KJ790

I am on the home stretch and I hit a road block. I recently ran out of CA accelerator, so I picked up a new bottle. It seems like the same stuff that I always used, and it says on the bottle that it does not craze plastics, but while assembling the mirrors I misted the new accelerator over the cab and the windows turned cloudy immediately. I have never had this issue before, so I am not sure if the new accelerator is different or is AMT changed their clear plastic parts? I had been told in the past that Future floor polish will fix cloudy windows, but that did not seem to help at all. I also tried to polish it out with Novus plastic polish, but no such luck. I found a new cab with windows on ebay so I purchased that today, looks like I am going to have to pull this cab back apart and replace the windows. Until the new windows are in, I am not going to bother adding the horns or wipers. In the mean time, I decided to set everything on the frame and take some pictures. Still a few more details to go, but it is coming together.

For some reason the movie truck had red drive rims on the drivers side, and (dirty) white rims on the passenger's side. It also had worn "lugger" tires on the rear axle and worn parallel ribbed tires on the front drive axle. I did my best to recreate this with what I had: And a quick mock-up:

For some reason the movie truck had one red quarter fender and one blue quarter fender. The shade of blue does not seem to match the cab color. I scratch built these out of styrene shapes. I hated the "rubber" flaps with a lighter to get some distortion to make them look more like rubber and less like ridged plastic.

I was able to lay some paint yesterday. For the fenders I added a few drops of white to Tamiya black to get a dark grey color. I added a drop of brown to Tamiya white to get a slightly off-white color. I have found that using true black or white tend to pop too much on a finished model. I then used Tamiya "Metalic Blue" for the blue color. I am color blind, so I have no clue how close it is to the movie truck, but I think it will give a good vintage look regardless. I made some decals using Microsoft Word and my inkjet printer. I noticed that you could see the shadow of old permit stickers on the sides of the sleeper. I used some clear decal paper with blue ink on it to replicate this look. It took me a few tries to get it as subtle as I was looking for. I also noticed that the tires in on the movie truck are almost bald. I shaved down the tread on an old tire master that I had and made a new mold. The first tire came out of the mold this morning. The tread is hard to see in the picture, but hopefully it will look alright on the finished model. I still have to add dust weathering to the whole wheel.

I have been working on a scratch built sleeper. I used some half-round rod that I trimmed down to try to replicate a rippled-back panel.

I have a few sets of M&R wheels. Some are $10 per wheel, some are $12 depending on the style. I would recommend them as well as Doug Wagner's aluminum wheels. I just had a set of M&R steel 2-hole wheels nickel plated to look like old school chrome budds.

I chopped the kit hood and grille up.

Thanks! Unfortunately I am done casting commercially for the time being, so I will not be casting these wheels. That is why I decided just to use the masters on this build. I have the chassis mostly together. I shortened the frame by 9mm and added a steerable front axle from KFS. I filled in the "peep" window in the passenger's door, and sprayed everything with a coat of primer. Next I need to start working on the sleeper.

Thanks! I was replicating a trailer from a movie, and in the movie the reefer fuel tank was missing. Only the straps that hold the tank were present, so that is how I built the model as well.

Looking at the movie truck, it looks to have 5-hole alcoa's on the steers and 6-hole budd wheels on the drives. I had mastered these wheels about 2 years ago, but never cast them. Since I don't ever see myself casting them (at least any time soon), I figured that this would just use the 3D printed pieces on this build.

I am basing this build off of the 1974 Joseph Strick film "Road Movie". This will be pulling the weathered reefer trailer that I recently finished. This is just such a classic looking combo that I couldn't help but be inspired to build a scale version. I am starting with an AMT California Hauler kit. I do not have any dimensions for a real 351, so I am just winging it from pictures and estimates. I hope to capture the look. I cut the grille narrower, and made some louvers using .08" half round rod. I cut the hood to be tapered to match the grille, then glued some extenders onto the inside of the fenders to make up for the narrower hood. I extended the front of the fenders slightly and added a small lip around the outside edge, both issues that are incorrect for the 359 the kit originally represents (and thus I assumed the 351 would need these corrections as well). I heated the passenger's side fender with a lighter and pressed the edge of a ruler into it in hopes of recreating the dent seen in the movie truck's fender. I also filled in the fog lights in the bumper.

Make sure your tires are the right ones for the rims. Jamie sells 20 inch and 22 inch rims and tires. 22 inch tires will fit too loosely on 20 inch rims.

Here is the truck today: Here is a picture that I took of the 6-71 engine.

Richard Petty had 2 of those trucks, I actually saw one at an ATHS show last year. I talked to the current owner and he told me that he bought it not knowing that it was a former Petty truck (it had been repainted white). Once he noticed that there was Petty blue paint behind the upholstery on the interior and that there was Petty blue showing where the white paint was flaking off, he started digging and found out who originally bought it. The trucks had 6-71 inline-6 Detroits in them. I may have taken some pictures, I will have to look.

Finished pictures are now in the "Under Glass" section.

This was a quick build for me, about a week start to finish. I used the new AMT release of the old Italeri reefer trailer. I shortened it to 36ft, made a new front bulkhead, scratch built a reefer unit, scratch built new landing gear added a side door, and swapped out the kit wheels for some old school resin 5-holes. Today was cloudy, so it was perfect for outdoor photos. I froze my butt off, but I managed to get some pictures. I swapped one of the 5-hole steel wheels out for a 5-hole aluminum wheel. The difference is subtle, but I thought it went well with the "well worn" look. Back in the day owner-operators had to make due with what they could get their hands on at the time, so miss-matched wheels were common.

Thanks guys! I have been busy with this one the last 2 days. I scratch built a reefer unit, and I wanted it to be missing a side panel, so I had to scratch build and engine and compressor for inside the unit as well. I have been playing with some weathering, I am hoping that it will look good out in some natural light.

The kit is too short for a modern reefer in 1/24 scale. It measures out to 12' tall in 1/24 scale, which most modern reefers are 13'6" these days. In 1/25 scale it measures 12'6", which was a popular height in the 60's-70's and is similar to the AMT Fruehauf and Ertl Great Dane kits.

I have seen a lot of complaints about the new AMT release of the Italeri reefer trailer. It is out of scale for 1/24 scale, but I see a ton of potential for it in 1/25 scale. The rib spacing works perfectly for a 70's-80's Brown or Timpte reefer. You can even backdate it further to be an early 60's trailer, as I am currently doing. I bought this kit for the Thermo King reefer unit, which will be used on a different build. Since I had the rest of the kit, I figured I might as well build it. I am going for a well used early 60's reefer trailer. I started by shortening the trailer to 36 feet in 1/25 scale. I added a side door, which helped to hide the panel seam in the 2-piece side. I also scribed panel lines every 4 feet to help conceal the panel seam on the opposite side of the trailer. I made a new front bulkhead using PVC pipe for the corners and a section of the kit roof that had been cut off when I shortened the trailer. The kit wheels will be replaced with resin 5-hole wheels. I also scratch built some old style landing gear. On the front corner I added a patch with some rivets to simulate a repair job on some previous damage.

Your builds are always so beautiful. This is gorgeous!

I use paintref.com for cross referencing paint codes. This looks to be the shade of red that you are looking for: http://paintref.com/cgi-bin/colorcodedisplay.cgi?comm=58209

Finally calling this one done. This one fought me quite a bit. After a 2 year hiatus I came back to it and finished it. This is based on a Revel K100 kit. I shortened the chassis and the cab, changed the wheels and tires, and scratch built the fuel tanks, exhaust, and intake. I also added a 3D printed grille and resin bumper.

Thanks Jeff! The stripes are all paint. It took me 2 attempts to paint it, and it still isn't perfect, but it will have to do. If I build another with the same stripe pattern, I will do it differently. I think it would be easier to use a thin decal stripe for the divider stripe rather than try to paint it.

As promised, here are some updated pictures. I still have a few details left to finish up, but it is starting to look like a truck.

After 2 years, I am back to working on this one. I had initially painted the cab with Tamiya rattle can, but when I clear coated it, the paint turned funky, so the whole thing got stripped. This was when I lost interest and set it on a shelf. Recently I got a bug to work on it again, so I mixed up some Tamiya paints from the small jars and sprayed it through my airbrush. The result was much better. This kit has the best chassis of any K100 kit out there, but the cab is terrible. I have never had such a hard time getting a cab together. The door hinges are poorly designed and difficult to work with. The headlights are too large and look out of scale, but it is too late at this point. New pics will be coming shortly.