I am going to put together a very nice document which I believe will help out many people here, including myself. I am buying quite a bit of older Athearn equipment, some have trashed shells but great motors, others are vice versa.
I want to make a document which will list what shells will fit on what chassis’s. For instance I already know that an SW7 shell will fit perfectly on a Baldwin S12 motorized chassis. So far, this is what I know for sure;
I don’t have any SD9, SD45 or SDP-40’s but I’m thinking all the 12 wheelers have the same chassis. I know some of you guys have the answers, I’ve seen some very knowledgable posts here.
Any and all help is appreciated, I’ll put together all the findings. Right now I would just like to concentrate on snap-on changes, no mods. Also, if you know of shells from other manufacturers that will pop right on to an Athearn chassis, please throw that info in also. I’m not really looking for the obvious, like Stewart shells, they’re manufactured for that purpose. I’m looking for the not so obvious from other manufacturers.
I don’t know the specifics, but Athern diesels with six wheel trucks have very little interchangeability. Their fuel tanks are different sizes, the chassis are different sizes, etc. Then there are the older body/chassis with the too wide bodies, they won’t fit on the newer chassis and vice versa.
The GP38-2,GP40-2 and the GP50 uses the same frame and is readily interchangeable as is the SW1000 and SW1500…Also note that the SW7 truck side frames will fit the SW1500 trucks.
As far as the 6 axle locos Bob is quite correct.
The SD 45 and SDP40 use the same frame.
The C series U-boats use the same frame.
The B series U-boats use the same frame.
The GP40 and GP50 use the same frame, the GP38 has a shorter fuel tank but will interchange.
Here is an MSN group site that has most of the part lists for Athearn locos. It will be helpful. http://groups.msn.com/HoSeeker
It is a simple matter to swap components between Athearn chassis, there are two basic motor lengths: short (switcher) and long (everything else). There are several different lengths of driveshafts, axles are interchangeable, many gears are too. All have the same clips holding the worm to the trucks, etc…
Also add GP60 to that list Also, in regards to what Ray Marinaccio said about the GP38-2 having a smaller fuel tank, some railroads specified a 3600 gallon tank, Southern Pacific is the only one that I know did this. So, if you are modeling an SP GP38-2 and it has that standard GP38-2 underframe, you will need to change it. I have two Athearn SP GP38-2s, one was the correct SP fuel tank, one has the correct fuel tank for most other railroads.
OK, so the SW1000 and SW1500 shells can be swapped just as the SW7 can with the S12. Does anyone know if all 4 of these are interchangeable then?
The information on swapping truck sideframes, driveshafts etc. is good, but for right now I’m not going that far in depth. I want to keep it simple at first. Shells ↔ Chassis.
As far as I know, the SD9 isn’t interchangable with anything else - it’s far shorter than the other 6-axle units. The trucks are also different to the SD40-2 and SD40T-2 - the sideframes on the SD9 are one-piece mouldings with no extra detail parts.