical reefers? Kerosene was used in the Eastman Heater car, which was developed in 1880. (Page 85 of the April 2013 issue of the RMC magazine)
The repair points of this model are the four stirrups, the lower part of the side board, the removing of the roof walk, and the white retouching of the R-side. Matching orange color seems difficult. Is the roof not good with silver? Given that, I do not know when it will be completed.
No, it is a 40’ car.
Chris, as you say. The box car is 40-foot. The attached image is the October 1980 issue of ORER. The energy to modify the model may have disappeared. 
I found a 50-foot model of the same design on the Ebay auction. The car number is “CP 166590,” which is the Walthers Mainline CP Rail 50’ Insulated Boxcar 166590 stock#910-2016. The attached image is quoted above from Ebay. That’s a 50-foot car, included in the 166549-166592 series, according to the ORER mentioned earlier. A little bit of energy came out. 
A quick look at the trucks on the CP 165134 car will show two greatly different wheelbases, pointing to distortion in the photograph itself, at a casual glance, causing one to believe the car might indeed be more than 40 feet in length.
It would be, as the car, prototype and model, is yellow.
SMP offered it, CP Action Yellow, in their Accupaint line, and it may still be available in their more recent version of those excellent paints.
The thinness of the sidesills makes it difficult to add new sill steps. In cases like that, I prefer to add strip styrene, of appropriate dimensions, to the inside face of the car’s sides where the steps are to be added. Use solvent-type cement, and let the joint completely harden before drilling it to accept A-Line formed metal replacement steps…
Use a suitable file to remove material from the cast metal underbody, in order to accommodate the added thickness of the car’s sides at those points.
If you’re going to remove the runningboard/roofwalk, you should either shorten the ladders appropriately, and also lower the brake wheel on the car’s “B” end, or add appropriate warning label decals to indicate that “THIS CAR HAS NO ROOF WALK”.
Depending on how accurate you wish to make it, you could also add the ventilators to the car’s sides, replace the cast-on grabirons with formed metal ones, and re-number the car to match that of one of the 50’-ers shown in the ORER page posted earlier.
If you’re also going to
Where is the heater on this car or box for the heater and tank for the fuel?
Under the door, and to the left of the door, attached to the bottom of the car.
Mike.
There were also 50’ versions of the real cars. An acquaintance sent a photo of one, but the underbody was too dark to make out anything other than the trucks’ sideframes.
Wayne
Thank you very much for your advice. The underfloor was diverted from plastic surplus item for processing reasons. The remaining is painting, and the challenge is to match the yellow color.
It’s late, but I’d like to show you the completed model. May 13, 2024 6799
