Model Railroading > Smokey Valley GE Dash-7 parts?

Was just paging through the Walthers HO catalog, and found an interesting picture in the "Superdetailing Parts" section. Apparently Smokey Valley makes two kits to construct the long hood of a GE B30-7A.

Was thinking I could pair those kits with a cab from HiTech Details, with a nose and drive from an Athearn U-boat, and have a pretty durn nice B23-7.......Perhaps this is a way out for those of us who are pining for a quality HO B23?

Has anybody purchased some of the Smokey Valley hood kits? How is the tooling on them? I hope they are better quality than the Railpower shell (Which isn\'t terrible, but the detail relief is somewhat lacking by the new stuff coming out from the major mfg.\'s).

Those parts replace the cab and short hood on RPP B23-7 shell to build BN\'s cabless B30-7s and B30-7As.

Smokey Valley parts are between RPP shells and Cannon parts. Certainly better than attempting the unit without them!

I built 2 B30-7AB,s one with the dynamic brake box and one without about 6 or so years ago with the Smokey Valley "B" unit and high hood front end kits and RPP B23-7 shell\'s and Athearn 4 axle "U" boat drives. Also a host of other details. They didn\'t turn out to shabby. I used to run them on the overhead layout at the hobby shop I used to work at, and as I can remember I sold quite a few kits to other modelers to build them also.

My response is almost identical to Santafesteve. I also built two of these B30-7A units, one with and one without dynamic brakes, using the Smokey Valley Dash-7 parts. With only a reasonable amount of skill and care, I felt that both units came out very well.

Painted BN green, spliced between two SD40-2s, with Mishima can motors, NWSL wheelsets, and DCC chips, that four unit set really looks nice running around the layout. Even better, you\'ve got something that almost no one else has, unless they go to the trouble to kitbash them.

Go for it, and best of luck.

Regards,

UP9116