PhilM Posted January 25, 2013 Share Posted January 25, 2013 I bought one of these off ebay recently and unfortunately it has a broken horn and couplings. For the life of me I cant find what is the appropriate horn to replace the broken one with. I assume a Cal-scale one would be best? But which one. Â As it doesnt come with instructions can anyone tell me how to get the body off as some of the packing dissapeared inside and I assume I need to get it off to replace couplings? I am pretty cack-handed and dont want to risk breaking anything! Â I hope to bring it into the more recent period by patching for Indiana Hi Rail - but that's for the future ..... Â Thanks for any help. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
JWB Posted January 25, 2013 Share Posted January 25, 2013 Here's a prototype photo: http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/bn/bn4257adb.jpg This looks like a standard Leslie horn, which used to be available from Details West, but my understanding is that they've lost their brass casting contractor, and I think they've been out of stock for quite some time. You can find equivalent plastic horns on some Atlas Trainman locos, if you're able to cannibalize, or even old Athearn bluebox locos had a crude Leslie that can be improved with some trimming.  To remove the body, you remove the couplers and coupler boxes and gently rock the body off the chassis. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Williams Posted January 25, 2013 Share Posted January 25, 2013 Most Atlas locos have six clips which are fairly evenly spaced from just behind the body moving towards the rear. Accepted procedure is to squeeze the body, usually starting at the rear. Carefully scrutiny at the point where the main body meets the walkways will usually result in the exact location being identified. This has to be done very carefully in order not to damage the plastic handrails. the idea is that the first set will release, and then you can move on to the next set, again, being careful not to damage the handrails. Sometimes it is necessary to remove the handrails where they locate in the cab area as the body sometimes starts to come away separately from the walkway moulding. In practise, this entire procedure is often an absolute swine to do. I recently had to remove the body of a Dash8-39B and was having terrible trouble. I then happened to invert the model and found thet the front and rear clips were visible inside the chassis area. A scalpel carefully applied, enabled me to release these two sets of clips, the middle set then released by the 'official' squeezing of the body techique. Why on Earth they can't find a better way with screws, God only knows! If I have models that release in this way (Kato tend to be similar), I cut off the horizontal part of the locating clips, just leaving the vertical bit for location, and rely on the couplings to secure the body. so far, I have not had any problem with any part of the body warping. Hope that helps a bit. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhilM Posted January 31, 2013 Author Share Posted January 31, 2013 Thanks for the advice - very useful.  This is how I hope to end up with an IHRC patch  - the atlas model is #4252. http://www.flickr.com/photos/8226029@N06/2906315698/  but it appears not to have a horn at all. Any ideas why?  And while I am asking, anybody have any good ideas for the decals? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Williams Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 No idea about the horn. Incidentally, my first post should read 'just behind the cab' not 'just behind the body' in the first line. hope that didn't cause confusion! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
doctor quinn Posted January 31, 2013 Share Posted January 31, 2013 The image of IHRC 327 later on the Flickr page has the horn mounted above the engineer's position on the cab roof. It looks like it is a Leslie 3 chime horn of the type made by Miniatures by Eric in brass. Â Â Nick Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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