Model Railroading > How you get your french fries... Rapido's Greenbrier Reefer

Rapido's new Greenbrier 7780 CU FT Reefers are hitting HO Scale mainlines all over the country and one of mine has already made it to a customer spur on my railroad. These cars are large. As with more and more modern equipment on the rails today, the cars seem to be getting bigger and bigger. There are several offerings of modern refrigerator cars available in HO scale and personally I have only a few models of this type of equipment simply because the big white boxes seem to be boring to me. 
I picked up a couple of Rapido's offering and I am not sure if it is the fantastic paint and lettering or the tooling or both that changed my opinion of these big white hunks of plastic, but these cars are far from boring. The lettering is sharp all over as are all the paint lines and separations. They are extremely well done. The details on the car are tooled well and the parts are assembled well with no missing, loose or broken parts. Operating wise, these cars roll extremely well and track over switches and curves. My two cars are also equipped with "sound" and two (one on each side) operation indicator lights. The lights are perfect. They look like the real thing and are actually of a prototypical brightness. You can tell they are on and they are not so bright that they look out of place. As for the sound, it sounds like a diesel generator running. A simple motor running. I would have loved to here a variation in the motor sound from time to time, but this works. I would also prefer these cars to cycle automatically and they don't, but the effect still works and I'm being picky. The volume is adjustable with a small screwdriver from the underside of the car. I have set my cars to the lowest level possible and that works well for a car like this.
Rapido did a fantastic job with these cars. No longer do I view these as large chunks of white plastic. Model wise, I have nothing to pick apart on this critique and there is something to be said about that. However, their is a major problem with the release and not the product. There are no "Magic Wands" to operate the electronic features, included in the boxes... Oooooppps!!! Now for me this isn't a huge issue because I have probably thirty of them laying around the layout, but a buddy of mine got one of these cars and he also has no "Magic Wand" on hand. Yes, a simple magnet will operate the feature, but somebody forgot to add the wand in the boxes....
Oh well, always something...

Andy      

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Thanks for your kind words! Jeff did a great job on these.

The factory included the magnetic wands with the production samples and then didn't include them with production! It was an oversight.

If anyone gets some of these cars and does not have a Rapido wand from another model, please send me a PM and I'll make sure one is dropped in the mail to you. We're not supplying new wands to everyone as the postage would wipe out all our profits, so please only ask for one if you don't have one already.

Thanks and regards,

Jason
 

I deal with the prototype cars all the time as there is a Lineage repair and service facility on our shortline. They suck to ride the blind end since you cannot put your arm behind the top ladder rung, so I will switch out the cars so a platform is on the tail end if I need to ride a long shove with them. But I spend most of my hours in the cab of the locomotive running the train, so it's not a huge issue. But since these cars come after my 1985-1995 modeling era, I cannot use them in my fleet. But if they ever made a replacement for the Walthers Gunderson Cryo-reefers, then I will be spending a chunk of money. Thanks for your detailed report on these new cars, I apperciate reading about the models.

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

Hope the fries get cooked in the fryer and not in a derailment. LOL!
I just received mine today and they are absolutely fantastic! I see them all the time here on this CSX line. I have the "Spuds" & "Hole in the Wall" cars. Might get some more later if they are still available. Like you said, they are out of my era by 10 years but exercising the modelers license because I just had to have them on the layout!
Thanks Rapido!

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So the sound/light is only on or off, it doesn't cycle? Hmm...ok. I guess that's common. I just assumed all/most of the generators cycled on/off as needed. 

Mike ONeill
Okahumpka, FL

funnelfan Wrote:
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> I deal with the prototype cars all the time as
> there is a Lineage repair and service facility on
> our shortline. They suck to ride the blind end
> since you cannot put your arm behind the top
> ladder rung, so I will switch out the cars so a
> platform is on the tail end if I need to ride a
> long shove with them. But I spend most of my hours
> in the cab of the locomotive running the train, so
> it's not a huge issue. But since these cars come
> after my 1985-1995 modeling era, I cannot use them
> in my fleet. But if they ever made a replacement
> for the Walthers Gunderson Cryo-reefers, then I
> will be spending a chunk of money. Thanks for your
> detailed report on these new cars, I apperciate
> reading about the models.

Same.  Whoever designed the real ones should be shot into the sun.  They are borderline unsafe to ride period.  The ones with the external ladders are OK, but the pocket grabs are just horrific.  I spent the other night switching a cut out and my arms still hurt.    

They should cycle indeed.  On an "average" day, they seem to run about 15 minutes an hour when loaded with fries and set to -10.  Winter they run less, and summer they run more of course.