Christopher J

Fantastic looking car hauler. Love it. The color choice is great, as are the cars being hauled :-)

In another thread I mentioned weekend projects I do with my boys. Below are some builds I worked on with them. The Kenworth W900 and K123 are box stock quick builds that they were hands on with. The Lone Star and FLD (almost complete) are projects they were around for, but mostly watched while working on their stuff.

Not topic related, but here is how I spend my modeling time when I have my boys. Zach and Jack. Zach is now working on painting on his own....here is working on a NASCAR kit. Jack proudly holding the Camaro he "helped" on. His help was picking the color, decals (from my box of decals) and helping glue a few pieces and then supervising the build. The W900 is the first truck Zach and I did together. Not a detailed build, just a simple Father/son boc stock build.

Absolutely great looking build so far! All the details and the weathering bring the whole together so well.

Thanks. I appreciate all the replies. I have my boys this weekend so the project will sit for a couple days while we work on thiers. :-) My oldest has a 95 Jeff Gordon Monte Carlo we started 2 weeks back and the youngest a late 60's Camaro. They do love their trucks though, as they'll tell you "my daddy was a driver". There are two W900's and Kenworth K123 in the cabinet that were visitation weekend projects we didntogether. I'll have to get pics at some point.

Couple shots to show the tanks. Thinking of scratch building an APU to fill the void on the right side. .

While working on my FLD I accidentally got tape on my Freightliner grill. I tried to as careful as I could but pulled/ripped my grill decal. Does anyone know where I can source a new one? I looked on Modeltruckin.com and a couple other sights, but didn't see any Freightliner decals. Also doe anyone know if PE Resins still sales parts, namely wheel skirts. Also is Sauerkraut models still making parts? I was looking for some stuff a few months back and descriptions on some things said "out of stock". I looked again recently and the descriptions were the same.

All I can say is WOW!!!! Being a rider and a driver I hate to see stuff like this. Happens a lot though where drivers make bad decisions. I had a Fed Ex driver pull out into an intersection in front of me a couple days ago. Fortunately I ride an extremely maneuverable crotch rocket. Drivers making poor choices is killing those of us who drive responsibly.

Thanks, much appreciated. Did some more work today, stuff that's not easily seen though compare to current pucs. Just did touch up painting in certain areas. Got the tank straps detailed and tanks and side skirts glued on. Will probably do more tonight as I need to fix my passenger mirror bracket. While balancing the truck on its rear gluing on a skirt a part I was holding broke and the truck fell over on the right. Being that the brackets are crazy thin and tedious to work with and gluein place I'm sure you all can imagine the words leaving my mouth. Ugh!!!

That truck looks great, nice build overall. The paint looks good from the pics show.

Very nice build! For being a kit with I'll fitting parts and bad instructions you have made a hell of a build! The work on the truck and crane as well as detailing is outstanding. I love this build.

Rollin Northeast....gonna hold off on Texas until we get this load of plastruct and glue delivered. :-) I find I need some help. I accidently got tape on my Freightliner grill decal. Anyone know where I can source one?

Thank you. I'm actually leaving the top of both the sleeper and cab loose (dry fit) as I plan on taking the truck to next year's show here in KC along with a 59 Caddy I'm building.

Work on the sleeper begins... I wanted a different color carpet for the sleeper. I didn't feel like going to the store so I started mixing various embosssing powder colors until I got something desirable. The sleeper was barren minus the bunks and having driven an FLD I knew it needed something. I made a familiar shelf with the double oval opening but chose to put it on the floor under the bunk as this sleeper has a door and it would have blocked it. I've eliminated the stupidly small upper bunk and trimmed away part of the mounting tab for it. I replaced it with a shelf for extra storage. I dug through my resin parts bowls and found a laptop and flat screen. I found a spare decal for a TV screen from a low rider kit. Threw in a case of beer and some more magazines. Relocated the hood cables since the springs wouldn't cleat the sides of the hood and radiator.

Worked on some small details today...hood cables being one of them. These weren't bad for a first try, going to have to relocate them though. The get stuck between the hood and radiator....bummer

Fantastic looking build. I love the amount of detail being put in. Out of curiousity, how are you hinging your doors?

Making progress.... foil work is done for most what I want to appear as chrome or polished stainless on the cab. Most everything has been hit with two to three coats of clear lacquer and so far setting up nicely. I decided I wanted a mural on the back of the sleeper so went through my stash I have acquired for low rider builds and found one I thought fit the bill. I used a wet q-tip to work out trapped air then hit it with Walthers setting solution. After it dried I hit it with a touch of clear to protect it.

Fantastic looking build. I absolutely love the scratch building that's been done. This is going to be a beautiful build once complete.

Thanks to all for replies and compliments. After several passes through my parts boxes and misc bowls of pieces I found a gear box with the linkage on it. I cut that down to length leaving the "knuckle" on it. The 3 spokes were removed and replaced with the center of a 58 Chevy Impala wheel and bits of plastruct. I used the remains of cut pins for the turn signal and trolly brake. It now looks (to me anyway) like a custom FLD wheel. The figure is glued in and arm glue points slightly modified to widen out his hold. @kilrathy10, yes the seat back were filled, felt they'd look better that even though they nearly touch the back of the cab wall. Waiting on the exterior to dry a day or so before handling it Soni can mask off for the other color and do some trim work.

That's a great looking build, I really like it. Great work!!

The steering wheel that comes with the kit is three spokes. Kind of reminds me of some from the late 70's. The FLD had a two spoke wheel.

Looks fantastic. I used the same mask and had problems with the adhesive leaving residue on my paint. Did you have any problems with yours?

Mocked up the cab pieces to make sure the paint matches. Gonna hit the back section of the roof again, otherwise happy with the color choice. Fire orange and metalic black. Mocked up the mud flaps with the club logo.

Did some painting on the body tonight. While waiting on that to start to set up I did a little interior work. I remembered I had some unused figures from one of my Fujumi garage diorama kits and decided to mock up the interior and try one for fit. The steering column is missing so I'll be going through the parts boxes looking for something I can use and make one. Also considering modding the steering wheel as the kit one is incorrect.