Gary Chastain

Good people here, progress is looking good.

Sitting better for sure, will study the way it sits, may want to lower it a bit more or go with this setup. Undecided. Got to get the front height set, then I can set the rear ride height to keep it level.

First mock-up, lowered the front of truck about two scale inches, so far. Used slightly narrower front axle from my parts bin to locate the wheels where they should be.

Oooooo, that looks nice

Oh… agree, that custom makeover probably cost as much as the original purchase price, rich man’s game for sure.

Doing some research this morning on customizing, I have been following this build on Semi Casual (YouTube). It’s clean and simple application of customization. panel added between tanks behind sleeper, place for my blue lights. panel added to close in front of rear fenders wow, this picture puts a whole new meaning to detailing air tanks. Not sure of the defining line between mild custom and a full custom build, but I’m throwing caution to the wind.

Brian, you realize you are influencing all our builds, I can steal two or three cool tips or build ideas for my next build….but I can’t remember 30 or 50 detail ideas, that’s just sensory overload. 🤪😂🤣😜. Just a great build.

Thank you Andy thank you Ron

Ditto, that exhaust has some of the best weathering I’ve seen, well done.

It does feel good to finish one and start another…..but…..I have this thing going on where I can’t stop dreaming up new projects……squirrel 🐿️🐿️🐿️🐿️ Brian, can you feel your finish line yet?

Steal away, then I can steal some ideas from your build😁😁

I have not used this suspension before, bit of a learning curve, see how it goes. May try to build a fixture to get axle heights and spacing correct.

Now that…is a cool load for your truck. I did not know that Plastruct made stuff like that.

Some progress today

Yup, the blue lights are doable………opps got distracted by some shiny bits😂🤣they are sticky back, easy to attach. Boy, this opens the door for some creativity

Thanks Landon, gonna break some rules again on this build, hence the above post. Or it might end up in rather large box of bad ideas😂🤣

Was at Hobby Lobby today and the clerk who knows me asked if I picked up any reduced price model kits. She said they are getting ready to reset the model department. I asked what does that mean. She said new kits will be added to the current lineup, she did not know if the selection would be made larger or stay the same size but will be happening soon.

Thanks Mario

Thanks for the kind words. The shiny bits under the hood is a mix of polished aluminum tubing and plastic rod/tubing painted with Krylon Premium Mettalic original chrome. I like the look, kinda polished aluminum look but not chrome. I have used this same paint for aluminum wheels on big rigs. The hose clamps are actually chrome tape used for decoration on ladies finger nails .035 wide, but on shrink tubing (the red and black) hoses it will stick for a little while then start to unroll, so I used a small dot of fast drying clear finger nails polish to seal down the tape joint and rolled it to the bottom, still holding several days later. The grill is painted with Revell chrome, I think three coats. Some of the heater/air conditioner lines have 2mm crimp tubes (silver plated) over the hose to facilitate the fittings. Feel free to message me with further questions or pictures of the items.

With this truck color (dark mica blue) I wanted blue marker lights for the back of the sleeper, maybe other spots. I had seen one of the guys here posted, using half round colored lens for his custom made lights. After much searching I found some at Hobby Lobby in the scrap booking section. Going to experiment with the 4mm blue lights and making/finding some light backers. Also picked up some aluminum tubing to build more custom exhaust stacks, like the look I get from them and low cost.

Agree, it would need a motor that makes a statement. gonna hold off on this build a bit, want to find a chassis/frame where the suspension is not molded to the frame rails. Still looking for something.

Really nice combination

That’s a cool project, be watching

Thanks Adam

Thanks Victor, yes the color was a good choice, thanks for you comments