Chariots of Fire

"Slime" green; probably the most difficult color to keep clean and looking good. Was quite a fad back in the day with some"experts' saying it was for better visibility. Today lots of rigs are back to some scheme of black over red, white over red or just plain red but with lights and strobes everywhere! And thrown in for good measure are diagonal reflective yellow stripes all over the back.☺️

I see lots of nuts and bolts!😎

Don't know how I missed this build but I did! Fantastic work! Now I know that at least two 980's exist!

Matt Leese does a lot of 3D printing. U-joints come it a variety of sizes depending on your needs. His email address is mdlbldrmatt135@gmail.com Give him a shout. Good guy to deal with.

Brian: I got some of those U-joints in 3D form a while ago. Neat stuff. If you need a reference let me know.

Never thought I would say this but it may be time for me to assess 3D design and printing! Scratch building is such fun but enhancing it with nicely detailed parts is over the top!

Looking to see this for sure. I did the earlier Autocar cab as a WW II piece. Cool looking trucks.

Those bolt heads will show up in the paint if you do nice thin coats. Some highlighting and/or washes will also bring them out.

First time ever building a 3D printed kit. The fit was perfect and the printed detail was superb. It was so smooth no sanding was necessary.

Thanks for the comments, guys. Much appreciated. On to the next build!!

It's now loaded up and ready to travel. The cable guides and pulleys were completed and painted and some decals were added. A little of that red dust was applied as well. Got to go shag down the M-20 and get it moving!

Got the cable frame designed and put together. Some metallic embroidery thread was wound around the control unit drum and then up through the pulleys and frame to the blade pulleys. I tried my special "winding tool" and shazzam! The cable lifted the blade and it stayed up when I released the operating handle. Sometimes things go right. Now I just have to take it all down and paint it and then put it all back together. 😁

That's a nice conversion, Warren! Well done!

Here's the tool for turning the winch drum. Not very sophisticated but it will work. Two pieces of square tubing soldered together.

Work continued on the winch for the dozer. Details were added here and there to enhance the look. As part of the build there had to be a way of securing the winch so that the blade could be raised in position once the cables are attached and to stay where put. I hope this works. The drum on the right side is where the cable will be attached. Once the cable frame and pulleys are done it will be strung starting at the drum with a few windings of cable and then will be guided through the rear pulley to the front one and down around the pulleys on the blade. The final attachment is a clamp that is wedge shaped. There are no bolts or clevises that secure the cable. Just the wedge that holds the cable through friction. The harder it is pulled, the tighter it gets. I made the operating lever so that it could put pressure on the center of the drum using a spring on the back. The idea is that when the cable is wound, the friction from the lever will keep the drum from turning. But by pushing on the lever against the spring the drum will be released and the winch can either be wound in or out. I made a tool to fit on the winch center pin so I can turn it by hand. I'll post another picture showing it. Right now there are no pulleys that would allow the dozer to pull a pan scraper. There is evidence that not all D-7's had this feature but it is one that could be added in time. For now the winch is by itself. I'm not sure that the winch is not a bit high. Will have to check the photos of the real ones to make sure. Right now it is just mounted on a pin that can be relocated with another hole.

With the M-9 trailer finished work picked up on the D-7. The kit had hydraulic lifters for the blade. I liked the old cable lift so a Letourneau cable control unit had to be scratch built. Here's the beginning of the work. The body of the unit is done along with two cable spools and a plate for the rear. There is a lot left to do to make the two pulleys that are mounted on top. They are not used for the blade but in case the dozer happens to pull a pan scraper, they would come into use. Roughly this is where it sits. Some adjustment of the back of the dozer frame will have to be done to accommodate it. The body of the unit is made of 0.020 and 0.010 sheet stock. 0.030 strip stock and one piece of sheet were used in other parts. Hex rod bolt heads were used in back of the spools.

As soon as the dozer is done I will! Promise!

Got this finished up tonite. Now to get back on the dozer and finish it up!

That's nice work. Like especially the refer addition and the depth of the rear wheels. Great stuff!

The last part of the build is nearly done. Some of the air brake components have been added and the last thing done was to make the two ramps that allow access to the trailer deck. It took me a couple of tries to get them right but the time involved was worth it. The ramps are made of plastic sheet stock using 0.010, 0.020 and o.030 thicknesses. A drew out a series of templates for the sides (there's a third one inside) and taped them to the sheet stock. Then they were cut out and smoothed up. The 0.030 sheet stock was used for the center one and the 0.020 stock for the outside. I had to check to be sure that they were all the same so a bit of sanding and adjusting was done along the way. At first I tried filling in the curved parts with strips of small stock but that did not work well as noted in the unpainted ramp. It was also the wrong shape. I ended up using the thin 0.010 sheet stock for the surfaces and the scale thickness really made a difference. It bent around the curves easily. CA glue really does wonders in cases like this! Not all of the individual air lines and tubing have been added but much of the mechanical part that is visible was put together with plastic tubing, plastic rod stock and some 1/16 diameter aluminum tubing. Common pins were also used. A look at the underside with all of the various lever arrangements to get to the final results. Nothing wrong with the tires. They float in two different directions but sit flat on the ground due to the trunnion design with no problems. This is where the ramps go. Now I have to make the attachments that will fold and allow them to sit on the deck. Here's a look at the M-20 and M-9 when put together. They take up a lot of space! Last to be done will be the lift cables for the dozer.

Hi, Peter. I had two to choose from and decided to give away the better one. But honestly, for what I do? The older one works just fine.

I also have the Chopper by NWSL. Had the version that Peteski shows but gave it to a fellow modeler who had none. I kept the original one that has a masonite base and uses a single edge razor blade. I use it all the time for cutting small stock. When needing repetitive pieces the same length it is indispensable.

Here's a look at the prime mover and the trailer together. It's going to take up a lot of shelf space so I will have to add one to the display case just for it! The D-7 bulldozer is not finished yet. The blade and hoisting cables need to be added. It will be the load for the trailer.

You've got good eyes!!??

The double sheaves are painted and installed. The long lifting handles were made from common pins and set in holes drilled in the face of the upper plate. Some CA underneath holds them in place. Some Tamiya gun metal highlighting has made the sheaves stand out a bit. The brackets that hold them in place are Evergreen strip stock shaped and glued down. Almost ready to tackle some of the underneath stuff. That should be fun!?