cifenet

Super! I thought the photos were taken from a movie somewhere, very realistic and your great craftsmanship shows!

Thanks for sharing this. looks very awesome so far! Even the boxes look cool!

Wow, I don’t even know how this works. Great job getting this going! Would definitely follow this.

Great effort and work putting this done! I can see many parts were used and it is also functional!

Too much details you got going! I am definitely interested in seeing how the engine would come out!

And it is a good start indeed!

Appreciated your support on this so far, I counted the photos I have been uploading here and it is reaching 80+ already. If you guys can put up with it, I will probably reach around 130+ by the time I am done with this truck. Dealing with decals was not fun and I had to alter the original plan. I did a quick comparison between the gold decal and gold paint and saw minimal difference. Choosing Gaianote 08 Gold instead of decals was a good idea. Gaianote shoots smooth and dries quick and hard. I like using them. The paint code "Ex-" indicates extra size. I began masking activities. I found this task easier than cutting the decals straight 1/8th inch wide and laying around the entire vehicle. The problem of the masking this type of pattern is that, stripes can be tricky to align straight and evenly spaced. Your eyes can only measure so much and the accuracy suffers as you get tired doing same thing over and over again. I decided not to raise my stress level and reminded myself that this is only a hobby. So I only corrected obvious mistakes and continued making progress. The pictures show my re-work of painting to correct the stripe alignment. Various masking tapes were used, but I was only able to produce mediocre result. I see rough edges in various places. The biggest rookie mistake I made was that I forgot to sand down the paint edges, the gold stripes reveal paint borderlines between blue and white. Bad me. It is too late to fix this and my hope is that clearcoat may help hiding it with some sheen later. The painting work started on the sleeper section also. While my sleeper is getting painted, I gave a couple of clearcoat layers on the hood and cabin section. Things are looking better for now. Polishing is something I think requires good practice and patience. I do not use polyurethane clearcoat, so manual polishing is must. I usually start with 2400 grit polishing cloth and move all the way up to 12000. When purchasing the gold decals, I also picked this decal set thinking "ARAL" logo would look good on my truck. It is a German petrolem/oil company so it won't be correct for this US truck with US registration/plate, but I still thought the design of the logo looks classic and the color matches well. I like the front view of the truck, it reminds me of a "security armored" truck that goes around and collects money from banks!

Great job making this so clean and keeping it realistic. Nice photography as well!

Great finish on the model, and the details are top notch!

Super fantastic finish and looks like the photos are from car museum! Great job on this. A question, did you custom mix the color? I like the tone of it.

This is some investment and Good information here so far. I also dig fire engines, I think they are fun to build (although I have not build one yet), it has many components that can be challenging though!

This is very enjoyable to follow. Your build execution is high quality, great job so far.

OMG, the details do come out after you apply the primer! The primer itself even looks awesome! I can see you faithfully constructed all of the necessary air lines and such. Fantastic indeed!

I am thinking your clear is shooting bit dry. What clear are you using? Many ways to overcome this, but you can also increase thinner ratio as a first step. If you think you have enough thickness of clear layer, you can sand down some and see how things are. May have to repeat applying clear. The yellow looks fantastic though!

Wow, awesome progress! Like the clean interior and exterior color as well. One thing I noticed- Fujimi’s carbon fiber decal has literally “X” line as carbon pattern, I am thinking this was something Fujimi could have done a better job..

The frame work looks awesome so far. I like the choice of color also. I enjoyed your writing on your findings on your research. Keep up the good work!

Super cool, looks quite difficult to scratch build these components, but you pulled off very nicely!

Truck is taking its shape, looks great with the body on. Nice details you are adding to the front! You have small and delicate details, it will be interesting to see how you would manage the painting task. Good job so far.

This is one sweet looking bus! Beautiful finish and details, nice job! The build looks complicated, but you managed to produce this one so clean. I definitely want to give this kit a try also.

Thanks guys for following up this with me. My work desk isn't pretty at all, but I got everything I need here. But my wife wasn't too happy that I took over one of the tables in the main floor with this mess and I got sent down to our basement over the weekend. Luckily the weather is getting warmer and nicer in Chicago region, I didn't mind the basement treatment. I continued to detail the grille and I wanted to add some kind of "mesh" or "net" behind the grille. Usually P/E part could be used, but I took a cheaper solution. It barely shows up from front, but I know it is there and no one can tell if it was just some cheap sewing mesh. The front bumper details were also added over the weekend. I have some collections of rivets, bolts, pins, etc., I examined how I was going to add details to the bumper. The Tichy Train Group bolts were the cheaper solution, but they didn't look sharp for my application. They could be very good for detailing frame or under chassis area, but for the front bumper, I needed something to be more recognized/pronounced. And that means going with "bigger" stainless mounting bolts. I also created two driving lights using "light curing clear resin". I did introduce some bubble during the curing process, but my laziness got hold of me and I allowed myself to move forward. I decided to use these parts. Scale Hardware is no longer in business, but I really loved their products. It is shame that they did not survive today. The front bumper is complete. I used Micro Kristal Klear to attach the bolts and lights. CA glue can stain the painted chrome and the fume can cause hazy surface. I like using Micro Kristal Klear for this type of application. Test fitting windshield early is always a good idea. I found that the front windshield did not have the enough angle to conform the body shape. I could cut the windshield in the middle and attach left and right separately, but I resolved with "somewhat" less destructive method. I inserted a brass pin as an anchor which can hold the upper part of the windshield in place. I can simply use a small amount of glue at the bottom or tape up and it will fit correctly. Finally after giving some good thought, I decided to go with blue with white stripes. Some gold stripes will be added also in between. I picked out these colors. My next truck will be silver for sure. I masked basic painting livery. \ I forgot to mention before, but I did complete the work of adding the quarter panel guards. These were positioned just enough to hover the wheels without touching. For curve lines, a photocopied decal sheet helped creating body conforming masking templates. The initial paint job came out satisfactory for my liking. I always have to correct paint mistakes afterwards, I usually set my initial expectation low. The paint line looks rough, but I didn't care. To simplify my work, I decided to only deal with the cabin and front hood. The sleeper will be painted and managed at a later time. I guess I can only handle up to two things at a time! I purchased gold decal sheet from Germany which I plan to use as added stripes. The metallic shine is what I liked, but I quickly found that this is some tedious work, and not as easy as it seems. I saw the decals to be on the "thicker" side and difficult to apply. A good amount decal solution was brushed on and after 20 minutes, I was only able to manage 3 stripes. Including the sleeper, I counted 30+ stripes that I need to apply! No way....

Incredible work! The details and finishes are simply outstanding! I can’t wait to see how you finalize!

GM needs to sell this version to Public. Excellent idea and beautiful finish, great job!

This one is pretty sweet. The oversized fenders made the car looks mean and powerful. Good job on the custom work!

Highly modified! I like the result and it has some comical look to it. Like a mini Matchbox collection except it is much larger and has all the details!

I like the choice of the color on this. Good clean build overall, and the color of the wheels stand out!