Aaronw

Yeah, always an issue doing it this way. If you mean you can't physically get them that small vs maintain a useful quality at that size, you can right click on the image and type in your desired dimensions. Usually this method is just a stop gap though, it can provide some detail at a distance, but they are usually just colorful blobs up close. To get really good quality you pretty much have to go with one of the programs I mentioned in my first post. Anyway it looks like you've found a source to get what you need though. It sounds like there are more interested in these decals than just you, so hope this works out well for all of you.

I thought so to, but I found out that isn't the case. Lasers are less prone to smudging when you apply the sealant though which makes them nicer to work with. Here is an example of what I was talking about using word for. These are actually just things I set up to print on paper to include as cab details in emergency vehicles (reference books, forms, maps), but would work the same for decals. The numbers are included as a key so I know what everything is supposed to be (print is too small to read on the individual items). You can set the table grid to be invisible so the lines don't print out if you want.

Yeah, that is my usual outside of the US seller, but they've been out of the Renault kits for a while. Reading some other posts though it sounds like those have sold really well explaining why HLJ hasn't had them in stock. Supply issue, not HLJ issue.

Entirely different scale so not exactly duplicating anything, but another Type 1 micro bus. I wonder if we will ever see a Type 2 bay window micro bus in styrene. I know the early split windows are more collectable, but it's not like the Type 2s are unpopular in the 1-1 VW world. That is the big news so far in new kits for me this year as well.

The Louisville would be somewhere 1970-74. The trucks were introduced in '70 and the V200 (CAT 1150) diesel that is in the kit was replaced by the similar V636 (CAT 3208) in 1975.

Well with word, you simply open a table with columns / rows set to provide the size blocks you need. The you insert pictures into the blocks and resize them to your needs. This allows you to control where on the page they will appear much like the business card programs do. Tables take some practice if you've never used them but not too bad. You can find short video tutorials on youtube to walk you through table use if you are not familiar with setting them up. I've not seen any specific decal making programs that were of any use beyond maybe providing some useful clip art. If you buy the Testors decal kit they include a sample of their decal maker software (the full program is $8.95), but I've not heard many praise it's virtues. It's cheap though and from what I understand it works similar to the program you used to have. The testors decal paper is ok, and I rather like their decal sealant in a spray can. Decals printed on a laser printer still need to be sealed. I prefer a laser printer to inkjet for decals, but there isn't much difference in quality and both will run or smudge if you get heavy handed with the sealant.

For fairly simple stuff you can simply take a good quality image and shrink it, then use a word program like Microsoft word, open office etc to layout your sheet. You will get some distortion, but by starting with a good large image you can get a respectable result. This is also used by many to make license plates, books or magazines to lay on a seat in a car etc. The big advantage to this method is it has a fairly shallow learning curve and uses programs most people already have on their computers. The higher end is to use a vector based drawing program like Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator. These are what most professional / hard core do it yourselfers are using. These are not cheap programs ($200+) but if you are a student (or have kids in school) you can use them to get a cheaper student version for about 1/2 price. Sometimes you can find an older version on ebay for much less, and they really don't lose much for our use vs getting the latest version. Inkscape is a free vector drawing program, I have no experience with it, but hey it's free what do you have to lose. Vector based programs are different from the more common (and generally much cheaper) raster (aka pixel) based programs like Microsoft Paint that you get free with many computers. Raster based programs use tiny dots to make an image, so when you enlarge or shrink the image it actually changes by adding or subtracting pixels. Large changes in size can result in major distortion issues. Vector based programs use reference points instead of pixels so you can take a small image and blow it up into a huge image or take a large image and shrink it down to a postage stamp with no loss of quality. This not only allows you to rescale for different uses but also allows you to work at a conveiniant size. I frequently work on a decal at about 5-6" which is big enough to see the details well, but small enough that I don't have to pan around the screen much. I shrink it down to 1/2", 1" or whatever as appropriate for the model it is going onto. The real downside to most vector programs is they have a very steep learning curve and are not particularly intuitive for most people. I've been using Corel Draw about 10 years now and I'm still learning how to do things. It is also somewhat labor intensive. Doing something complex like a city or state seal might involve 6 or 8 hours of drawing time. Something simple like a warning sticker on a commercial truck which is just text on a brightly colored polygon "Don't put your tongue in the fan belt" is pretty easy though, maybe 10 minutes. Making your own decals is really fun and opens up a lot of new options, but it can be a lot of work. The other issue is the decals are basically transparent unless you use special printers, so you need to use them over light colors or use white decal paper which creates its own issues.

The circle template looks like it would work, and is better and easier than what I was about to suggest. Once you have the centers marked a spring loaded center punch would probably do a good job of getting a good starting bite for a small drill. They are cheap ($15-20) and easy to use, just push down until they pop, on thin plastic you might not even need the small drill.

First of all, I think it is awesome to see somebody making something from scratch using sheet plastic and various other bits. On the guns you are on the right track, but these are kind of blocky and two dimensional. They remind me of a toy gun a dad might cut out of plywood for his kid (well back in the days when kids were happy with wooden toy guns anyway). If you round off the edges of the stock and forearm more I think they will look a lot more realistic. Mostly probably just a result of being excited and rushing. Take a little more time getting the shapes right and these should look great.

The only reason I really care about categories is visibility. If somebody has a question about how to run the airlines on a Ford Louisville, asking about it in a section for big rigs is more likely to get an answer. In a general free for all posts will get bumped down so fast, that they may not be seen a day later when the guy who knows the answer pops in. Similarly if someone wants to chop the top of a '57 Ford, popping into the custom car section makes that a lot easier. Then you have the search issue, again sections reduce your work. It seems pretty simple to me, if you need some help with a '59 El Camino (based on the Impala?) who is going to be moe help, truck guys or car guys? If you were dealing with a fullsize vehicle, are you going to ask your neighbor with a '57 Chevy or the guy with the lifted 4x4 for advice on your El Camino? I know some use the view new content and so have no concept of volume per section, but the rate a section "bumps" is important. If it takes days for something to move from page 1 to page 2, it probably should be combined with another category. if it takes 10 minutes, it is time to look at adding some new spots because the posts start to become white noise. Yeah, but the custom big rigs are like "utes", many of them are trucks, fancy but still working vehicles, but some are clearly show vehicles not meant to do a day of work and those would probably be best appreciated alongside the custom cars.

I'm curious, do most people insist on accurate specific tires, or do you just want a decent looking tire with something actually on the sidewall. If a model company included a set of Goodweasel Falcons (surprisingly similar in appearance to Goodyear's Eagle) would that satisfy people, or do most want the name of a real tire even if it costs more? Personally I don't really care that much about the sidewall, but I do like a good looking tread pattern, so I'd be fine with fictional clones.

The trucks section really should be commercial vehicles and work trucks / cars of all sizes. Personally I do think pickups, vans, panel wagons used for work, not show belong. A Ford Pinto with a dominoes sign would even fit in as would a farmers old pickup. Factory stock pickups and such also fit in here. Custom and show rigs whether full size big rig slammed and chromed, S-10 "tuner" style or a low rider '59 El Camino share a lot more with custom cars than trucks. These are more about style, and looking good, not working and getting dirty. Monster lifted 4x4s, and "utes" (El Camino / Ranchero / Brat things) are just going to have to be a value judgement on where the builder feels most comfortable as they can easily go either way with slight differences in building style.

There is a flaw in the logic that American workers have priced themselves out of manufacturing. Most "import" cars for the US market have plants here in the US, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Mitsubishi, Hyundai, VW, BMW, Mercedes all build cars in the US with American workers. In fact Chrysler hasn't been one of the big 3 for quite some time, being overtaken by Honda and Toyota for cars built in the US years ago. Toyota is now the 3rd largest "domestic" car maker in the US with Chrysler and Honda neck in neck for 4th place (they keep flip flopping position between 4 and 5). You can put a lot of the blame for US carmakers problems squarely on management and investors making poor decisions.

The Mack is also a much larger truck than the Ford even without issues caused due to differences in scale. I think the Ford cab would end up looking very small and kind of silly. It looks to me like a fairly simple matter of squaring up the cab openings from the kit and making some doors from sheet styrene. The hood is clearly fabricated, but the cab looks to be based on the original cab It is a very slab sided truck to start with so shouldn't be a particularly difficult conversion. The engine swap could be more involved if you are going to use a Chevrolet I-6 as in the video. The Mack had a rear mounted radiator at the front of the cab. It looks like the conversion uses the cooling system from the 6, with a radiator in the more conventional location in front of the engine.

Do you really think they would sell less well than Japanese cars? Those certainly seem to work for Tamiya, Aoshima et al. Might not be huge sellers in the US, but we are not always the target audience.

I've been following a lot of the 3d threads here and elsewhere so I know about the texture issue. Also understand due to limitations in the program Sketchup can result in some minor faceting on circles. I expect there will be some need to give things a once over with some sand paper, just part of the learning curve. I was planning on using the Frosted Ultra Detail as the description sounds like it is most appropriate for our uses.

Why would licensing be different between the old Beetles and Golfs and the new Beetles and Golf replacements? There are new VW kits, just no kits of new VWs.

I'm not really familiar with Ma's Resin, but the only vintage wheels / tires that I am familiar with are 20" rims for 1.5 to 3 ton trucks (Opel Blitz, Modelhaus). I've been tinkering with Sketchup off and on for quite a few years now, mostly just using it to make plans I can then print out on paper to translate to cutting plastic, but now that 3d printing has advanced to the point that you can "borrow" someones high tech printer I thought I might as well see what I can do. I've got a CAM 104 siren almost ready to go. CAM was a San Francisco Bay Area based company whose sirens are found on a lot of California fire apparatus in the 1950s and 60s. Just need to add the slots around the stator housing and make the base. There are "better" free CAD programs out there, but Sketchup is very user friendly with a lot of good tutorials available online and on youtube. I'm not an engineer so it is about my speed. I tried some of the other programs out there which can do more, but I can't really function in them.

No, the tire will have to be done to fit the rims as there is nothing available. I'm working on this particular wheel for the 1950 Ford F-3 I'm doing, so I'm looking at some vintage off road tires for ideas. Coker tire is a very handy resource for this since they focus on vintage car and truck collectors. Tires are more proving more challenging than the wheels due to the tread which adds a whole new issue. I think I've answered my own question on the separate centers which you also get at. When drawn to scale there is room for a fair bit of adjustment, but since these won't be made from steel and there are minimum working thicknesses much greater than the 1-1 in scale there is a big advantage to combining the outer ring and center. These are just an experiment for me. Nobody really does vintage truck wheels, and I like building vintage trucks, so... time to learn a new skill. It seems like people are having good luck with Shapeways.

So here is what I've got for a 17x5.5" RH5 rim with an 8x6.5" lug pattern which would have been used on a 1950 Ford F3 or Chevrolet 3800 1 ton truck.

I've been fooling around with 3d drawing with the hope of making a mid 20th century split rim wheel for older medium and heavy trucks. I'm focusing on the Firestone RH5 style "Widow Makers" since they were very common so I've been able to find a fair amount of information on them. They were found on a lot of Ford and GM trucks from the late 40s through the early 70s. It's actually going better than I had hoped, although I won't know until I try to get some printed. Anyway, it has occurred to me that I can actually make these in 3 pieces, the two halves of the rim allowing the tire to be easily mounted (much like the 1-1) and a use separate center disk which if I design it right should be adjustable for different wheel offsets. Originally I had planed on making the wheels 2 piece with the disk and one rim half a single piece, but the separate center seems like it might be a useful feature. I haven't seen any wheels done this way before and am wondering if there is any reason that this seems undesirable.

They must have read my thread on European cars. This is great news, now I just have to find a reliable source for Ebbro kits.

Good start, and the camper shell looks great.

Well since I had this donor kit out I couldn't leave well enough alone... Adding a second old Ford which will be done as an F-5, it will be green. This series of Ford truck was known as the Bonus Built Fords, so this is kind of going with that theme (a bonus build ). I bobbed the running boards on the second kit (in grey primer) and used a piece of strip plastic to give it a clean edge. I'll be using the left over to extend the running boards on the red truck (something I didn't think about before painting, but they will be black anyway so not a big deal). The F-1 through F-6 shared fenders with the only difference being larger wheel openings to fit larger tires. Only the F-7 and F-8 used wider fenders so this remains a fairly easy conversion. I removed about 2mm along the edge of the opening to accommodate the larger 20" wheels and changed the shape of the opening a little based on a photo of an F-5.

Not what I expected. the calculations are easy enough, but the common sizes both 1-1 and scale is actually a pretty handy reference.