Fabrux

My master bedroom is currently undergoing mold remediation, so it's contents are spread out between my model room and my daughter's room; we are staying at my inlaws for now. Modeling is difficult, but I made myself a path to my workbench and I've been working on this truck while the remediation guys work. I have the chassis just about all done, just need to hang the spare tire. As with the Blazer, I had to fabricate a Y-pipe. I tried a different method, didn't work so well. I cut little slivers and styrene and glued them in the front centrecaps; together with the red paint they look like manual locking hubs. From a distance, anyway.

Speaking from experience as someone that has crammed their workspace and ~500 models in a 6'x12' room, currently in an 8'x9' room, I would say 10'x10' would be a bit on the small side!

The base kit for this build is the GMC plow truck kit. I'm using a fenderside (correct GMC terminology) bed from an earlier Chevy issue along with the GM truck rallye wheels. I cut down the chassis to have single exhaust and single tank. Like the Blazer I just did, I used a piece from a scrap frame to fill in the crossmember where the second muffler was. Then I went and cut out the second molded-in battery and filled in the "hinge" openings in the firewall. One feature that I really don't like about the Monogram pickup kits of this era is the separate rear cab wall. I have glued this one in and reinforced the inside with melted sprue so that it will stretch enough to get the interior tub in but won't break the glue seam. I smoothed out the cab/cab wall transition as it was rather square. Here's a mockup of how the truck will sit. The bed is from a gluebomb so I've actually had to cut out the floor (to be replaced with basswood) and make my own tailgate. And here's how it sits now, a mockup with paint. The color is Testors Aztek Dark Grey. I stripped the wheels and bumper and painted them white; the grille was stripped and painted Krylon Matte Aluminum. As the kit is molded, it has a SBC with a column-shifted manual transmission, so I decided to build this one up as a base model truck. In my mind the engine is a 305.

I finished this one up, forgot to post about it. Only have the two pictures so far; once I do a proper photoshoot I'll create an Under Glass thread. The spare tire carrier is from the pickup kits, the spare tire itself is from the recent GMC plow truck kit.

Looks like a Peterbilt 320. I spent a lot of time at airports working FIFO jobs so I've seen lots of funky airport equipment. Never saw a fuel truck that big, though.

You know for being two of the most similar countries on Earth I often forget just how different the banking systems of Canada and the US are. We've had chip debit cards for about eight years now, tap + chip debit cards for 3-5 years. On the other hand, Visa debit cards that work as a credit card online but draw from your bank accounts are only a couple years old here. My current bank card is all three

Well, look at that! At least that's an easy fix.

Trying to get myself back into building, decided to try and start with something simple. Good old Monogram Blazer kit. This started out as a partially built Mad Mudder kit, cobbled with a GMC Jimmy parts kit. Unfortunately between the two kits I didn't have a correct intake manifold, so for simplicity's sake I glued the hood shut. Spare tire and carrier are from the pickup kits. I just couldn't let those tiny door handles stay so I shaved them off and carefully cut a set off a spare pickup cab. I cut out one set of the molded in exhaust and used a piece from another Blazer chassis to fill in the gap in the crossmember. The one thing that always bugs me about these kits is the grille just doesn't look quite right. I paint-detailed this one as best I could, even painting the appropriate grille slot grey where the displacement emblem would be. The colour is Testor's Aztek red.

When I started looking around for photo hosting sites nine years ago, I settled on Picasa as it seemed to fit my needs the best. Google has since purchased Picasa, merged with their Google Photos service, and are now shutting down Picasa. I migrated everything over from Picasa to Google Photos, consolidating my two Picasa accounts into one. Now I have discovered that Google Photos has apparently disabled image embedding functionality.

Looks like this: https://goo.gl/photos/kFrrLNsUguK25QDr7

If one isn't too fussy about what the backs of the wheels look like, the smaller insert for the 1:20 wheels fits inside the 1:25 wheels to be able to mount them. Another option for the bench seat is to cut the seat from the Revell (not Monogram) squarebody kits, it fits pretty good.

The tires in all 4WD versions of his kit are 1:25 scale versions of the Formula Desert Dawg PCV. The wheels will also work with AMT/MPC Commander XTs or Firestone All-Terrain T/C. As for the bench seat, it is a separate piece and fits in perfectly but I have not come across a resin repop of it. With the reissue of this kit and the modern cottage industry I would imagine someone will be offering the seat, 2WD suspension, stepside bed, etc.

HARRY HAULER BUILD!!! Although, if that cover photo is what his cab is looking like, the rear doors are a tad short.

Now that I have my own copy of this kit, I can add some comments. The grille in this kit is the '84 style shared with the Hardcastle & McCormick truck. The original Fall Guy issue has the correct '81-82 GMC grille. The optional rims in this issue are the custom wheels in the H&M kit. Bench seat was offered in the original '78 2WD kit and the H&M kit. The '81-82 Chevrolet grille was in the Sodbuster and Ground Shaker kits. I for one am extremely pleased to have this kit reissued, no matter what form the tooling is currently in!

That sounds a lot better than my first thought, which was that what was dumped from those belly dumpers was going to be rolled!

Jeff, what is that tool in the background? Looks like an ancient Dremel...!

The MPC '40 Ford coupe is the recently reissued snap kit, is it not?

There is a 1:25 scale version of the car you're after by MPC/AMT, however it hasn't been reissued in a bit so you won't find it on your average hobby shop shelves. I believe the '89 style was only kitted as a GT, so some creative bashing would be required to make an LX. I don't know that there has been an EFI 2.3L kitted, but the earlier MPC versions of that kit tool have a carb 2.3L in them.

That "car" was a contestant at one of the 24 Hours of LeMons races: https://www.24hoursoflemons.com/ Chances are the car was a completely Canadian car, built at the Halifax, NS plant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volvo_Halifax_Assembly

So the AMT Nova engine is the one to get, not the Trumpeter Nova engine?

Bill, what would be the best engine to use for '73 and up trucks? You've seen my modifications to the AMT '60 C10 engine for a '69 Blazer and I have another one planned for a '76 C10. If the MCW resin engine would be the better starting point I'll get a couple of those.

While I can't attest to the 1969 model years, I do know that on the one truck I have first hand knowledge on (1996 F-150), the darker colour was painted over the whole truck. This particular truck was blue with a silver down the middle of the sides, however the inside of the bed and the rear cab wall were still blue. I believe my dad's old project truck '73 was the same as well. For the trucks that just had the cab roof painted white, I would hazard a guess to say that the white was painted after the whole truck and the main colour would be underneath.

It appears that on 5 February 2016 Heller entered a redressement judiciare, a French legal status that roughly corresponds to receivership.

MPC snap kit hands down. The kit is a '75 with the one-piece roof. Use the Revell snap kit as a template or roof swap to get the '76-'91 style roof. Grille from the Revell kit can also be made to work in the MPC body to make it a '77-'79.

Sorry no updates on this one for a while. Didn't like how the paint turned out on the body so it's been sitting in it's box waiting for me to get around to stripping the paint and trying again. But, in the mean time, here's how the '69 2WD suspension looks on the '78 frame: