Chuck Most

Added a makeshift PTO unit. Probably not the most accurate representation of such a unit, but it'll work for what I need. You'll see the reason I added the PTO unit sometime later. The addition of the PTO box necessitated another change to the interior- a second lever jutting out of the floor. I also finished out the interior by making kick panels to 1- house the aftermarket speakers, and 2- cover up the open sections in the inner fenders. I also cluttered the floor with a crushed Motorcraft box and an empty oil can. A tool box was set on the seat- it was pushed into the balsa foam a bit to simulate a weighted box squishing into the seat cushion. So that's another benefit to using the balsa foam to simulate the exposed seat foam.

Did one of those a few years back.

I mentioned the engine swap earlier. Well... here it is... The bulk of it is an AMT '57 Thunderbird Y-Block, with the Lincoln valve covers from the AMT Chris Craft boat and a later-model four-barrel carb. I'm calling it a Lincoln 368. I did swap on the four-blade fan from the '53 flathead, and modified some small block Chevy headers to fit. It also has an on-board air compressor, which was taken from the recent AMT Tip Top Shop accessories set. I added the filter and fitting to flesh it out a bit, and it's driven by an AC clutch from an old S&S photoetch sheet. A line will run back to a remote tank. You can also see the heater hoses, which will be fitted into the firewall once the cab is installed. I've also settled on the wheels and tires- open steel 8-bolt wheels and Firestone Town and Country mud & snow tires, both from Scenes Unlimited. The inner wheels are the modified kit parts for the custom wheel option provided in the '53 kit.

I haven't posted a work-in-progress chronicle here in years. Usually the number one way to kill a project for me is to start posting progress on a forum. But, since this project has pretty strong momentum, I think I'll wing it this time and present it as my way of celebrating 10 years as a forum member. Of course, I began with AMT's deathless '53 Ford F-100 Trophy Series kit. One of my all-time favorite kits of one of my all-time favorite subjects, so I always try to have a couple handy. The first little task was making up a heater box and duct work for the inside of the cowl. I have a 1:1 '54 F650, but since it's out in a cold shed (the door of which is pretty much drifted shut at this point), I used online photos and a little artistic license when creating the components. Since this Effie will feature an engine swap, I also added some auxiliary gauges from a Detail Master photo etch sheet. Also from a Detail Master set is the cassette deck and cassette. The face is the photoetched piece from the set, while the body is made from styrene strip. The photo etch cassette tape was fattened up with a thin strip of styrene on the back. It was then stuck into the opening on the head unit. Loose wires seem to sprout from everywhere under the dash on these old F-Series rigs, even more so if extra electrical accessories are added, as is the case here. So various scraps of plug and detailing wire were strung out from under the kit dash. I added photetched keys and ring, also from a Detail Master set, and to say that tested my patience would be a dramatic understatement. All that work and I doubt it'll ever be noticed. Oh, well! The gauges and cassette deck were also hung under the dash. The steering wheel and column were not overlooked. A turn signal stalk was added, and a machined aluminum tach (source unknown) was slung onto the side. The wheel itself was fitted with a scratchbuilt Brody knob. I've always wanted to try a ripped up seat. After messing around with some balsa foam for another project, I hit upon an idea. The molded cushion detail was cut out of the seat, and replaced with flat sheet. New "cushions" were then carved, and wrapped in some scrap fabric. Once the adhesive had cured, I sanded along the edges to wear through the fabric. It is kind of hard to see, but I worked a sag into the driver's side of the cushion to simulate years of use. I also weathered the seat a bit, by dragging a piece of sandpaper I'd used to shape the foam over the fabric. Here you can also see the shifter, made from scratch as the kit-supplied floor shifter wasn't quite as "burly" as I'd wanted. Moving on to the floor, it was sanded to wear down the engraved detail, then hit with some weathering powder. And a peek in through the back window.... yep, much of this won't even be visible. Here we can sort of see one of the flaws with the AMT kit- the wide open areas around the toe board, which makes the tops of the tires visible from certain angles when you peek into the cab. I have a fix in mind for that, and there's quite a bit more to come once I venture outside the cab.

Beats another LS swap.

A customer wanted a Grande, but "those hideous wheel covers" were a deal-breaker. So, the service manager popped them off and swapped them out for the dog dish caps on their new service truck. The whitewalls came later- they were on sale at the local tire shop. The big block actually comes with the GMC kit, even though the box says it has a 350. Mine had no stock intake, so I had to steal that from a Chevelle kit.

Shapeways! I'll have to check which store I know of two stores selling two different kinds.

This started as the Cameo kit. The frame and bed were lengthened, and it was fitted with Scenes Unlimited 8 bolt wheels. The bumpers were scratch built and the rear window was changed to the small version. When the original 283 blew up, it was replaced by a Pontiac V8 from a GMC, and when that one blew up it was replaced with a dual quad 421, because why not?

The idea here was a pickup that a GMC dealer would use to help out stranded truckers. Well, stranded truckers with GMC trucks under warranty anyway! I replaced the stock rear fenders with scratch built tool boxes and made a light bar. The rear bumper was also scratch built and fitted with a pintle hitch from Scenes Unlimited. In the future I may weather the signboards and add some tools and general clutter to the bed.

Love it! I'm glad this kit is coming back out. I just recently turned the monster truck version back to stock myself- the lack of stock mirrors in the monster truck version is a bit of a bummer.

The shop truck is done- For many years, Carl had used a series of Datsun/Nissan pickups for his shop trucks. By 2010, though, his tattered old 720 was showing it's age and he was looking to get something newer. Since opening the shop, Carl had picked up a side business of locating, and sometimes importing, various classic vehicles from Japan, Europe... and on one occasion, Australia. A local man had been looking for a kei truck- such as a Subaru Sambar. Carl found the man his Sambar, but while chatting with the dealer, he'd mentioned a Scion XB that had been converted into a panel truck. Carl had always thought the XB resembled a small Chevy Astro, and thought that maybe a panel conversion would be an eye-catching shop vehicle. The dealer said he'd keep his eyes peeled. A few weeks later, the dealer called Carl up and said "It's not a panel, but it might strike your fancy". Upon opening the e-mail attachments, Carl realized he'd just found his new shop truck. The vehicle was a 2005 Scion XB that had been converted, not into a panel truck, but a pickup truck. The dealer told him that it did have a salvage title, and had been built by a car stereo shop in Nevada from a wreck, but the car ran and drove wonderfully and the conversion work looked to be of very good quality. And the price was certainly right. It pretty much looked the way it does now when Carl picked it up- later on he had a local sign shop do the lettering. Eventually this will be parked on the diorama... someplace...

This began as the Tamiya Toyota BB. It was converted into a phantom pickup, then converted to a LHD US-market Scion xB. The lettering was done on my inkjet printer, and this will be the company vehicle for the Foreign Objects Import Auto Repair diorama I've been working on. The Scion itself was more or less just a quick time killer build, other than my drunken squiggle paint job on the windshield border (done after I'd messed up with the kit supplied template) is the one thing that will drive me crazy about it. Later on as the diorama goes together I'll come up with some kind of backstory for it.

Minor update... I thought a shop truck was needed. I took the Tamiya Toyota BB and converted it to a Scion xB that had itself been converted to a pickup. ?

I bought this kit a while back incomplete- apparently a previous owner had planned to build a stock pickup and had removed all the custom parts and accessories from the kit. I undid that. The basic kit is box stock with a few swaps- a front bumper, hood, tonneau, roll pan, and tail lights from the phantom Dually kit, and the wheels and tires from a Ranger XLT. I kept the original grille because I love the '88-'89 four-headlight setup. I also used the Edelbrock engine dress up parts and shifter from a '57 Chevy stepside, and I rusted it out to resemble how most of these trucks looked in Michigan by about 1994 or so. The decals came from AMT's two American Pride sheets, while the door logos are from the newest reissue of the '49 Ford kit. I really like the rear window graphic- Revell has done something similar in their recent reissues of several pickup kits, but this graphic is actually see-through, like the real rear window graphics you can get.

I started with a piece of plastic tube and just kind of went from there. It's approximately a 9" motor- the idea was that it was rebuilt using the guts from a much newer Warp9 motor.

After the success of his Gratiot County Historical Tours venture, Jerry sold part of the business to a partner. For the first time in a while, he had income AND spare time. It had been a while since he'd messed around with a car just for fun, so he decided to build a rat rod. Not a traditional rod, unfinished rod, or what have you.... a rat rod. Surveying the farm for bits and pieces, he located a 1940's electric motor and decided then and there his rat would be an electric car. The motor also dictated the front wheel covers- Jerry went with '65 Ford Galaxie wheel covers as they somewhat resembled the front of the motor. A 1919 Olds touring body was dug out of a hay loft, and the chassis was made from a small trailer used to transport a cement mixer. Jerry hit the junkyard and nabbed some I beams from a '93 Ranger and made his own radius arms for the front suspension. The Woodlite headlights are something Jerry had kicking around in a box in his attic for ages, so he finally used them here. He used some teardrop cab lights up front as turn signals to mimic their shape. The bed and floor were all made from various bits of scrap metal. Jerry found an old knife switch and rigged it with a cable to use as a parking brake. An on board generator, driven by the driveshaft, was an idea Jerry had to charge the car in motion. Fact is the generator created quite a bit of drag and wasn't of much use below 70 MPH or so. Maybe in the future he'll replace it with a gas-powered generator... a hybrid rat, then. The car quickly earned the nicknames "Power Wheels" and "Jetson's Rat" for the sound it made in motion. Jerry had fun throwing it together and puttering around in it, and all for about the cost of some new wide whites and junk he had laying around.

In 1972, Tim Pierce bought his first new truck, the all-new Dodge D200. He got it at a pretty deep discount too, as the local dealer had mistakenly ordered one too many orange ones for a local road commission and refused to try to stick them with the extra truck they didn't need. Not that Tim cared- it somewhat blended in with the red-orange Flambeau Red on the Case equipment he used at the farm. The pickup served Tim faithfully for years- it was used to haul trailers when he began selling trailers at his farm, and it helped carry building supplies when he built a dedicated trailer shop in 1977. By 1994 though, the old truck was getting a little ripe and Tim replaced it with a new 3500 dually... in MDOT Orange, of course. The truck mostly sat until 1996 when his oldest son Brad got his license Brad is the one who did a little rust repair in auto shop, located a new tailgate, and gave the truck it's nickname, "Ancient Orange". He also ended up replacing the hood after it blew open on the way home from a football game one night. When Brad moved out he left the old Dodge behind, but Tim still uses it around the farm and at the trailer dealer. He keeps telling himself he'll restore it one of these days. The model itself started out as the MPC monster truck. I bought it about a week or so before news broke that the MPC Dodge long bed kit was to be reissued. Such is life. I returned it to stock using the front and rear suspension from a Little Red Express kit. The wheels and hitch came from Scenes Unlimited, and the gooseneck hitch in the bed is scratchbuilt. The grille is a slush casting I got from a fellow member, I'll let him come forward and identify himself if he wants to. I will say I hope the upcoming MPC reissue fits together a tad better than this 1987-ish reissue did. And if these pics look different than what you're used to from me, I can explain. My normal photo stand is under several inches of snow and ice, and I used my phone instead of my camera for the photos.

I love it! I did something similar much more recently- mine is even painted blue, but I went with a bit more of a modern theme with mine.

I had an idea what I wanted the finished model to look like, then worked all of that in. It looks worse in person. I tried a rusty road-salt effect with thinned gray paint that didn't quite work out how I wanted. The model took about a weeks' worth of evenings off work, and the story probably only took about three times as long to write as it does to read.

Nice! I do hope they'll sell the sheet for it. I believe the graphic scheme changed little (if at all) between '77 and '79.

They're in more or less a straight line across the state. I loosely based the story on a couple of brothers who owned car dealerships across the state of MI- they had one as far west as Muskegon and one all the way out in Bay City. It was a good three hour trip between the two widest spread locations, which was why the further-flung dealers were sold off over the years.

Ever wonder what Scary Jerry's daily driver is? No? Think it's something wacky and over the top? Well, prepare to be sorely disappointed! In the late fall of 1992, Jerry's formerly trusty old beater met it's end. After being sideswiped by an out-of-control Olds Custom Cruiser during a heavy rain storm, Jerry's '72 F-250 had slid off the road and into a ditch, which had demolished the front end, severed the drag link, and slammed the radiator into the fan. Other than some bruising on his palms where he'd braced himself against the steering wheel (which had bent during the crash), Jerry was fine. The elderly woman in the Olds was fine despite spinning out into the ditch on the opposite side of the road. His truck, on the other hand, didn't fare so well. The old Ford ran but was no longer driveable and in all honesty wasn't worth repairing. Jerry had always wanted a Ranger, as he had several friends, relatives, and co-workers who owned and loved them, and there was an all new Ranger for 1993, so Jerry figured now was the time to purchase his first new vehicle, and all signs were pointing to the new Ranger. One afternoon after work, Jerry walked in to G.R. Wilson Ford-Lincoln-Mercury and went to the desk of Ed Luchenbill. Though Ed was an imposing giant of a man, who bore a more-than-passing resemblance to Refrigerator Perry, he was quite soft spoken and very knowledgeable about the new Ranger, telling Jerry he was thinking of getting one himself. Jerry rattled off a list of what he wanted, and it sounded to Ed like what Jerry wanted was an XLT, seeing as how Jerry seemed keen to have something "way nicer than an Orkin truck". Upon reviewing literature showing the various features and options, Jerry agreed, and asked "You happen to have one with the 4.0 and five-speed in stock?" Ed replied with "Yes... but it is silver." Jerry had said that was one of the colors he'd have liked to avoid. But, a quick spin around town with Ed and Jerry told him he'd have bought the nasty metallic purple one with the four cylinder on the lot next too it, as he was so impressed with the new Ranger. That impression never really wore off, as Jerry drove the wheels off the little silver pick-em-up for years. In the late summer of 1996, when Jerry was promoted to third-shift supervisor at his job and a mere three months after making the last payment, he hit a deer on the highway about two miles from work. Though the Ranger was physically unscathed, the bumper had taken a pounding. The deer, naturally, had gotten up and trotted off into the twilight. That weekend Jerry went to the local junkyard to find a replacement, and the owner told him he had a brand-new chromed XLT bumper, minus the rub strip, for a mere 45 bucks. Jerry took it. He also grabbed an air dam from a Ranger in the yard. On the way back home, he also picked up a cheap set of fog lights... thinking perhaps they'd either help scare off any oncoming deer, or at least enable him to see them better and avoid them. Jerry had always planned to add the rub strip, but never got around to it. The old Ranger plugged along without incident until 1999, when, again, it had to quench it's thirst for deer blood, on the way home from work this time. The replacement bumper and air dam were okay, and so was the splash apron, but the grille had been demolished and the hood was crumpled badly enough that Jerry had to physically remove the latch to open it. Though undamaged, the passenger's side fender had been pushed back just far enough to jam the door on that side. Once more to the Junkyard, where there was a black '93 Ranger Splash that had met it's end after a hard rear-ender. He just loosened the bolts on the original right fender and pulled it forward so his passenger door could open again. Jerry had planned to paint the grille and hood (or maybe just the hood) to match the truck, but never got around to it. By 2001, Jerry had gone back to first shift, and at the end of the day he and some of his crew would often sit on the tailgate, having a smoke and gabbing about the day's events and plans for the evening. One day, as Jerry and two rather burly co-workers popped a squat on the Ranger's 'gate, there was a sharp "twang" sound as the rusted tailgate cables snapped and the tailgate slammed down onto the bumper. The three men had a good laugh, and Jerry went home with his tailgate down, as the impact had crunched the skin, ripped a hinge, and bent it just enough to where it would not latch properly. Minor blessing, the bumper escaped injury aside from a scuff on the plastic trim. Another junkyard trip, and the owner had a '93-'97 tail gate in Toreador Red on the shelf. Jerry had always had a mind to repaint the tailgate to match the truck, but opted to get a sprayed-in bedliner instead, as a local shop had just started providing the service and the deal was too good to pass up. A year later... the mismatched panels remained, but a brand-new Pioneer CD head unit had replaced the factory AM/FM/Cassette unit shortly after it had chewed up Jerry's treasured tape of Anthrax's "Persistence Of Time" album. The years wore on, and the Ranger wore out. Jerry followed the suggested maintenance schedule to the letter, and when he noticed something amiss, he fixed it or had it fixed as soon as possible. As the miles piled on, the Ranger had gone through countless front pads and rotors, one set of shoes and drums, two clutches, both radius arm brackets, rear leaf spring hangers and shackles (all casualties to rust despite a Ziebart treatment when new and periodic undercoating in the years since), and numerous normal wear-and-tear items. The driver's seat was in bad shape, both from ordinary wear and from Jerry's often horrendous farts. A fresher seat with reddish upholstery from a junkyard Ranger was swapped in. The old Ziebart treatment was beginning to wear off as well, as by this time a few spots of rust were visible at the cab corners. Jerry was often complemented on how rust free his Ranger was for a Michigan beater, but even an eternal optimist like Jerry knew it was bound to happen sooner or later. On his way back from interviewing for a new job at a metalworking shop in 2006, the spare tire carrier had broken loose due to rust. Jerry got the job, but the carrier never got replaced, and the spare took up permanent residence sliding around in the bed. Now, here we are in 2019. For just over a quarter of a century and nearly 375,000 miles, the Ranger has served Jerry faithfully through two "real" jobs as well as his various little escapades on his own. He's driven it to the theater to see every Jurassic Park movie since the beginning. Unfortunately, he also drove it to the theater to see all three Star Wars prequels. Not every trip is a success, after all. It transported parts and materials to create the Mobile Pork Incinerator and several of Jerry's other whacked creations. The Ranger is now older than the F-250 was when it was totaled, and has done nearly three times as many miles. But things aren't looking as bright these days. The cab corner and rocker rust turns out to be a bit more serious than Jerry had thought- one day after driving in a thunderstorm, Jerry noticed the carpet was getting wet. The floors are just about gone. That shocking development also solved the mystery what was causing the cab to sag and the random machine-gun click of the fan blades hitting the shroud. Jerry first suspected the cab and core support bushings had collapsed, and he was right- and those are fairly easily replaced- but the cab mounts themselves don't look so hot. The scary part is that he had it up on a hoist the previous spring and the floor looked scaly but solid then... And there's that plume of blue smoke that turns white upon startup, and persists for about five minutes of driving, despite no oil-fouled plugs or evidence of coolant getting into the cylinders. Jerry's not sure if it's just in his head, but he swears there's an ever-so-slight knock coming from somewhere under the hood, barely audible past the noise from the leaky gaskets on the cracked exhaust manifolds and the squealing alternator... But as of now, the Ranger endures, just like Jerry. So does the sprayed-in bedliner Jerry had done all those years ago, more or less on a lark. And salesman Ed Luchenbill? So does he. In fact, he's about to celebrate his 29th year as a sales rep at G.R. Wilson Ford-Lincoln. Ed ultimately didn't get a new Ranger the year Jerry did, but he's already ordered his 2019 version. Will Jerry do likewise? Who knows...

For many years, the three Sullivan brothers owned a quartet of service stations across Pennsylvania. Their flagship Harrisburg location's claim to fame was it's 24 hour service bays- overnight mechanics were on duty seven days a week and some holidays to help get motorists stranded during the night back on the road, or to accommodate people who were stuck at work during normal shop hours. The other three locations weren't quite as epic, but still got the job done. The vehicles used by those facilities could be described the same way. This '53 F100 was used by the Kecksburg Esso station. It had been purchased new, but by the mid '60's it had developed a character all it's own. The engine had been hopped up with Offy heads and a dual carb intake, for extra power to deal with those Pennsylvania hills. Towing mirrors, spot lights, cab lights, and a shop fabricated snow plow and headache rack had been added, along with a fabricated rear bumper and hitch. One by one the original hubcaps had fallen off, and had been replaced by '62 Mercury and Lincoln full wheel covers on the front and rear, respectively. Though tattered and road weary, the old Ford always got the job done, whether it was running parts for a customer vehicle or going out to help a motorist stranded with a flat or an empty tank. On the evening of December 9, 1965, Larry Sullivan had responded to an old lady who had a flat tire and en route to where the woman's Buick sat alongside the road, he became one of several eyewitnesses to a glowing, bell-shaped object crashing into a wooded area. Later that evening, Larry had taken the F100 back out to get a better look at the crash site, but was politely (but firmly) told to leave by two young men in military uniforms. The Sullivan Kecksburg Esso closed in 1971, and the '53 ended up parked behind the Harrisburg location for a fairly long period of time. At some point the snow plow disappeared, and the tool boxes and tools were dispersed into the service department. It was then towed to the Sullivan's station in Exeter, where the mechanics had planned to restore it during slow time at work. But there never seemed to be enough time at the busy Exeter location, and the truck sat some more, until the Exeter location closed in 1979. It languished at a Sullivan family member's farm for several more years, until another relative in Michigan picked it up as a project. It's still a project, even though for the first time in ages, the old Ford is running and road worthy once more. Now.... the model itself. It was an incomplete mid '90's issue of the AMT F100. I had the Esso graphics laying around forever. Same goes for the Mercury and Lincoln wheel covers, the '49 Merc Offy heads, and the Replicas and Miniatures two-carb intake. There were no Esso stations in Michigan, but there were (still might be?) several in Pennsylvania, and the 1994 version of this kit included Pennsylvania plates, so I went that route. This truck was based out of Kecksburg, just so I could incorporate the UFO story into it's history. This was mostly just a fun "throw it together" kind of project.

That sounds about right That's the custom air cleaner from the '65 Continental.

I love it! I've built the first-gen Q in a quasi bosozoku style, and I have two others I haven't touched yet. Might need to try something like this with one of them.