Locomotive shells

[rbryce1]

A long time back I purchased 4 Bachmann GP40 DCC equipped/no sound locomotives.  I tried to add sound to one of them, but there was no way to install the speaker without almost completely removing all the metal from the frame.  Now Bachmann has released a new version of the Alaska GP40 with sound, but they only have one road number.  I have three options: 1) use them as is with duplicate road numbers on the layout.  2) try to change the road number with a matching font/size/color decal if I can find one or  3) swap the shells.  Does anyone know if the new GP40 shell is interchangeable with the older GP40 shell?  I'm hoping they kept the same shell design and only modified the shape of the frame to accept a speaker, but who knows?

[Searsport]

Hi, if it is any help in your re-numbering, Microscale do several HO decal sheets for the ARR:

http://www.microscale.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=ARR

Best Regards,
Bill.

[Trackbump]

Use sugar cube speakers .They are great and do not take up much space .Less material needed to be removed to make them fit and real nice rich tone with the prime mover and the horns.

Adam

[rbryce1]

They did use the same shell with one little difference (other than making the newer ones much nicer).  I took the shells off both units, compared them and they looked exactly the same inside and overall shape.  The new shell went over the old frame perfectly.  Screw holes matched and everything.  The old shell went over the new frame  but would not sit all the way down.  When I looked inside of the old shell, there were 4 small tabs in the top of the shell (inside) stopping the shell from going down all the way.  I assume these tabs were for holding light bars.  I used a pair of pliers to easily twist and remove them and the shell went down and mated perfectly.  It seems Bachmann did not change the rest of the fit-up at all as I did not see any difference between the old and new shells except for the speaker mount in the metal frame.  All the other internal mechanical features look identical except possibly using a better motor, as the new one runs circles around the old one, used a sound card instead of just a decoder and modified the metal frame to accept the speaker in the fuel tank.  The appearance and detail of the newer shell is much nicer.  The same shells also are inter-changeable between the new GP-40 (#3002) and the old GP-40 (#3018) and between the old GP-40 (#3018) shells and the new GP-38 (#2007) frame as well.

[rbryce1]

I bought 2 more shells from Bachmann with different Alaska road numbers and I was able to make the swap with only needing the one modification to the older shells.  

Now I have an Alaska GP38 with sound, road number 2007 and 4 Alaska GP40's with road numbers 3002, 3015, 3018 and 3019, all sound equipped!  Happy camper.

As a matter of fact, the older shells will fit on the frames for both the new style GP40 with sound and the new style GP38 with sound.

I could probably find more GP38 shells with different road numbers, but since I now have 1 Bachmann GP38, 4 Bachmann GP40's, 3 Bowser F7's, and 3 Athearn SD70MAC's, all Alaska, all different road numbers and all with sound, I think I have more than enough Alaska diesels for the size of my layout.