Athearn Bluebox Upgrade

Fellow blogger John R put up a post on how he assembles inexpensive boxcar kits from Athearn, Roundhouse, Accurail, and other manufacturers. I added a comment about some tweaks I've done to Athearn bluebox, and John suggested I do a post of my own about these tweaks, with photos. As it happened, I had a bluebox kit ready to go. My method is derived from articles in RMC by the late Richard Hendrickson and others.

The main problem with Athearn bluebox was the metal clips that held the couplers in place. These had a tendency to fall off and leave the couplers on the track, which was irritating anyhow, but could also cause derailments -- and if it happened in a tunnel, good luck finding the coupler. In addition, if you wanted to install Kadee boxes to replace the Athearn coupler box, you had the issue of having to drill and tap the steel weight. I used to do this when I had access to my late Dad's drill press, but no longer.

I know some guys will say they just crimp the Athearn metal covers a little tighter, or fasten them with Goo or something, but my view is that's just not how you do things, and it'll eventually come back to bite you. So here's how I do it, a little easier than drilling and tapping the weight. The subject car is a special run in the last New Haven boxcar scheme, done for a Connecticut hobby shop that I think is now gone.

What we're going to do is turn the floor upside down so the scribed side faces the bottom and proceed from there. The first thing to do is cut off the small lip that projects into the doorway so it won't get in the way when we reassemble the car:

With that done, using a hobby knife, scribe a line down the car centerline to make it easier to locate the new Kadee coupler boxes:

Then clip the factory coupler pockets off the sill-bolster casting:

Then attach the sill-bolster assembly to the new bottom of the floor with the truck screws and run liquid plastic cement in to secure it:

Next assemble the floor into the body so you can use the body as a guide to locating the coupler boxes. Run liquid plastic cement in to secure the boxes -- be careful not to attach the body to the floor.

Then drill through the pivot holes in the Kadee boxes #50 and secure with 2-56 screws. When this is done, attach the weight to the new inside of the floor with silicone calk:

There are other advantages to doing this upgrade, especially the ability to add aftermarket brake parts to the underframe without the need to drill into the steel weight. Here's a car where I did this:

The bluebox car is light, so you can add weight to bring it up to the NMRA weight. Other simple upgrades are possible: on the car above, I cut off the "claws" on the Athearn door and added A-Line stirrup steps. I lettered it with decals that were briefly available from the now-defunct V&O Historical Society: