1/24 Revell DLK23-12 Mercedes Benz 1422

[cifenet]

I have been working on this kit for sometime and thought I share some progress. 

 

My goal is to finish building it without facing self-inflicted issues (which I usually have). 

 

I built pretty much straight out of box except for the tires.  This is an old kit and the tires were quite bad (and I think they are under sized for the truck as well). 

They were all deformed and kept releasing some kind of greasy oil.  I ended up replacing them with 3D printed tires.

 

Painted everything pink first to enhance the red base coat. 

 

The painting was somewhat tricky, due to its complex building order, I had to paint most of the parts separately prior to the building.

I made a custom red base coat with fluorescent agent in it. 

When bright light hits the surface, the red does give out subtle glowing hue making it more "orange-ish" tone.  

 

I scratch built the stabilizer components so they can function better.  I need to make total four of these.

 

My frame must have been incorrectly leveled, experienced all kinds of difficulties attaching the bed correctly. 

After several tries, I was able to align the bed so it sits almost parallel to the frame.  Still not perfect, but not very noticeable for me to worry about it.   

 

The kit went together nicely, but many parts needed some TLC to fit and look correct. 

Extensive masking efforts were also required when painting the side panels though.

 

My next biggest task is to assemble/paint the ladder components.  I want to give naked aluminum finish for the ladder, but I haven't fully committed yet.

The ladder extends 4 times of the retracted length (shown above) and when fully extracted, it is quite impressive to look at.

 

The kit has fully detailed engine parts and its cab tilts as well.  The ladder extends and rotates 360' too.    

Hopefully, I can finish this one soon and it has been pleasantly fun building experience so far. 

Edited June 10, 2024 by cifenet

[Gary Chastain]

Good looking build

[GLMFAA1]

I don't know what RoG added to the tires but I had bad tires in the SImba and was fortunate to get replacements from RoG. Nice build, In my opinion the kit seems bigger in scale and bulkier than the Italeri kit. The real challenge was the Heller Dalahye Bonneville ladder. 

greg

[youngtiger1]

Nicely done. Love those Euro fire trucks.