airrj

That is Mike Flag right? I raced against him at Holland for several years. I have always thought about making a replica of my SS. Very cool build.

Very nice start. You said that you used exhaust metalizer over the black on the trans. Can you tell me more about that? I have never seen it used before. Who makes it, and does it just give a metalic type finish? Thanks.

Thanks for the suggestion. I will jump on that tonight. And thanks for the glue suggestion, I would have never thought about that.

So I am working on a '69 Camaro Pace Car and the hoods that came with the kit are pretty poor fitting. The hood contours at the front edge and rear edge sit nicely, but the sides of the hood are warped up about .030". It is a noticeable bulge unfortunately. I am looking for the best practical way to get the hood to lay flat. I built some of the factory underhood bracing to jazz up the looks and hopefully to help give the part some structure, but the hood has too much warp for this little panel to hold it flat. It is a cowl induction hood. so there is so structure from front to rear. Any suggestions? I don't want to try to sand this thing flat, because I am afraid there won't be any material left when I get done. Thanks for the help. R.J.

I have just gotten back into modeling, so I haven't jumped into a scratch build yet, but I hope to someday build some of these vehicles. This is a small collection of photos of unique Antarctica vehicles that are in service working at McMurdo Station, the largest US station on the Ice. I am headed back to the Ice in about six months, so I am hoping to take down some supplies to work on some scratch building while down there. I hope this gives someone some ideas for some builds. This is a '50's vintage Cat SD-8LGP. These 'Stretch 8's' were build from 1953 to 1959 by Cat for the US Antarctic Program. There were eight delivered to the Ice and I have heard that there were four sent to Greenland as well. These rigs were stretched 36" in the center section and the tracks are a huge 54" wide. They have incredible draw bar pull rating for the low ground pressure. There are three of these still in service on the Ice. One should be at the SeaBee Museum in Port Hueneme, CA, one is that the bottom of a cravasse in the shear zone of the Ross Sea, and three have been scrapped. Here is a better view of the width of the tracks. The next group of vehicles are all made by Foremost in Canada. http://www.foremost.ca/index_vehicles.php This one is called "Ivan the Terra Bus", everyone that gets off of the plane for the first time in Antarctica and sees Ivan to take them to town. You see all of the returning folks running away from Ivan looking for a ride that goes more than 10 mph. Delta Scharen is a fuel delivery truck used to resupply fuel tanks in remote areas of town. There are three passenger Deltas in town that are used for moving people back and forth to the airfields. The tires are 66x44-25's. These are the same tires used on Monster Trucks, so these would be easy to get tires, at least the Chevron style. These two trucks are Nodwell 110 units and they are both older ARFF trucks. They were slated for disposal a few years ago, but they are in service for a few more years now until replacement units are secured. There are two of these units on the Ice. One is a 4-door unit, and a 2-door unit as well. They are also airfield fire apparatus. This is the newest ARFF rigs. There are four of them in serivce now. They are 2005 and 2006 F-550's with Mattracks or Grip Tracks. If anyone wants some additional photos let me know. There are some cool vehicles down there. R.J. http://picasaweb.google.com/airrj1

Elmira FD, nice touch. Have you ever been down to Homer, NY to see the private collection of ALF's? I don't remember the guys name off hand, but he has like 10 or 12 ALF's from '30's vintage to 700 series, to a '82 FDNY engine. None of it is museum quality, but all very cool. Keep up the good work on the model. R.J.

I love the silver on that car. Nice build.

Nice build. I really want to do a truck next.

Cool Build! I am from the Buffalo, NY area and there used to be several Hy-Ranger ladders in the area back in the day. I never saw one with the Ford Chassis. I have seen allot on Young Fire Apparatus chassis.

Ryan, I posted some photos of a '51 F-7 Fire Truck. The photos aren't great, but I have allot of close up photos from the engine compartment. I was replacing the clutch last year and I snapped a bunch of photos so I could remember where it all went. I am about 2000 miles from the truck, but if you have any specific questions I can get someone to take so more photos or measurements. http://picasaweb.google.com/airrj1/1951F7BigJobSWFC1 Cool build, I look forward to more photos. R.J.

Here is my workstation. I am currently working in my temporary apartment right now. So I am working off of the coffee table. I am boxing everything up and going on the road in a week, so I will be working on the kitchen table in my RV. So everything of mine has to be portable and ready to move. So the tackle box and a cardboard box stores everything I have.

Beautiful start. I did an ALF as a kid and I would love to do another someday. I look forward to more of your photos.

I am in Cheyenne, WY and every time that I drive down I-25 to Denver I pass at least two flatbeds of these tires headed north. In the last three months I have seen 15 truckloads of these tires. It is amazing that they produce that many.