Aaronw

The Scout really needs a bath. Nice '55 you have there, I've been working on my dad to get him to donate his '52 GMC to me. It would be great for a nice sunday drive to the hardware store.

Nice trucks, I really like the tow truck. The girl with the purple Ramcharger looks like she just stepped out of an early 70s car ad.

You can stop second guessing that when you figure out how much you would have spent doing something else. 150 kits plus supplies is probably well under $2000 or around $150 a month or $5 a day. Now think what you would have spent if instead of sitting at the bench building a model you were out spending money. Just going to a movie by yourself for 2 hours costs about the same as a week of modelling once you add up the ticket, popcorn and a soda.

So you think a slammed pickup truck using the same styling as a low rider car belongs with semi trucks instead of with low riders? In the other direction a Fed Ex Chevy Astro Van has more in common with a Semi than with a soccer mom's Dodge Caravan. It is not snobbery, it just makes sense to have the same style of vehicle with others that share that style, not just by chassis.

No but it shows posting volume. If it takes 6 weeks for a forum to to fill one page that is a slow forum, there is room for 30 posts on a page, so that is less than one post per day. When you have forums with very low traffic people tend to drift into busier forums because it's no fun talking to yourself. For some things volume doesn't matter, but for modelling categories I think it is important. Ideally I would aim for 4 days to a week to clear a page, and no more than a month. If things are being pushed off the page in only a day or two it might be time to divide into more catgories, if it takes 30-60 days it is probably time to combine it with another category. It only take 4-5 posts per day to clear a page in a week, only 1 a day to do so in a month, so I'm not saying just put it all in one big forum. I'm just saying you should carefully evaluate how much traffic a category can expect to get. Looking at the current forum I just don't see the need for seperating racing into multiple categories.

I'll just poke my nose in with two more comments 1 Randx0 has a good point, the model categories should be grouped together. I don't care what order but it is kind of weird the way we currently have model cars than a bunch of other stuff, model trucks, then a bunch of other stuff. Harry where you have categories listed xyz / pdq / lmnop is that showing what would grouped together or are you suggesting each / designated a seperate forum under a common heading? I'm hoping the first because the second means a lot of new forums. and since I'm feeling generous this morning I'll throw in a 3rd comment for free . For any should we / shouldn't we categories I'd prefer to see it left out, if on a second look it later appears to be worth adding a seperate category add it. It seems to me it is less disruptive to add (cool we got something new), then take away due to low volume (boo, you guys don't like xyz models). Competition seems a good candidate for this, I'd suggest starting small then revisit it in 3 months and see if any categories actually have enough volume to justify their own forum. Looking at the current drag and NASCAR forums I see the first page in drag racing still includes posts 2 weeks old and NASCAR includes posts 6 weeks old. To find posts 2 weeks old in Model trucks you have to go to page 2 (almost to page 3), On the workbench you have to go to page 5 and in General page 6. I just don't see the reason for a very narrow forum unless the posting volume will knock week old posts off the front page.

Don't forget the 5 foot long 1/72 Japanese submarine, that was a fairly significant new tool. Unfortunately it wasn't well received.

Just thought I'd add I'd also be fine with Cars Light trucks Heavy trucks

I would really like to not see this turn into 47 different sub forums as I have seen done on a number of sites. A few carefully selected broad categories should work. General - stuff that doesn't belong elsewhere, including marginally off topic but potentially of interest stuff. Off topic (no politics, no religion, nothing likely to be offensive) stuff that really doesn't belong anywhere else (it's going to get posted might as well give it a place so it keeps it out of other forums) Cars - 4 to 6 divisions with clearly defined broad applications (I don't build most of these so adjust as appropriate) Race cars - non-street legal cars built for racing Performance cars - street legal cars that go fast, includes daily drivers that race weekends (SCCA etc) Modified cars - generally fast, street legal (mostly), cars with major modifications, hot rods, gassers, etc Not sure if tuners would belong here or under performance. Custom cars - cars built for style more than performance, low riders, and similar (sorry I really don't know the classes of these cars) Factory stock - Cars as they looked in the show room (minus those built for speed). Trucks Light commercial - working vehicles under class 6 (not neccessarily truck based vehicles), pickup trucks, delivery vans, ambulances, police cars, taxis etc Light trucks - non-commercial stock to lightly modified light duty trucks, pickups, El Caminos, SUVs etc. Includes street legal performance trucks like the Ford Lightning, Chevy SS454 and GMC Syclone. Heavy trucks - Class 6-8 big rigs and medium duty trucks. Includes vehicles like fire engines, large utility company trucks, and off highway trucks (Payhauler). Wild things - Truck specific craziness, Pullers, monster trucks etc. Includes car based vehicles used in these kinds of events. I don't really see the need to duplicate many of the car sections for light trucks, to me a "low rider" truck belongs with other low riders, a NASCAR truck belongs with race cars. Just because they are built on a light truck instead of a car doesn't mean they need their own section, they should be apprciated by the same people. I also don't see the point to a xyz forum, wip for xyz forum and underglass for xyz forum. A Cars under glass and a Trucks under glass section seems more than adequate, and wip should be in the appropriate sub category. Tips and tricks, I'd like to see this split into a question / request section and a posted tutorials section. I'm not really in favor of a read only feature to the tutorials, some of the questions and comments that come up add to the tutorial. Group builds - just a place to find the group builds. I don't see any reason it needs to be divided into further sub categories. Those are the big ones for me. A few I could do with or without. Kits - questions, comments about a kit. Reviews - new or old, post a review of a kit you have. Make sure to keep the wanted, swap, diorama and resin sections

Harry this has come up before and it has been made clear each time that the Model Trucks section was for Class 6-8 trucks, the medium and heavy duty rigs. It is not for the light duty trucks which includes 1 ton and smaller trucks. Light commercial vehicles have been tolerated, but some of the wilder light trucks have been politely told they really belong in another part of the forum. It ends up with the smaller guys getting smacked around like a ping pong ball looking for a home. Gregg's adding a light duty section will help but I think it is pretty clear why there has been confusion. At least with trucks I think most try but it is confusing. They get told by one mod that they belong down there, then told by another they belong up top. As far as the rest I agree it would be nice to see everything posted in the right place and just once, it certainly makes it easier to find posts. I am rather surprised people have the time to send you PMs complaining about it though, I wish I had time to worry about trivial things like that. In no way are any of my comments meant to imply you are doing a sub par job. Moderating is a fairly thankless job, so thanks for putting up with our gripes and groans. Thanks

I have a book on old Dodge trucks, it looks to me like they were available with an L head 6 of 228 or 331 cid. Dodge also began to offer a 331 cid 6 cyl diesel in 1939 (no relation to the gas 331). These motors only put out 90-100 +/- hp so a repower later in life seems quite reasonable to me. If the V-8 from the L-700 fits that would be a possibility, Dodge also used the 226 slant 6 in some of their smaller heavy trucks. I think Sourkrout has a Detroit Diesel 6-71 which might be a good choice being an inline 6. You could justify the engine and carhauler on the old truck by saying they scrapped a wrecked GMC mounting the salvaged body and diesel on an older Dodge they had on hand.

Thanks, I had no idea what these would have used but I was hoping they would be slightly oddball smaller motors, suitable for other uses which it appears they are. The cars themselves look like they could be fun too. I hope your thoughts about possible aftermarket motors comes true, they sound interesting as well.

This might help by giving you the official classification of the trailer you want. It comes from the DOT Emergency Response Guide, and lists the different style of trailers. http://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/saf-sec-sur/3/erg-gmu/erg/roadtrailer.aspx

Any idea what kind of motors we might find in the midget racers? The SVO is nice to see, I've been watching ebay, now I can just sit back and wait a few months.

Contests categories are generally driven by the number of entrys, if they don't usually get a lot of trucks they will lump them together. It seems like most want at least 10-15 models to make up a new category, so if you are only getting 10-15 entries it doesn't make a lot of sense to split things up. As far as here I agree the truck situation is a bit confusing, the truck forum is specifically for heavy duty trucks class 6-8. This leaves the smaller trucks in a weird limbo since they don't fit into the truck forum and even some of the moderators think they don't belong in general. I'm not really in favor of having a forum segregated for every minor variation as it is at SA. Personally I'd prefer to see everything together or just a handful of broad categories. I wouldn't suggest a light truck section though, as they easily fit into many car types depending on how they are built. Heavy trucks are clearly on their own just by their size and purpose, but light trucks share a lot with cars as they can be built as low riders, hot rods, muscle cars, working vehicles etc. Light commercial would be a good possibility that would include cars like taxis, ambulances and police cars as well as light trucks built to work. Those built in other styles really probably belong with cars of that style.

I've got a section of wall 6 feet by 4 feet just for trucks, about 75 pickups and maybe 40 large truck kits.

Bah, no judges, I say Thunderdome, 2 men enter, 1 man leaves.

Unless you are wanting them for a dark colored background you could probably do them on an inkjet printer, just make the colors much lighter than they would have been originally so they look faded. For example to do black lettering on a light colored door, use 10-20% black (light grey) instead of black.

I hate super glue, it seems like everytime I go to use it, the bottle has dried up. I did have some stuff with a screw top and a brush I really liked. The brush made application easy and the screw top took care of the clogging / drying. I found it in a drug store but they don't have it anymore . Mostly I use epoxy these days, it doesn't dry up in the tube, it doesn't run, it doesn't cause fogging and it won't stick your fingers together.

I don't think silicone would work very well, it seems like the wire would just slip out. Epoxy is easy to use but takes practice, make sure you have 2 equal size blobs then mix them well. I have some 1 ounce plastic cups (a bag of 100 was about $3) that I use to mix my epoxy. For small jobs you have to make more than you need as 2 half pea sized blobs is the smallest I've had any luck mixing. I don't care for the double syringe style tube for epoxy. I was able to get two seperate 5 ounce bottles (like small mustard bottles) which I find easier to get an equal mix. There are some epoxy putties that you might be able to use if you really hate the liquid stuff. They are not clear but the two halves are different colors, a blue and yellow ribbon is one I see at a lot of hardware stores, when the putty turns green it is mixed. I haven't tried this stuff on a model so don't know if the grip is as good as 5 min epoxy. You also might try contact cement, you put a drop on both halves, when the touch they grab and hold (very little ability to relocate so get it right the first time). It is primarily used on wood and counter top materials, I don't know if this stuff is safe for styrene so I'd try it on some scrap first.

Frying pan spatter guards could provide a good screen for that. Just shop around because the screen varies by brand, some is tiny expanded metal (diamonds), and some is like small screen door screen (square).

You do not need an explosion proof fan for a paint booth, none of us would be able to afford a spray booth if we did as they start around $1000 just for a small fan. An explosion proof fan is a very specific item meant for very hazardous atmospheres like venting a fuel bunker or a full size automotive spray booth. None of the commercial hobby booths use an explosion proof fan. What is recommended is a fan that is not in the air flow like a shaded pole blower also known as a squirrel cage. The blower is on a rod allowing the motor to remain outside of the airflow. Almost all of the commercial hobby booths use this style of fan. If you get a good fan it will generally be the most expensive part of your booth. I built mine for $200, the fan cost $144.

Thanks, one more thing to add to my must get list.

Pat, how is the suspension set up, seperate springs or molded into the chassis? I'm wondering how hard it will be to do one of these as a 4x4, seperate springs would certainly make a conversion easier. Good looking truck so far.

Chop chop, you've had almost 45 minutes whats the hold up on pics.