The reefers look terrific. Great work, and inspiration on the decals. Have you considered a car lettered for the most important New Mexico agriculture product - the green chile? Is Dixon still selling the apples?
I like them. Yours are great!
The D&RGW did have somewhat of a billboard reefer, with "fish, poultry, eggs, etc painted all over the sides. LGB made a model of it.
I built one for the Heinz Co.
They look great.
Just keep them out of the sun.
Inkjet printed decals will fade…really fast.
Ralph
They look great Boomer!
Terry
My Heinz reefer (from a Phil’s kit).
Krylon makes a clear UV protectant spray that should prevent them decals from fading.
Looks really good.
I had bad luck with the ink jet decals, glad you could do it. I found that color laser ones work best for me. I have a friend that prints them off for me.
Great looking reefers, Boomer!
Does anyone know what the specific “safety” issue was that caused them to ban billboard cars?
I guess you could call these BillBoard Reefers:
Sorry, Boomer, I guess I got the last reefer kit Phil had. Which became the basis for the Abbott’s Dairy Express Reefer.
http://www.largescalecentral.com/forums/topic/20680/abbott-s-dairy-express-reefer
The second one is a Bachmann Reefer. I’m not even sure where or when I bought, but most likely at York a few years ago. I liked the look of it.
The third one is an LGB reefer. A friend had it for sale and I couldn’t pass it up, since I liked the Indian logo on the side.
The Abbott’s Dairy Reefer I put B’mann passenger car trucks under, since the picture I had of the car had those type trucks.
Nice work Boomer, and I always enjoy the extra research/history/stories you provide
I’m gonna have to make a few of these.
Ray Dunakin said:
Great looking reefers, Boomer!
Does anyone know what the specific “safety” issue was that caused them to ban billboard cars?
Ray,
I’m not 100% positive, but I think it was the fact that the RR didn’t care what was inside a car. You ordered a reefer, they get a reefer to you. It was the shippers that wanted their product inside with the correct advertising outside. Billboards were banned from interchange in 1934 by the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Nice work Boomer. I need to start palying with decals mainly for signs on buildings.
Fantastic work, Boomer.
-Kevin.
Nice work Boomer.
Great work, Boomer.
I have on the agenda to paint some Billboard reefers with a fictional Brewery I want to put on my railroad at some point.
Boomers thread is most timely and the posts here show some good modeling work.
I have a 1:24 (as far as I know) model coming from a specialist car shops in Pennsylvania. It represents a Bi-Centennial design: I will post a pic when it arrives.
I already have some 1:22.5 Big Hauler cars viz, a stock car, flat bed and a billboard car plus a kit bashed caboose which with the new car will form part of an older style consist hauled by one of my Ten Wheelers.
A few years ago I removed the trussing, trucks and stirrups from a Big Hauler boxcar and used as a static store. Today saw it being cleaned up and bolsters, for new trucks, were fitted. I have a brake and stirrups in the junk box.
I now need to find a likeable billboard design, which will be of simple style, which I can paint and decal. This will give a decent train of five cars and caboose.
Great inspirational posts guys - as usual.
How prototypical. An old piece of repurposed railroad equipment being restored.
David Maynard said:
Krylon makes a clear UV protectant spray that should prevent them decals from fading.
Looks really good.
Nope. They still fade quickly if exposed to sun. I’ve found out the hard way 
Color laser printed decals will fade quickly too. Except the black.
I sprayed all my printed decals multiple times with Krylon UV. Still faded.
So, I get ALPS printed decals from Stan now.
I don’t take any chances with Stan’s decals. The cars stay indoors when not in use.
Ralph