Chop-nosed GP7/9?

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Hi all,

I’m interested in rebuilding an Atlas GP7 or GP9 so that it has a chopped nose (in HO). My first thought was to buy something from Canon and Co., but they only do the more modern Spartan cab kits, not the round-roof style as on the early geeps. I’m interested in modelling a CP rebuilt geep and i know i can get a Kaslo shell, but it’s just the cab and nose that needs work, so i don’t really need the whole shell. How difficult would it be to cut the short hood in half and fabricate the front face of the cab? It’s mostly the windows that i think would be hard to do. Also, has there ever been an article that has covered this in MR? If anyone’s ever done this, i’d appreciate it if you could post a picture of it. Many thanks,

Peter.

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I think the P2K GP7 or GP9 would be easier since the nose is a seperate piece.

3

IIRC the June 2009 issue of MR had an article on chopping a GP7. I’d look it up but my mags are home and I’m not.

4

The Walthers Trainline brand has a replica of a chop nose GP9. These are now on sale at Walthers .com for $27.98 instead of retail $44.98.

Perhaps others can post their experiences with these models.

5

You got it right odave. It was an article on modeling rebuilt ATSF GP7’s. The OP wouldn’t like it though, SF made their own cab which looked just like a spartan cab, except the cab roof was wider and slightly taller. It gave the appearance of being extremely high because the roof cab slants were now longer and at a steeper angle.

An idea would to get a spartan cab or find an EMD model that had the spartan cab for cheap. Cut out a piece of sheet styrene for the cab face and make it fit the original roof profile, then cut out a whole for the windows, cut out the front window section of the spartan cab, glue it in place on the new cab, then glue the number board box from teh spartan cab in place.

Part of my RR’s original diesel roster will include RS2’s and GP7’s, this certainly gives me ideas.

For pictures either look on google pictures or railpictures.net. I looked up CP 7 photos came up, about half had the rounded roof other half looked like standard spartan cabs.

6

I did one many years ago, with a Athearn unit. When I get my camera batteries charged up, I will take some pictures and post. It also has the extended rear sand box.

Doing the cab front was no real issue, I just used the front window section from an Athearn spartan cab and got it to fit. It has a Miniatures by Eric number board for the top. Pictures tomorrow, so stay tuned.

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As promised, here are some photos, this locomotive ran on Vancouver Island in the 80’s, so I decided to model it. It received its modification by CP in August 1977. Note that unlike the wholesale GP9 rebuilds of later, it still retains its dynamic brakes. It is one of my first real kitbashes:

Overall view:

Nose:

Rear:

Rear again:

And how it fit in a new window section for a chop nose, in this case a BC Rail RS18:

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Thank you all for your help. I had completely forgotten about that ATSF geep article in MR. Not exactly what i’m doing but really close.

Pathfinder: Thanks for the photos! what an interesting model. I expecially like the extended rear sandbox. Also, nice job on the BC rail locomotive; i’d half considered building a chop-nosed RS18, but i think i’ll wait until the Trueline Trains version comes out (i want one of the OSR ones).

Once again, thanks all for your help.

Peter.

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Glad to help. If I was doing this again, I would look for one that is already a low nose, like the Walthers or PK2000 units. Mine is “old school” Athearn BB with the extra wide hoods.

My RS18 is on hold, pending the arrival of TT units. But it is so far along, I need to just finish it [sigh]