KJ790

Cab is fitted to the chassis. Just a few more details to finish up.

Engines have always been a weak point for me, but fortunately you can't typically see them on the finished model. Since the radiator will be slightly visible through the grille, I made a set of louvers from .080" half-round rod. The engine is an attempt to make an early 60's 335 Cummins from the kit NTC. I added a 4x4 married transmission out of a Diamond Reo kit, as that is what the real truck had. Getting the "bells" on the exhaust and intake connection to line up with the plumbing mounted to the back of the cab was quite a task.

Finally finished all of the little details of the cab. I added some slight weathering and attempted a couple splattered bugs on the front. Next onto the engine.

The interior is mostly complete and I had to do a quick mock-up to make sure that everything fit right. I had to modify my cab hinges slightly, as the interior seemed to spread the base of the cab out just enough to mess up the alignment on my hinges. I added R.B.'s signature cowboy hat on the dash as well.

Thanks everyone! I have a couple trailer ideas, but I will likely scratch build a mid-50's Great Dane reefer to go with this one. I have been working on the interior. The dash is scratch built. I drew the gauges and surrounds in Microsoft Word, then laid the decals in either side of a piece of clear plastic so that the gauges would have a small amount of depth to them. The front of the dash is littered with what every driver needs, a road atlas, log book, envelope for receipts, and some hand written directions.

The chassis was painted. I used individual letter decals from microscale on the fuel tanks, what a task those were to line up. Not perfect, but it will have to do. I drew the spoke hubs in CAD and had them 3D printed. The rims were a set of resin cast rims that I had made a while back. The 1:1 truck I am using as inspiration did not have very aggressive tires, so I am using a set of tires from the AMT Papa Truck kit. I sanded off the "Tyrone Malone" logos with fine sandpaper. Weathering of the chassis has begun.

I was not happy with the first paint job that I did, so into the strip it went. The second attempt came out better, but still not perfect. Luckily this truck is going to have some weathering to help hide some of the flaws. Decals from Firebird designs were applied. The permit decals are from CMT.

I drew up a back-dated grille in 3D cad and had it 3D printed. Then sprayed the first coat of white paint on everything: I also started on the chassis. This was a frame from the parts-box. Up until 1969, the K100 used tapered frame rails to make room for the popular V8 configuration engines of the era. I modified the kit rails to represent this. I also shortened the frame slightly. I cut the kit fuel tanks down shorter and shifted them forward on the frame slightly. I made a step for the driver's side tank out of diamond plate styrene sheet. I added a resin torsion bar suspension and steerable front axle with the front brakes cut off. The battery box was lowered on the frame rails to reflect the 1:1 I am using as a reference.

I thought that I would post my work so far on truck that I have wanted to build for a long time, a first generation 1964 Kenworth K100. I am using an AMT K123 kit and backdating as much as I can. The cab was an old glue-bomb that was damaged. I stripped the old paint and started working away at it. I made new luggage doors on the side of the cab, filled the "peep" window in the passenger's side door, shaved off the protrusions on the roof, moved the passenger's side vent door towards the back of the cab, added a rear window opening, and made new lower front quarter panels and headlight housings. The rivets were made using a punch and die set with .010" thick styrene sheet. First coat of primer:

I made the grab handles and the grille.

Thanks Brian! That Mack has been stalled on the bench for a while. I wasn't happy with the chassis that I started, so I will likely start over with a different chassis once I get back to it.

Thank you! I just did the math and I have built about 7% of the trucks that we had owned. There was also a group of owner operators who pulled for us over the years which adds about another 50 trucks or so (3 of which I have built in scale). I still have plenty of material to work off of ?. My wife is always asking me if I am going to build them all. I want to build more from the 80's and 90's, but they take a lot more work since there are not kits available for most trucks in that era.

After a lot of work, I am calling this one done. I started with an AMT dual drive Freightliner kit, I lengthened the frame slightly and added an air-ride suspension. The cab was mostly scratch built, with the interior being made from 2 AMT kits put together. The fuel tanks, quarter fenders, mirrors, and exhaust were all scratch built. The tires and drive rims were designed and cast by me, while the steer rims were from M&R wheels. The pinstriping and lettering on the doors was done by hand, though I am not in love with how it came out. Here is the inspiration: And the finished model:

Beautiful! What did you end up using for headlights?

Just waiting on a few final details to arrive. I have to add turn signals and brake lights, permit decals, and a pogo stick with hoses for the trailer hookup.

It has been a while since I have been able to work on this, but I have made some progress. The cab is nearing completion. Paint is complete along with some weathering. I have the wheels complete and weathered as well.

That looks great!

Here is my latest trailer build. I used the sides from a Moebius reefer kit, cut down to 48' in length. I used the front and rear door frame from an Ertl great dane kit, then scratch built the running gear, rear doors, and landing gear. I drew the reefer unit in CAD and had it 3D printed.

Sorry for the slow response guys, been busy with the baby for a bit. As Brian said, the cab fans are 3D printed.

While I agree to some extent, it may make it even more confusing for some. Most of the model truck kits (AMT kits at least) come with older tube-type rims. These had a deeper lip, and were 20" or 22" when measured at the tire bead. For this reason, AMT tires are stamped as 20" or 22" on the sidewalls. In real life, when the switch to tubeless tires occurred, the lip on the rim became shorter, making a 22.5" tubless wheel equivalent to a 20" tube type, and a 24.5" tubeless wheel equivalent to a 22" tube type. In general, a 20" tube-type rim and a 22.5" tubeless rim will have an OD of approximately 24.5" while a 22" tube-type and a 24.5" tubeless rim will have an OD of approximately 26.5". The problem lies in that many people do not know the difference between tube-type and tubeless rims. Since many people want to use kit tires on aftermarket rims, many aftermarket manufacturers try to list the rim size to match the kit tire nomenclature, so they may call a 24.5" tubless rim a "22 inch rim" so that people know that AMT's 22" tires will fit on it.

As mentioned, the real truck had 24.5" rims. This measurement is taken at the bead of the tire, so the actual outside diameter of a real rim will be larger than 22.5 or 24.5 inches respectively. The aftermarket rims from Moluminum are perfectly in scale, he offers both 22.5" and 24.5" rims. Doug Wagner also offers machined aluminum 24.5" rims in 1/25 scale that are perfectly to scale. If you want the most accurate looking build to the real thing, I would say use Doug's aluminum wheels. It is an expensive option, but it is the most accurate way to go. Moluminum's resin wheels would be my next choice.

That came out great!

Oh no!

I was finally able to get some outdoor shots.

That looks great!