Alyn
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Everything posted by Alyn
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Getting down to some of the final details. I scratch built a water manifold from styrene rod and radiator hose from a corner piece of sprue. The oil cap is 1/8" & .030" styrene rod with some buffed metalizer. I got in a rush and permanently mounted the engine before fitting the headers. These are from the Revell Hemi Cuda kit, but heavily modified to slip into the tight space. I'm calling the engine done. The drive shaft is from the Ram VTS kit, shortened and sleeved with aluminum tube. I tried to detail the u-joints a bit as well.
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Thanks a bunch Dave. Ever since I stumbled onto this site, I've been a big fan of yours, so your comments mean a lot. Some guys can do nice bodywork, or great detail, or have good ideas, but you consistantly manage to combine all three. I am surprised that you took a peek though, since the Retro-Ram's not roll'n on 22's. cheers
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and the result... Holes were drilled in the fender tops to insert the 1/8" rod. I put that off for days before working up the nerve to lay a drill bit on freshly painted fenders. Luckily the blue paint is still intact. The windshield is clearer than it appears in the picture. The right side headlight is a little milky in this view, but has cleared up as well since the Testor's clear parts glue has thoroughly dried. Now on to the chassis details.
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Update time, not a biggy, but it's kept me busy. Chuck, I left the V-10 in the parts box for a future project. Yeh, it's got a HEMI! I have the chrome headligthts that came with the 32 Ford fenders, but I wanted something similar to the ones on a 37 Chevy. I happen to have the chrome bezels from AMT's 37 Chevy gasser kit, so some buckets were needed to work with those. Here's the what I came up with. These are the caps from some gel pens (with sparkle glitter ). The pointed ends weren't quite pointed; they were indented so a little reshaping was required. Then they were cut down to a more reasonable length. 1/8th inch rod was inserted to provide a solid mount. I didn't want to just glue them to fender tops.
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More! More! More! This is the kind of build ya just can't get enough of. Lot's of detail and you're doing an awesome job of it. I'm still in awe of the gage cluster and the pedal assembly; both of which are excellent. You're Vette has "GSL" written all over it.
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Here's an example of a 1:1 with that same port layout; Nish streamliner "big motor". 801 cubic inch Chevy big block (Aries aluminum block), 13 liters, 1600 HP normally aspirated. Notice the hole in the valve cover where the valve stem made a hasty exit. The valve head was swallowed, chewed up and disappeared out the exhaust port without a trace. Your motor is looking more appropriate for the task at hand with that blower on top. What I really like, though, is the paint treatment. The checkers on the side look cool.
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Nice to see you're using something other than the common bent wire hinge solution. These look much better. Your door hinges look expecially nice. It looks like they(door hinges) have a temporary hinge pin. What will you be doing for the permanent pin? Another interesting build. You have a knack with the tiny stuff.
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Finished up the tail lights. Aluminum tube covered in matte black with Tamiya clear red acrylic used for the red lense. I sanded off the paint on the tubing edge to give it the look of a bright metal bezel. These are the kind of universal lights you can find at your local auto supply store or Tractor Supply, etc. They were as common as mud back in the day.
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Out of my Hat! That's a much better place than what I had in mind. At least that way you wouldn't have to clean and sanitize the parts Fujimi-Man, as far as contests go, I entered a brush painted 56 Ford pickup in a local contest when I was around 12 years old. I thought it was a cool model, but it didn't win anything. Now, 45 years later, I started building models again and wanted to finally win something, so I plan on entering several contests this year. The blue is Tamiya Mica blue. I wanted to find something that matched the box art on the Dodge VTS kit and this is pretty close. Unlike most others, I don't start out with mist coats, but shoot 'em wet right from the start. It works for me, but it's not necessarily the best way to do things. About 30 years ago, I worked in a paint shop, so that helps. The blue was followed by several coats of Tamiya clear which contributes to the shine. The top of the roof has been polished as it had a spec or two of dirt/dust in the paint. I could point out a few other flaws, but I won't The tail lights are done. They're built out of aluminum tube filled with styrene. After applying some BMF, clear red acrylic paint was poured into the end of the tube to form the lense. For the headlights, I'll just find some old lenses in my parts box. I have the chrome 32 Ford headlights that go with the fenders, but I wanted something more bullet shaped so the ends of a couple of ball-point pens will be used. Thanks for following along
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Under the hood. Brake assembly is from the Ram VTS kit. The battery is scratch built with zipper teeth for the cable clamps. The throttle lever on the front of the injectors (if you can see it)is a piece of copper wire flattened and bent 90°.
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Thanks, gentlemen. Here's the way the Retro-Ram sits today. I got tired of only having one car to bring to contests, so I threw this one together to the point that I could enter it. No headlights, no taillights, no exhaust, no radiator hoses and no driveshaft, but close enough. This one's all about the design, not the details. I took it to the Kansas Automotive Modelers Society (KAMS) show a couple of weeks ago and brought home a 1st in Class (Light Truck & Van) plus the Club Members Choice award. Tonight, I'm working on scratch building some headlights and tail lights.
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Here's a couple more pics that wouldn't load last night. Don't know why they work today The pickup bed including tailgate is entirely scratch built. I'm in the midst of building some simple "can" style taillights and need to add a couple of bolt heads to the tailgate hinges. The bed is made from individual planks of basswood, separated by stryrene "T's" covered in BMF.
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I tried to post a picture that shows more of the front and one of the tailgate, but they won't appear for some reason. I'll give it another shot tomorrow.
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And finally, some color. The blue is not quite as dark as the first picture looks. It's Tamiya Mica Blue over a silver base.
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I'm still struggling with the picture posting on MCM. Last night these wouldn't appear, tonight there's no problem. Same procedure both times. I don't know ... Chuck, that's an awesome build. Amazing how similar our techniques are. I went through your WIP and thought I was reading about mine. Any how, the firewall is made from a slice of .060" styrene sheet stock with half-round rod used to simulate bead-rolling. Strips of square rod were glued inside each side of the body to provide a shoulder for the firewall to seat on. This keeps it flush with the front edge of the body sides. Notches in the base of the firewall (and rear of cab) help position the body on the 32 Ford fenders. Once the firewall is glued in place, it will provide strength to a body that has been cut in every direction(like Frankenstein, but not as ugly ).
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Here's the interior complete with the exception of the gauge decals. the dash top was extended to match up with the windshield profile and aluminum bezels were added for the gauge cluster as well as some pin heads for chrome knobs (retro again). The shifter is from the Ram truck, but with the metal bezel added around the base of the shifter boot. Finally, pedals from the Coddington 32 Ford again and carpet. The gray is Tamiya primer. The blue accent is to match the eventual exterior color which will be Tamiya Mica Blue.
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Thanks for the kind comments, guys. Here's another progress shot on the Hemi. The Hilborn style injectors on the top are scratch built as are the aluminum pulley's. I have a better shot of the front of the engine, but once again I can't get it to view.
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I decided to use brass for the rear springs for strength. Keeping the leafs thin enough to look realistic would make a styrene spring pretty weak at the ends. After the leafs were cut, the ends of each one were slightly tapered and rounded similar to 1:1 leafs. The shackle is made from two short sections of brass tube soldered to some .015" brass sheet (same material used for the leafs. I'll wick some solder between the leafs and paint them a dark metalic color. No one will ever know they're brass.
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Here's the interior tub with the Porsche dash. The steering wheel is from AMT's Boyd Coddington 32 Ford Coupe. The kit sucks, but this steering wheel will work nicely. I've also narrowed the Dodge Ram bench seat by taking out the center storage portion of the seat. The head rests were removed as well. More retro that way.
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I narrowed the Dodge Ram dashboard, but it looked pretty bad. It pretty much filled half the drivers view through the windshield. Revell's slant nose Porsche donated one that worked out great. It only needed about 1/8" sliced of the passenger side and it fit like a glove. Well, there's suppose to be a picture of the Porsche dash mounted in the tub, but I'm having a heck of a time getting some of my pictures to show up. I'm using the same procedure consistently, but some work and some don't. Anyway, the Porsche dash is the perfect replacement and I'll get an update showing it later.
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Thanks, man. I'm working hard to get me a "hell yeah!" Here's a progress shot of the frame. I added a kick-up where the rear of the cab will be and some cross members. The strut rods are from the Revell 40 Ford. I'll be using the axles from that kit. The brackets on the outside of the rails will be the front mount for the leaf springs.
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One more; manifold painted and installed including some pop-off valves. The blower is painted Model Masters titanium metalizer.
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This is the basis for the blower manifold. The Hemi is from the 71 Cuda convertible kit and is set up for dual 4-barrel carbs. To use the blower, I had to do some more scratch'n.
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The Ram truck frame was too bulky and would take a ton of work to mate up to the Deuce fenders, so a new frame is required. Here's the start. These rails were first laid into the bottom of the fenders to determine the initial spacing and size. The that basic shape was laid out on the paper with the center line drawn to keep things symmetrical. The wood for the bed is basswood veneer. It was too thin, so two slices were glued together to form each plank. The separator strips are styrene with a "T" cross section. I tried to space the wood such that it would line up with the strengthening ribs on the back of the cab. The wood in the picture has about 5 coats of acrylic clear.
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Thanks. I suppose I should know what SNB stands for, but not much comes up. Snub nose bomber Snotty new boy Short, Nasty & Bad Short ??? Bed I use Bondo red glazing and spot putty for filler after filling major gaps with scrap styrene. When I run out, I'll probably switch to something else as the spot putty has shrinkage issue. To overcome this, you have to allow for many days of drying time or it'll come back on you after the paint is applied. Here's an update on the engine. The chrome was stripped from the valve covers and a blower robbed from the parts box. The covers were sprayed at a distance so the spatter would create a rough surface. Then topped with flat black. Plug boots where scratch built from styrene rod. The shaft was cut off the kit distributor and replaced with aluminum tube. This was then relocated to a more accurate position on the block. I scratch built some wire looms out of .005" aluminum. One 4-positon and two 2-postion to keep the plug wires in check.
