Scratch Built 1958 Mercedes-Benz LP 333 Twin Steer Truck aka "Tausendfüssler" - Plus Tutorial: Making Louvers (complete)

[Plastheniker]

Usually I am not that much interested in R/C models, but indeed, this deserves the word masterpiece, really spectacular! I watched the video several times, what outstanding modeling abilities!

 

[10thumbs]

Hello Jürgen,  you really build excellent models.  Very clean and they seem to be all photographed in a manner that lets them look very real.  I have no idea what scale these models are specifically, very well done.

I've seen your presence on some German forums where more of your builds are shown.  My compliments.

I especially like the satin sheen of your paint jobs.  Some time I'd like to understand a bit more of your technique.

PS:  Your wire wheel lacing tutorial is outstanding, many thanks.

Michael, Wiesbaden

[Rob Hall]

Quite the work of art.

[Plastheniker]

Michael, Robert, thanks a lot!

 

All my models, i. e. also my scratch builds, match the most popular scales unless a different scale is stated in my topics:

 

• American trucks 1/25
• Euro trucks 1/24
• Road cars 1/24 or 1/25
• GP & F1 cars 1/20
• Military vehicles 1/35

 

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Jürgen, I hope I am not too inquisitive, but I still ask myself how you made these absolutely uniform louvers. They look perfect.

Did you use 3-dimensional louvers from transfer sheets? Those that I know are way too small.

Or did you remove the louvers from a kit part? Then you would have been very lucky first to find the right louver size and then to remove them without damage.

I asked some of my fellow modelers, but they hadn't any idea either  .

[Plastheniker]

Thomas, sorry for my late reply.

 

You are right.

3D transfer louvers are made for the smaller scales of model railroads.

Indeed I also considered "transplanting" kit louvers but I dropped the idea because I couldn't find anything usuable.

 

After some pondering I finally found a technique of making absolutely identical louvers by reshaping ordinary inexpensive quarter round rod.

 

[Belugawrx]

Another beauty J !!

That interior alone is a years work....

Stunning

Cheers

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Jürgen, now it is clear what you didn't do, but  h o w  did you reshape the quarter round rod so precisely? 

 

Would you probably consider to share your technique? Certainly I am not the only one who would like to know it.

 

[Plastheniker]

Of course I do, secretive modelers shouldn't join forums.

Probably I can start a tutorial here in this thread next week or a week later.

Anyway please give me some time, I won't forget it.

 

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Jürgen, thanks for taking the time! We are looking forward to your tutorial.

[Plastheniker]

Replicating louvers is always a problem. Louvers have a cross section like this:

 

 

Unfortunately no manufacturer of styrene strips as Plastruct or Evergreen supplies something similar.

Two apparently obvious solutions fail in most cases regarding scales 1/25 and larger:

• 3D transfer louvers are made for model railroads, thus they are usually too small.

• Transplanting kit louvers mostly fails because it is not very likely to find exactly the size and the number of louvers you need; moreover cannibalizing a kit is costly.

 

I am going to describe two slightly different techniques of making louvers.

 

 

Making louvers

 

 

I. What do you need?

 

• For the samples shown here I used Plastruct quarter round rod 1.5mm/0.060". Your projects may require smaller or larger sizes.

• Indispensable is a drill stand with accurate height adjustment. As shown here I use an inexpensive Proxxon Minimot equipment. I simply added a modified clamp from Proxxon's Universal Holder and fixed it with the horizontal grey wing screw to the column. By turning the vertical chromed wing screw I can adjust the height of the rotary tool by fractions of a millimeter. Probably you remember this device from my wire wheel tutorial.

 

• As shown you need a large-diameter, non-flexible, thin saw blade. Mine is Micro Mark's #14137 with 2" dia. It works perfectly.

 

 

II. Making medium and large louvers

 

From the quarter round rod cut equal sections of exactly the length of the desired louvers.

 

 

Assemble four of these sections to form a four-piece round rod and hold them together with a piece of tube. Fix them additionally with a small strip of tape in order to prevent any slipping.

 

 

Insert this asembly into your rotary tool and sand the protruding end to make a nice hemisphere. Do the same at the other end.

 

 

Remove the four parts from the tube. Now they look like this.

 

 

Superglue them onto a piece of styrene sheet. Adjust the height of the saw blade and "decapitate" them as shown here.

 

 

Dispose the red part on the drawing. The green part is the louver. Deburr the louvers if necessary. The final result looks like this.

 

 

 

________________________

 

To be continued - any questions and comments welcome

 

Edited January 28, 2016 by Plastheniker

[Ace-Garageguy]

You're every bit as much engineer as you are modeler. Beautiful work on everything, fascinating technique.

[Plastheniker]

The front louvers of my model were made using quarter round rod of the above mentioned dimension.

 

The thickness of the used saw blade is the only limiting factor of this technique. Micro Mark's saw blade shown above is 0.015" thick. The actual cut of any saw blade, however, always becomes wider than the blade thickness because of the more or less visible imbalance of the rotating saw blade. It is obvious that from a certain point decapitating very thin rods cannot leave anything usable.

In this case simply test thinner saw blades. If they aren't too flexible they may work.

 

If everything fails I use the following slightly different technique.

 

 

 

II. Making small louvers

 

Here the result are less uniform, but since the louvers are much smaller the result is still acceptable IMO.

E. g. I had to replace all those rather small louvers on this crude 1/24 kit, whose original louvers were hardly perceptible.

 

 

Again use quarter round rod of a suitable dimension.

With a Sharpie paint both plain sides of the quarter round rod red for better visibility. For more stability put the rod f. e. into a groove and fix it provisionally with pieces of tape. Then scrape off the part of the rod marked red on this drawing with a #11 blade:

 

The remaining Sharpie-red surfaces show when you have to stop scraping to achieve a uniform shape. Nevertheless it is likely that scraping is overdone here and there, so prepare more rods than you need and choose the best sections.

If all rods have been finished cut equal pieces of the required length giving all ends an equal bevel of f. e. 45°.

Glue these louvers in place and shape the ends to a more round and uniform look.

 

________________________

 

To be continued - any questions and comments welcome

[Plastheniker]

III. Gluing louvers

 

Louvers should never be applied freehand. Any irregularity in a row of louvers would be very conspicious. Always use a stop rail or a jig for perfect alignment.

 

In most popular scales louvers are rather small and by this there is only a tiny area where glue can be applied. Any visible glue, however, will spoil the result.

The best choice is gluing with acetone. Align a louver, dip a small brush into acetone, and let the acetone flow between model and louver. The acetone evaporates in seconds welding both parts together without any trace. The joint is strong enough as long as it is touched with care.

 

If the acetone joint is prone to rough handling it must be secured with liquid super glue.

• If there is access to the back of the panel first drill a small hole where the louver will be placed. At last secure the acetone joint by applying an small amount of super glue into the hole.

• If there is no such access fix all louvers with acetone. At last using a very thin piece of wire pick up a minimum of super glue and apply a tiny droplet into all gaps betwen the louvers.

 

 

IV. Considering manufacturers' inaccuracies

 

Never rely upon manufacturer's accuracy when using styrene strips. There are often more or less different dimensions even in the same package.

Regarding quarter round rod there is one issue more. The two plane sides are mostly different, i. e. one side is wider than the other.

 

Therefore proceed like this:

1. If you need more than one rod use a caliper and choose the most similar rods.

2. If the two plane sides are differently wide, mark either the wide or the narrow sides. Always make sure that the marked sides have the same position when reshaping the rod, f. e. always glue the marked sides onto the piece of styrene before decapitating the rod sections. Otherwise you would decapitate sections of varying height. It is obvious that this would result in louvers of varying shapes.

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

I hope everything was understandable. If not please let me know.

Thanks for your attention!

 

[kilrathy10]

You are good, Man....You are good at this.....Great tutorial....I don't think I'd be ambitious enough to attempt this technique, but it sure is interesting....

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Jürgen, thanks for your trouble and thanks for sharing. This a comprehensible tutorial about a really ingenious technique.

Once someone had the right idea in retrospect everyting seems obvious.

 

By the way the forum search for "Plastheniker" doesn't work very well. Is there any way to find a list of the topics you started in the past?

 

[Plastheniker]

...  By the way the forum search for "Plastheniker" doesn't work very well. Is there any way to find a list of the topics you started in the past?

 

Thomas, indeed the forum search is not very useful. Nevertheless finding a forum member's previous topics is quick and easy:

 

On the profile page of every forum member there is a rectangular white button "See their activity" right of the avatar.

When you click this button a list of all previous posts of this member appears.

When you then click "Topics" on the menu on the left a complete list of all previous topics of this member is shown.

Clicking a particular topic on this list opens the topic with all pictures. If only thumbs are shown clicking a thumb shows the picture full-size.

 

[gino]

thanks for sharing this !

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Wow, what an impressive list! It promises some interesting hours. Thanks again!

[SpreadAxle]

You did a fantastic job on this truck. Very nice.

[Plastheniker]

Thanks for the latest replies!

 

I was asked recently by a German modeler who was too young to remember the fifties what the sign on the rear platform gate means.

If anyone is interested this is the story:

In the fifties many German companies produced enamel signs with their company logos (often insurance or petrol companies) as giveaways meant to be attached to trucks. Most popular were pin-up girls and slogans for more road safety.

The most popular of the latter kind were "Hör' auf deine Frau - fahr' vorsichtig!" (= Listen to your wife - drive cautiously!) and this one on my model

 

 

(= Take your time and not your life!), a timeless advice still worth to be considered.

Edited December 1, 2016 by Plastheniker
New picture link

[Belugawrx]

Cheers J !!

Thnx 4 dat

[Bennyg]

Very nice! Thanks for sharing.

 

Ben

[Ack! Ack-ack!]

Very interesting, I didn't know either.

You mentioned that those pin-ups of the fifties were giveaways with company logos.

My next project will be Revell's 1952 Büssing 8000 kit. It has a nice decal sheet including a pin-up girl for the grille as the instruction sheet says. This Revell pin-up has no company logo.

Were there also pin-ups without company logos or is this Revell decal something like a generic pin-up without real reference? If it is historically incorrect I will rather leave it out.

 

No more stupid questions from me in this topic - scout's honour!  

 

[Plastheniker]

Thanks for the recent replies!

 

...  This Revell pin-up has no company logo.

Were there also pin-ups without company logos or is this Revell decal something like a generic pin-up without real reference? ...

Thomas, sorry for my late answer.

The Revell decal is correct. It shows the most popular pin-up giveaway of the fifties, the famous Veedol skater. When you inspect your decal very closely you can even read "Veedol" on her dress.

Originally the skater character was created in the very early fifties by a later very successful German advertising artist for a German skate manufacturer named Hudora. It is said that he was inspired by the beauty of "Miss Germany" of those days. Soon after he got the order to create an advertising character for Veedol of Germany. He reutilized his Hudora skater after a few modifications. Veedol used this skater for many purposes for (I believe) 20 years and modernized it continuously. When the skater was dropped neither the artist nor Veedol were able to explain why she had become so popular.

These are some variations of the Veedol skater and some copies:

 

 

BTW I didn't use the decal on my Büssing because IMO it detracted from the typical Büssing grille.

In either case you will enjoy the kit, it is fantastic.

 

Hopefully Harry won't give me warning points for posting sexist stuff  .