On Jul 26, 2020, at 1:23 PM, mopacfirst <ron.merrick@...> wrote:

Here's a followup on the coupler and coupler box replacement.  

For the two cars that I completely removed the stock Intermountain coupler box, I anchored the Kadee 262 box in a manner that seems adequate.  I had some .046 brass wire (DA 2511).  Cut a length of around 3/16", just shy of 1/4".  Then I used ACC to loosely fix it in the hole remaining from the Intermountain coupler box mount into the body, not necessarily needing to be perfectly vertical.  After that cured, then I used Shoe Goo to attach the Kadee coupler box in its proper position -- the Kadee box ends up with the right location along the car centerline.  So this mount seems to be a success.

I'll note that the recent Intermountain cars seem to be painted after assembly of the body, roof and side/end details, while the underframe, brake equipment and coupler boxes seem to be unpainted black plastic on the several cars I've bought recently.  So any cars that have just had the couplers replaced with the #158, without a change of the box to the Kadee 262, will get a wash of body color paint (usually boxcar red) on the ends and sides of the original coupler box when I get around to installing the uncoupling lever.  I need to go back and look at the last batches of IM cars delivered before the Chinese factory collapse, for instance the 10"-0" height cars with 3-4 ends (the "postwar" car as IM calls it) to see what condition they're in.  My move is imminent so a lot of the cars are not available for inspection right now.

Now for a question.  I saw the posts about IM so longer selling parts.  But one thing I do like about IM 40' steam era boxcars is the one-piece metal roofwalk of an Apex pattern.  Has anyone ever been able to get these separately?  I had a couple that I pried off of some Burlington cars because the prototypes actually had a wood roofwalk, but I immediately used those on something else.

Ron Merrick