Are 1966 and 1974 key dates?

So, with all this forum information, I decide to modify Caboose 715. I thought I might at least remove the roof walk if I do anything. If I can succeed at that, maybe I will do more.

As it turned out, removing the roof walk was easy. It was not attached other than a pressure fit, and I used a jewelers screw driver to pry it loose.

But there were these little nubs molded into the roof itself that supported the walkway. So I am masking around these and removing them with a razor saw and using a needle file to level each nub to the roofline.

After the rough cutting and filing, I removed the masking tape and filled the hole in each nub with putty.

After the putty was dry. I used needle files in an effort to preserve the ribbed nature of the roof.

Next step will be painting. Anyone have suggestions for the color and make of the paint?

I am guessing you have already found this resource, http://atsf.railfan.net/waycars/     , but I will post this anyway.

Class Ce-8: #999700-999749
The Ce-8 class was built by the International Car Company in 1978. The cars were essentially the same as the Ce-6 class, but were received in the standard caboose scheme rather than the variation modeled by the 6's. The 8's also had full "skirts" around the lower edge of the body, compared to the partial skirting on the 6's. The Ce-8's were assigned system-wide, and could be found in any type of service. Cars 999717 and 999718, along with a few Ce-1's and Ce-2's, were briefly assigned to transfer duties at Kansas City. They were given white cupolas with red numbers to indicate their assignment to this service. By 1984, the cars had already begun to wander to other locations. Class Ce-6: #999538-999542 Twenty five years elapsed between the construction of the last standard cupola Santa Fe caboose and the purchase of the extended-vision Ce-6 class from the International Car Company. The five cars were delivered in 1974 in a slight variation of the standard caboose scheme. The steps and underbodies were black, and the yellow Santa Fe emblems were smaller than usual. By the time 999539 was photographed in 1988, it had been redone in the standard scheme. The spotless car was serving on the local that worked the branch from Rincon, NM down to Deming and up to Hurley, NM. Two years later, it was sold to Metal Processing Industries in Vinton, TX (on the Santa Fe north of El Paso) and presumably scrapped.

I believe the Santa Fe's cabeese had cupolas that were centered on the car.  It appears that the cupola on the model is off center.

Thanks guys! But I do not think I will try to center the cupola, unless it is easy to do. Does anyone know a procedure?

So I took all the forum's paint color suggestions into consideration, and I decided to use Model Master Acrylic Insignia Red and it matched exactly.

But as the attached photo below will show, my preparation left plenty of bumpy areas. I think I will get some fine grain sandpaper and go over the affected areas on the roof, and then re-apply paint again if needed.

Since I have two cabeese to do, I will wait awhile before I try to change the hand rails on each end.

Here is a Parts Diagram for an EV Caboose. It does not seem like an easy fix to relocate the cupola.

Stwa posted:

Thanks guys! But I do not think I will try to center the cupola, unless it is easy to do. Does anyone know a procedure?

 

The process would be straightforward, but not easy.  "Simply" cut out a roof section equal to half of the offset, move the cupola and put the roof section on the other side of the cupola.  Now, if the roof ridges line up, that is another story altogether!

If you are into Santa Fe cabooses you should have a copy of "Santa Fe Way Cars" by Stephen Priest. His book is the bible of Santa Fe cabooses. 

I would like to thank all of those people who have responded to this thread. I think I proved to myself, that I could remove the roof walk from one of these models. However, the model itself is nowhere near a prototypical CE-8 way car. 

I will only commit to that task for each of my two models. None of the freight cars I have accumulated so far have roof walks, so this task brings my models into compliance with the regs at best. I like their modified appearance as well.

Just a post script. I finished Caboose 712. But, no matter how hard I try, there are still imperfections in the roof. I think I need to bear down harder on the sandpaper.