The Erie Railroad Boxcars Part 3 - 4
44a: Since I didn’t have any more 4” x 8” stock
on hand, I cemented 3, 1” x 8” pieces of styrene
together to form the 3” x 8”. During the process of
building up the 3” x 8”, I ran some solvent along
the glass that I use as a work surface hold the 3”
x 8” in place. This creates enough adhesion to
use the scraper to shape the rib, and yet is easy
STEP 10: The Ends for the 75500 – 75999 and
the76000 – 76499 Series
Continued ...
reasonably close to the shape of the prototype ribs. The
idea that I came up with is to make a scraper that had the
shape (or at least close) of the rib. After all, it should be
fairly simple to file the needed shape into a piece of brass.
Some measuring of the casting that comes with the Sun-
shine kit I determined that the ribs were 8” wide and 3”
deep. To make the scraper, I filed a groove with a half-
round file to a depth of 3”. Once I was satisfied with the
depth, I used the tip of the file to make a tight radius in
the corner at the top of each ridge. I then filed vertically to
form the side of the rib.
44a
An end view of the
shaped stock rib
material
44b: I began by
measuring up 10” from
what would become
the bottom, and drew
a line. Next I measured
in 8” from each side
and made a mark
at the bottom. This
was followed with a
measurement of 1’-2”
in from each side and
a mark was made at the line I had just drawn, and
continued to the top of the car. I then drew a line
between these two marks. This creates the layout
for the poling pockets.
Before any cuts were made I also laid out lines
2” in from each edge. The 2” line locates where
44b
STEP 10: The Ends for the 75500 – 75999 and
the76000 – 76499 Series
Continued ...
to remove with an X-Acto knife. A light touch is
required to do this, only scraping a little off the top
each time.
After I was successful in making some ribs (whew,
what a relief) I cut the blanks for the ends from
.060-styrene stock. This is close enough to the 6”
needed for the end pieces. The end pieces for the
75500-75999 series are 9’-4” x 10’-0”. The end
pieces for the 76000-76499 series are 9’-10” x 10’-
0” and the ends for the 76500-76999 series are
10’-5"×10’. Two were made for each series.
MRH-Jun 2013
