OldNYJim

First thing I thought too Mark. That thing's cool!

Thanks for the kind words Anthony! I'm thinking two pink and one white on the canopy - what do you think? I did some work on the engine tonight, made another distributor (after the carpet monster apparently ate the last one when I wasnt looking) and got those giant stacks mounted on there. Looks CRAZY And did a quick mock up to see how much room I have for everything here... I ordered some pink flocking for the carpet of the interior, and I've been toying with ideas for some custom pedals - maybe something cone shaped might be fun? I'll need to make some sort of fuel tank too - the one in the kit is HUGE, and sits inside the back window which is where the (fictitious) driver would have to squeeze in to be able to sell ice cream out of the side window More fab required...

Cool story Anthony! I used Tamiya rattle cans for the base colors, and then Tamiya acrylics through my cheapo airbrush for the graphics. I'm just a beginner at this stuff, but the Tamiya acrylics are very forgiving of my beginner's skills. Speaking of which, started mocking the chassis together today (this little thing is cute!) and got some Tamiya flat aluminium on the chassis Meanwhile, the canopy was bothering me - I wanted to work out how to get some fabric-looking texture onto it, so make it look like it was made of cloth. The plastic part is ok, but it doesnt have any sort of texture to it. Then it occured to me - the clear plastic transfer material that you can get to help apply vinyl graphics has a similar texture to what I was looking for... Needs a little trimming, and I'm not sure how well paint will stick to it, but I'll give it a shot!

I didn't forget about this! Just had a busy week. I had the idea of a pearl pink frame, and some hot pink interior parts, so after a little rummaging at Duane Reede I found a nice pearl hot pink nail varnish. It took probably 10 goes to thin it down enough to clear through my airbrush, but I managed to get the frame, seat and instrument console painted tonight eventually I'll leave that to dry overnight and then I can get down to getting the chassis assembled and getting this thing on it's wheels!

Next up, I figured an ice cream truck would need an ice cream machine, so I invented the Mr Ice - the finest ice cream dispensor that you can put next to a hemi that'll still work I made it from flat styrene sheet, use part of the packaging for a headache tablet for the concave recessed part, bent some styrene rod for the nozzle and added a handle. The lettering is vinyl, and I'm hoping that when painted and Alcladed it'll look as though the words are embossed in the machine. Also, in an effort to get the engine a little further along, I wanted to get the wiring done. The stock kit distributor is ok but it was pretty small, so I cut the top off and used some drilled out styrene bar to make a new one. I cut lengths of wire and superglued them in place, and once I've painted the distributor itself I can glue that back onto the bottom of the kit part and attach to the engine.

What colour did you go with in the end?

Amazing! What a great start Ray! And cool concept - looks like a salt flats racer! So cool!

Wow!!! It's looking INCREDIBLE dude!

Thanks Ray and Dave! I had a busy few days, but today I got chance to work on a little detailing project that I wanted to do. I sanded off the molded in detail from the centre console of the interior because I wanted to try and scratchbuild a speedometer. Bear in mind this piece is TINY, so it looks terrible in the photos but I'm pretty pleased with it in real life... So, I painted some styrene sheet with flat black paint, designed a VW-style speedo and used a vinyl cutter to scratch the numbers through the paint down to the bare white plastic: I made a few at different depths so I could see which numbers looked clearest - they ALL look a little fuzzy zoomed in this close, but from a foot away they look pretty realistic. Plus, noone will be able to see this properly anyway when it's assembled. Next I got a pack of googly eyes from Michael's, and cut the back off to make a nice clear dome for the glass I used the black part of the googly eye to make a coloured centre section to go on the dial - much like a real VW speedo. Here they are getting some primer before ice-cream pink spray Next, I cut a small retangle of the thinnest styrene I could find, ran a black marker over it and made what in real life would be a recess for the odometer, stretched some styrene sprue as thin as I could get it to make a needle and assembled with some clear paint to hold it all together Then I affixed the 'glass' with some more clear paint, and once it's set I'm going to run a silver marker around the edge to simulate a chrome ring Basically a pointless exercise given how hard it'll be to see, but I wanted the challenge of making a speedo with an actual needle on

Great post Randy!

Looks great so far! Beautifully built too!

Ohh, the clear wheels are cool!

My question though, Mark, was if someone will figure out how to print an STL file on that little kid-grade printer. Now THAT would be cool

Great tip, thanks David! I'll try that next time!

Thanks guys! Did the black outlines this morning... The edges need a tiny bit of tidy-up with some thinners, but I'm pretty pleased with how it came out!

Or I cheat and use a cutting machine OK, so I gave the yellow 30 minutes or so to dry and added the 'mesh' mask to both sides Airbrushed some unthinned Tamiya Clear Orange (it's pretty thick but I didnt want to risk it seeping under the mask, or to have to leave the mask on too long) And then carefully peeled the mask back off both sides: Now I need to let the orange and the yellow set overnight so I can mask the letters and spray a black edge over them. I think I want to have a gloss black outline around the letters but leave the orange/yellow parts a kinda matt finish so it looks a bit more cone-y. We'll see how it looks afterwards though...

Thanks bud! Kinda girly, but the tinted windows and chrome and Hemi should help a little Meanwhile, I spent some time designing the graphics I wanted for the sides of the bus, and cut them from some masking material: Then masked up and sprayed the base yellow color with Tamiya acrylics: I'm going for something inspired by the waffle-looking pattern on an ice cream cone over the top of the yellow - so I designed a pattern and cut out a mask for that too - just gotta wait a while for the yellow to dry so I can lay this down without it damaging the paint Meanwhile, I've been stripping some of the chrome for 3 days now and bleach isnt touching it - need to ponder on that a while and work out what will work...

What a gorgeous build Tim! I've always admired your builds and this one's no different - love it!

Join the party Dave! Only a small update, but I got the paint on, ready for the graphics!

What a great build! Love the weathering, and it's beautifully built!

Great save on the paint!

Looks GREAT! What a cool idea! Is the rear end a lot wider than the body currently?

Oh wow, those graphics are incredible!!!

Successfully got the first color down! Went with Tamiya Racing White, which is actually a nice creamy colored off-white I'll let that set up, then I'll be masking the bottom half to make the top half a nice strawberry ice cream kinda pink shade, before a single coat of clear to protect them both and then I can airbrush the letting I have planned on the sides. Meanwhile, I can get started on the engine - this is the same shade as the upper part of the body will be

Made a headliner this morning - it wont really be visible when this thing's assembled anyway, but I couldnt stand all the nasty ejector pin marks in the roof Then I laid some silver inside the body, asked the inside and got some primer down. First colour coat next! I'd usually do the body last, but because I'm doing a two tone paintjob and I'll be doing some graphics after that I'll lose a few days letting this thing dry before I can do the next part so I'm getting a jump on that now