Peterbilt 359 'needle nose' conversion

[robdebie]

I'm preparing to do a 'needle nose' conversion of the AMT Peterbilt 359, in order to create a 281 (the 'Duel' truck). With new parts required for the hood and radiator, I was pretty sure I would lose the aligment of cab, hood and grille. Therefore I built a jig that held these parts in place. The jig has three steps.

Here's the jig with the kit's cab, hood and grille (taped together) placed on the jig

Now my question: what width should the narrow grille have? Does anyone know that figure?

I have three reference values:

1. in the 1984 FMS article, the author narrowed the grille bij 1/4", making it ~42 mm / 1.65" (or 41" in reality)
2. I measured the grille width in a line drawing in an old spec sheet, and found ~34 mm / 1.32" (33" in reality)
3. I plotted a drawing of the wide AMT grille over a screenshot from the movie, narrowed it until it fitted, and found ~35 mm / 1.38" (34.5" in reality)

As expected, three different values.. Help?

Rob

Edited May 1 by robdebie

[Aaronw]

Not a Peterbilt expert, but from memory the reason for the change in grill was the adoption of a larger radiator, the older radiator having 2 cores, and the new radiator 3.

Now if it is as simple as the old radiator being 2/3 the width, I don't know, but I'd think likely to save on tooling costs. Why manufacture all new cores when you could just make a new radiator housing (frame? body?) to hold 3 of them. 

[robdebie]

Aaron, thanks for this detail that could explain the relative width! In my unscientfic measurements it's a little wider than 2/3rds of the 359 grille width.

Last night and tonight I made a 3D CAD model. I will probably add some rivets, and maybe change the dimensions if new information pops up.

Rob

 

 

 

 

[Gary Chastain]

https://stsupplyco.com/collections/cab-hood-parts/products/kenworth-w825-needle-nose-cab-conversion-kit-1-25

not sure if this will help

[Dave Van]

I'd be in for a grille if you make extra. Thx

[Force]

The width of the grille on my 1959 Peterbilt 281/351 cab kit from AITM is 32 mm wide and 45 mm high, it's 1:25th scale.
Not all of the needle nose Petes has rivets on the rear edge of the grille, but the Duel truck do.
The 281/351 also has butterfly hood and if it's a one piece tilt hood it's a 258/388.

Edited May 3 by Force

[robdebie]

14 hours ago, Gary Chastain said:

https://stsupplyco.com/collections/cab-hood-parts/products/kenworth-w825-needle-nose-cab-conversion-kit-1-25

not sure if this will help

It took me a bit before I spotted it's a Kenworth 🙂

Rob

[robdebie]

12 hours ago, Dave Van said:

I'd be in for a grille if you make extra. Thx

I'm thinking about making the STL files available, but only after I finish my model. It has happened before that I sold cast parts to others, and they had their model done before mine was finished..

Rob

[robdebie]

6 hours ago, Force said:

The width of the grille on my 1959 Peterbilt 281/351 cab kit from AITM is 32 mm wide and 45 mm high, it's 1:25th scale.
Not all of the needle nose Petes has rivets on the rear edge of the grille, but the Duel truck do.
The 281/351 also has butterfly hood and if it's a one piece tilt hood it's a 258/388.

Hakan, thanks for your measurement! 32 mm, that's the lowest number so far.. My grille has grown in width during the 3D drawing, from 35.0 to 35.5 mm, so that sounds like the wrong direction. But I can change that relatively easily.

Indeed I want to add the rivets on the rear edge of the grille, some movie scenes shown them clearly. I also need to add a ribbed 'thingie' on top of the grille, do you know what that is?

Regarding the butterfly hood, I have't studied that properly so far. My main question is probably the approximate diameter of the piano hinges. I haven't found a single photo of that detail so far.

Rob

Edited May 3 by robdebie

[Aaronw]

I found my Peterbilt book, but although full of information and drawings, nothing on the width of a "narrow" nose vs "wide" nose. They do however give the frontal area of the radiators, the radiator for the 281/351 was 1050 square inches vs 1444 on the 289 / 359, so the older is about 3/4 the size, although it doesn't break it down into additional width vs height.

[robdebie]

16 hours ago, Aaronw said:

I found my Peterbilt book, but although full of information and drawings, nothing on the width of a "narrow" nose vs "wide" nose. They do however give the frontal area of the radiators, the radiator for the 281/351 was 1050 square inches vs 1444 on the 289 / 359, so the older is about 3/4 the size, although it doesn't break it down into additional width vs height.

Thanks for checking! My original question was a long shot, I realised that. It's not science anyway, so I decided to guesstimate the width, in order to make progress. I made version 2 tonight: narrowed it a bit from 35.5 to 34.0 mm, added rivets to the sides, and added a simplified hood ornament (since I couldn't see it properly). The file is off to the club member who will print it. Maybe I'll see the result next Tuesday at our monthly club meeting.

Rob

Edited May 4 by robdebie

[Force]

14 hours ago, robdebie said:

Hakan, thanks for your measurement! 32 mm, that's the lowest number so far.. My grille has grown in width during the 3D drawing, from 35.0 to 35.5 mm, so that sounds like the wrong direction. But I can change that relatively easily.

Indeed I want to add the rivets on the rear edge of the grille, some movie scenes shown them clearly. I also need to add a ribbed 'thingie' on top of the grille, do you know what that is?

Regarding the butterfly hood, I have't studied that properly so far. My main question is probably the approximate diameter of the piano hinges. I haven't found a single photo of that detail so far.

Rob

I just measured the AITM resin kit grille, I don't have any precise measure of the real thing.
I have a couple of magazine articles that states to remove 6 mm or 1/4 inch from the center of the 359 grille and that could be right...I haven't checked if it matches up with the resin grille.

The main primary 281 truck in the movie wich was destroyed at the end indeed had rivets at the rear edge of the grille, but there were two trucks used in this movie, a mid 60's 351 was used for the extended scenes filmed in 1973-74, and that truck did not have any rivets on the rear edge of the grille.
I have not noticed any ribbed "thingie" on top of the grille other than the ornament and mirror, I have not seen any good pictures of the top of the grille on the primary truck and I have collected all photos I could find on it.

From reliable sources I have found out that the Primary truck was a former Union Oil truck and it was a 1957, not a 1955 as stated on many places, Union Oil only bought two tag axle 281's in the 1954 to 1961 period, this was just the tractor, not the trailer wich was much earlier (late 40's) and wasn't originally on the truck.
The engine originally was a NH-6B Cummins but was changed to a Cat 1673B sometime under it's life, mid 60's, and the yellow horisontal air cleaner is indeed a from a Cat 1673, the trans was a RTO-913 Fuller.
This could be the movie truck or it's sister when they were new in 1957.

 

[Bugatti Fan]

There is a full article of mine about building the Duel Rig in a copy of MCM  from a few years back. Should be available as a back issue.  It was in the days before 3D printing or any resin transkits became available but quite doable as a conversion to the AMT Peterbilt 359 California Hauler the old fashioned way.

I used the kit's front wheels that are wrong and discovered my mistake long after I had built and fixed the model to a base! The correct type is shown in the picture in Hakan's post.

Edited May 4 by Bugatti Fan

[robdebie]

8 hours ago, Force said:

I just measured the AITM resin kit grille, I don't have any precise measure of the real thing.
I have a couple of magazine articles that states to remove 6 mm or 1/4 inch from the center of the 359 grille and that could be right...I haven't checked if it matches up with the resin grille.

The main primary 281 truck in the movie wich was destroyed at the end indeed had rivets at the rear edge of the grille, but there were two trucks used in this movie, a mid 60's 351 was used for the extended scenes filmed in 1973-74, and that truck did not have any rivets on the rear edge of the grille.
I have not noticed any ribbed "thingie" on top of the grille other than the ornament and mirror, I have not seen any good pictures of the top of the grille on the primary truck and I have collected all photos I could find on it.

From reliable sources I have found out that the Primary truck was a former Union Oil truck and it was a 1957, not a 1955 as stated on many places, Union Oil only bought two tag axle 281's in the 1954 to 1961 period, this was just the tractor, not the trailer wich was much earlier (late 40's) and wasn't originally on the truck.
The engine originally was a NH-6B Cummins but was changed to a Cat 1673B sometime under it's life, mid 60's, and the yellow horisontal air cleaner is indeed a from a Cat 1673, the trans was a RTO-913 Fuller.
This could be the movie truck or it's sister when they were new in 1957.

Taking ~6 mm from the AMT grille brings it from 48 to 42 mm, the widest of the values I found. I think that's too wide.

I'm strictly building the original movie truck. I've identified the film bits that show the second truck, and I'm ignoring those parts completely.

The 'thingie' is indeed the hood ornament. I found a few photos of it on other trucks, but all were slightly different. In the end I made a simple representation, since I wanted to send the file off for printing.

I didn't know that the commonly stated 1955 vintage was wrong, interesting. And thanks for posting that great photo!

Regarding the drive train, I haven't decided what to do with it. There's no kit with a Cat 1673B, and making a 3D design with no more than a few bad pictures will be horrible. Maybe I'll make it a curbside with a dummy engine..

Rob

Edited May 4 by robdebie

[robdebie]

6 hours ago, Bugatti Fan said:

There is a full article of mine about building the Duel Rig in a copy of MCM  from a few years back. Should be available as a back issue.  It was in the days before 3D printing or any resin transkits became available but quite doable as a conversion to the AMT Peterbilt 359 California Hauler the old fashioned way.

I used the kit's front wheels that are wrong and discovered my mistake long after I had built and fixed the model to a base! The correct type is shown in the picture in Hakan's post.

I think I found that issue here: https://www.magzter.com/US/Model-Cars-Magazine/Model-Cars/Automotive/158720https://www.magzter.com/US/Model-Cars-Magazine/Model-Cars/Automotive/158720

The front wheel problem was solved by another 3D design:

Doing all these parts in 3D printing is a bit of an experiment. It will move yet more time to the computer, away from the modeling desk. And I don't know whether I want that. On the other hand, scratchbuilding the wheels or the grille the old way is a ton of work, and probably never as nice..

Rob

[Aaronw]

I just remembered I have an old Silver State Resin Peterbilt 350 resin cab which were considered pretty good at the time. Measuring the grill I get a width of 35mm.  

[robdebie]

1 hour ago, Aaronw said:

I just remembered I have an old Silver State Resin Peterbilt 350 resin cab which were considered pretty good at the time. Measuring the grill I get a width of 35mm.  

Aaron, thank you again! 35 mm matches my 3D design pretty well (34 mm), I'm happy to hear that!

I hadn't heard of this aftermarket part, but I found a single phot report here: https://public.fotki.com/mackinac359/peterbilt-model-gal/pie-350-tractor/

The photos of that model trigger a fear I have: I think the needle nose conversion of my AMT 359 will result in a hood that looks longer than the movie truck. The hood of the Silver State Resin Peterbilt 350 also looks too long to my eye.

The spec sheets say the distance from bumper to rear of the cab is alway 119.25", and the AMT 359 model agrees well with that number. However there's one old spec sheet, hardly readable, that has one shorter option: a Hall-Scott 590 engined 281 was 113.25". That's 6 mm in 1/25 scale, and should be very visible. Help?

Rob

Edited May 4 by robdebie

[Force]

14 hours ago, robdebie said:

Taking ~6 mm from the AMT grille brings it from 48 to 42 mm, the widest of the values I found. I think that's too wide.

I'm strictly building the original movie truck. I've identified the film bits that show the second truck, and I'm ignoring those parts completely.

The 'thingie' is indeed the hood ornament. I found a few photos of it on other trucks, but all were slightly different. In the end I made a simple representation, since I wanted to send the file off for printing.

I didn't know that the commonly stated 1955 vintage was wrong, interesting. And thanks for posting that great photo!

Regarding the drive train, I haven't decided what to do with it. There's no kit with a Cat 1673B, and making a 3D design with no more than a few bad pictures will be horrible. Maybe I'll make it a curbside with a dummy engine..

Rob

I also plan to build the primary truck when I build mine and I'm gathering parts as we speak, I have everything covered except for the engine and front wheels.

I bought the resin cab kit from AITM and I also got a narrow nose hood kit from Dave made to fit the small window Unlilite cab AMT 359, I just took it out and measured it and the grille is 36 mm on that one, so it's slightly wider than the grille on the cab kit and close to your 3D design.
Go with what you think looks best.
If you want to be sure and get it right ask the Peterbilt guru Tim Ahlborn, he would know, he is a member here on the forum but I have not seen him post here for a  long time, I see him post on Spotlight Hobbies board from time to time, but he has a facebook group called MTDG Model Truck Discussion Group and he posts frequently there.


This is the closest I could find of an early hood ornament but I think some I have seen looks slightly different.
But good pictures are hard to find....I've tried., most of the ornaments I find pictures of are the later air plane style.

I don't know how I will tackle the engine issue either, maybe modify a kit engine to look like a 1673 or something like that, as you say, nothing is available.
There are two different designations for the same engine tho', 1693 for the truck engine and D333 for the heavy machine version, but they are the same on the outside, what can differ is if they have aftercooler or not, I have found lots of pictures on the web of these engines wich I saved to my files.

I forgot to mention the suspension on the truck, it was a Page & Page 60/40 suspension and you can find one at Czech Truck Model (CTM) wich recently added a couple of suspensions to their line of resin truck parts.
I'm sure more will come in the future, I have provided lots of pictures of old truck suspensions to them.
https://www.czechtruckmodel.com/resin-suspension-sets/297-ctm-24269-page-and-page-suspension-set.html
The axles are wrong for the movie truck as both are top loaders, but the suspension is right, the movie truck appearently had one top loader drive axle when it left the factory but it was also changed to a front loader axle, most likely when they changed the rest of the drive line but they kept the tag axle and the suspension.

When it comes to suspension on the trailer I found out from reliable sources that it would have had Kenworth style torsion bar suspension like this.

 

14 hours ago, robdebie said:

I think I found that issue here: https://www.magzter.com/US/Model-Cars-Magazine/Model-Cars/Automotive/158720https://www.magzter.com/US/Model-Cars-Magazine/Model-Cars/Automotive/158720

The front wheel problem was solved by another 3D design:

Doing all these parts in 3D printing is a bit of an experiment. It will move yet more time to the computer, away from the modeling desk. And I don't know whether I want that. On the other hand, scratchbuilding the wheels or the grille the old way is a ton of work, and probably never as nice..

Rob

These wheels look great, I have looked for some myself as I need them for my Duel project...and the engine wich is the only major parts missing.
The closest I could find was Moluminum's Tyrone Malone Truck Mate wheels wich really didn't look right and there are hub caps on them.
I also got some wheels from Strato Models wich were very nice, but they are too small as they are 20 inch wheels, I believe the movie truck had 22 inch wheels.
The fronts are like this but in different colors, black on the drivers side and white on the passenger side, the rear wheels are miss matched, drivers side drive axle has a 5 hole Alcoa aluminum wheel and the tag axle a 5 hole steel wheel, the passenger side has 5 hole steel wheel on the drive axle and 5 hole Alcoa on the tag axle, the tank trailer has 6 hole steel wheels on the front axle and 5 hole steel wheels on the rear, same on both sides.

Well here is my research for you, it gets more complicated than you think if you want to get it right and I have spent many hours researching for this truck wich is part of the fun.

Edited May 5 by Force

[Bugatti Fan]

When I was doing some research for my build basically by keeping looking at parts of the film by rewinding my VHS tape (yes it was back in the eighties) the hood ornaments turned out to be a rear view mirror of sorts.

[Force]

5 hours ago, Bugatti Fan said:

When I was doing some research for my build basically by keeping looking at parts of the film by rewinding my VHS tape (yes it was back in the eighties) the hood ornaments turned out to be a rear view mirror of sorts.

The truck has a hood ornament on top of the grille in the middle and it's small, but it also has a mirror on top of the grille to the right of the ornament pointed at the smoke stack so the driver could see the color of the exhaust and if it was too black he had to lift off or change to a lower gear and keep the rpm up to not damage the engine.

Edited May 5 by Force

[Bugatti Fan]

Thanks for that extra bit of info Haken. I did not notice the hood ornament when I was building my model all that time ago and only noticed the mirror. I often wondered what the mirror was for on the real truck.  It just goes to show how small details can be missed.

I still have my model and will have to make and add the missing ornament.

About a year ago I downloaded a set of the licence plates from the internet and replaced all the original hand painted ones from when I built it.

It just goes to show that old models can still be improved when new information comes to light.

Edited May 6 by Bugatti Fan

[robdebie]

On 5/5/2024 at 6:59 AM, Force said:

I also plan to build the primary truck when I build mine and I'm gathering parts as we speak, I have everything covered except for the engine and front wheels.

I bought the resin cab kit from AITM and I also got a narrow nose hood kit from Dave made to fit the small window Unlilite cab AMT 359, I just took it out and measured it and the grille is 36 mm on that one, so it's slightly wider than the grille on the cab kit and close to your 3D design.
Go with what you think looks best.
If you want to be sure and get it right ask the Peterbilt guru Tim Ahlborn, he would know, he is a member here on the forum but I have not seen him post here for a  long time, I see him post on Spotlight Hobbies board from time to time, but he has a facebook group called MTDG Model Truck Discussion Group and he posts frequently there.

This is the closest I could find of an early hood ornament but I think some I have seen looks slightly different.
But good pictures are hard to find....I've tried., most of the ornaments I find pictures of are the later air plane style.

Hakan, many thanks again for all your help! I will probably leave the width of the 3D model as it is, unless measurements from a real truck surface. It's not a scientific project anyway 🙂

Here are the first prints of the grille. The club member who printed them did three examples, all in different positions. On the right one, the grille louvers failed to print completely. On the left one, the louvers are 99% right. But I made them so thin they look like razor blades if viewed at the right angle. The horizontally printed one is maybe the best, but it's slightly curved.

All prints have in common that multiple supports attach to the louvers, and it will be very difficult to remove them without breaking the louvers. I will probably make the louvers thicker for the next print.

Maybe I'll revise the ornament too then, following the picture you showed.

Rob

Edited May 10 by robdebie

[robdebie]

On 5/5/2024 at 6:59 AM, Force said:

I don't know how I will tackle the engine issue either, maybe modify a kit engine to look like a 1673 or something like that, as you say, nothing is available.

There are two different designations for the same engine tho', 1693 for the truck engine and D333 for the heavy machine version, but they are the same on the outside, what can differ is if they have aftercooler or not, I have found lots of pictures on the web of these engines wich I saved to my files.

I found only two usuable pictures of the 1673 engines, most were 1693s. I found the same picture you showed, and one more, shown here.

I'm going to 'park' this problem for a while. Just maybe I'll attach the cab + hood + grille with tiny magnets, so they can be lifted off together to show the drivetrain.

Rob

[robdebie]

On 5/5/2024 at 6:59 AM, Force said:

I forgot to mention the suspension on the truck, it was a Page & Page 60/40 suspension and you can find one at Czech Truck Model (CTM) wich recently added a couple of suspensions to their line of resin truck parts.
I'm sure more will come in the future, I have provided lots of pictures of old truck suspensions to them.
https://www.czechtruckmodel.com/resin-suspension-sets/297-ctm-24269-page-and-page-suspension-set.html
The axles are wrong for the movie truck as both are top loaders, but the suspension is right, the movie truck appearently had one top loader drive axle when it left the factory but it was also changed to a front loader axle, most likely when they changed the rest of the drive line but they kept the tag axle and the suspension.

 

I have read too that the rear suspension was 'Page and Page 60/40 spring suspension', but I don't know how this was established. I can't see a thing of the rear suspension in the movie, with the exception of the ravine scene, where *maybe* the beam component can be seen (outlined in red), connecting to the leaf spring of the rear axle, outboard of the chassis beam?

A big thanks for Czech Truck Model link, I will probably order that set.

Rob

 

 

 

[Force]

15 hours ago, robdebie said:

I found only two usuable pictures of the 1673 engines, most were 1693s. I found the same picture you showed, and one more, shown here.

I'm going to 'park' this problem for a while. Just maybe I'll attach the cab + hood + grille with tiny magnets, so they can be lifted off together to show the drivetrain.

Rob

I have many pictures of the 1673 in my files since I started gathering when I found out the truck had one of them engines.
On many places it say that the truck had a 1674 but that's not true according to my reliable source, he say it was a 1673 due to age of the engines...the 1673, 1673A and 1673B was made 1960-1968 and the 1674 came on the market 1967...the movie was from 1971 and the engine was allready old and worn by then wich a 4 year old engine wouldn't have been...and the yellow air cleaner used wich was a 4 inch intake tube 1673 air cleaner, the 1674 used a 5 inch intake tube and a different looking air cleaner...so in conclution he says the engine must have been a 1673B.
Here is a link to my reference files for the 1673 https://public.fotki.com/ForceFC1/cat-1673d333/ , feel free to use them.

15 hours ago, robdebie said:

I have read too that the rear suspension was 'Page and Page 60/40 spring suspension', but I don't know how this was established. I can't see a thing of the rear suspension in the movie, with the exception of the ravine scene, where *maybe* the beam component can be seen (outlined in red), connecting to the leaf spring of the rear axle, outboard of the chassis beam?

A big thanks for Czech Truck Model link, I will probably order that set.

Rob

 

 

 

On this picture you see the missmatched wheels too, 5 hole steelies on the drive axle and 5 hole Alcoas on the rear tag axle as this is the passenger side, the other way around on the drivers side.
The suspension is hidden by the wheels most of the time so it's hard to see, and yes it's the beam you see highlighted in this picture and when you know how a Page & Page suspension looks like it's very clear.
Here is a truck chassis with that suspension.