Read above
The only manufacturer of U18B’s in HO Scale was Lionel a lonnnng time ago. I have kitbashed a few, and it is a long hard process. Check eBay, every once in a while one will pop up.
Hope this helps.
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will anybody kitba***hem
You didn’t mention what railroad as there were a few that had them. There are some photos here: http://www.railpictures.net/showphotos.php
I did 20 MaineCentral U-18 kitbashes back in the '80s using the Athearn wide bodied U-28 (or 30). I did all the body and frame cutting with a band saw and built jigs for the re-assembly.
I was just looking at the Atlas 4 axel U-Boat and it could certainly be done. It would require cutting and rejoining the fuel tank in 2 places and probably shortening the frame at the ends as well. The drive train would then have to be readjusted to fit the shorter frame. The body would only have to be cut and spliced once. The details would depend on the railroad modeled. U-Boats were generally pretty plain, basic details needed (depending on what you start with): grabs, handrails (if you want to use metal), ditchlites, coupler liftbars, MU & trainline hoses, windshiel wipers. You could also add details to the trucks.
I have one of the Lionel HO U-18s in my hand. The body’s not too bad, but it is a wide body, like Athearn’s U-Boats with about the same quality of detail. The chassis is not so nice and would require a lot of work to bring it up anywhere close to todays standards.
I can do the kitbash, contact me directly at: modelmaker51@hotmail.com