California Sheriff 1999 Chevy Tahoe PPV

[slusher]

Grill and headlights decals look terrific!

[av405]

On 9/29/2024 at 4:42 PM, Mike Slapattack said:

Wow this is really coming together! I love the mod-podge headlights, I've never attempted making headlights out of a clear gel medium but my local dollar store started carrying a wide array of Mod Podge products and I want to try it out. Keep up the work and tips!

 

On 9/29/2024 at 7:35 PM, slusher said:

Grill and headlights decals look terrific!

Thanks fellas!

[Ron Hamilton]

On 9/26/2024 at 6:59 PM, av405 said:

 

Thanks guys!

Carl, both are doing well and resting at home. Thank you for asking.

I got a chance to finish the grill recently. As I mentioned previously, it was painted with Tamiya German Grey. After considering some paint options for the headlights, I decided that decals might be the best way to go. I purchased some headlight decals from STS Decals:

https://stsdecals.com/collections/headlights

Before applying the decals, I used a black Gundam Marker I purchased at Hobby Lobby to outline the headlight buckets and create the illusion of a rubber seal.

I placed pieces of bare metal foil on the turn signal lenses and then brush painted over the BMF with Tamiya X-26 Clear Orange. After this, I applied the STS Decals. The pieces came from both the OBS Chevy and Ford Bronco sets, I just slightly trimmed them to fit my grill. To create a headlight lens effect, I used Mod Podge Dimensional Magic. I heard about it on a Facebook group and it seemed like a better alternative to epoxy, which can yellow over time. The Mod Podge is fairly self leveling, I just spread it out with a toothpick. It requires 24 hrs to dry. 

 

Once that was done, I took an extra Chevy "bowtie" decal from the C-3500 decal sheet to finish things off:

Overall, I was pleased with the outcome and I think the decals gave me a more realistic finish than what I could have achieved with paint. The pictures don't really show the effect of the Mod Podge, but it's there.

 

I'm glad I bought those STSdecals for mine.

[av405]

On 10/4/2024 at 12:41 PM, Ron Hamilton said:

I'm glad I bought those STSdecals for mine.

 Yes. I'm definitely very pleased with them. 

[av405]

Well, things have been busy at home. But a few hours at a time, I got a chance to work on modifying the rear door. The AMT Tahoe comes with a lift tailgate. As many of you know, Chevy used to offer rear cargo doors (aka barn doors) as an option on the Tahoes and Suburbans up until the 2007 refresh. This was no different on the police package Tahoes. Since LASD used cargo doors, I had to add them to my build with some minor "plastic surgery." First of all, I want to sincerely thank AMT for having made the tailgate door a separate piece: 

First of all, I had to decide how to relocate the tailgate latch from the center to the right side of the door. I decided to cut out two square pieces from the top half of the door, with one containing the latch, and switch them around. My tools for this task were various scribing tools and some trusty scribing tape:

Here's the WIP:

After I reversed both pieces, I applied some thin styrene strips to the back of the tailgate as a brace and secured them with Tamiya Extra Thin cement. I made sure that the strips were thin enough to not interfere with the clearance between the door and the rest of the body. I then filled in the gaps with Tamiya Epoxy Putty. If you note, the door latch is about an 1/8 of an inch too far to the right. This was a conscious decision on my part as I would have had to have cut right next to the latch molding to get the distance more accurate, and this would have made the epoxy application/sanding process much harder.

Following this, I applied the first layer of primer and it was time to scribe the cargo door line down the middle. I first took measurements and used a black pen to draw my cut line:

I followed this up with my trusty Tamiya Scriber and scribing tape. I applied Tamiya yellow tape on the opposite side in case my blade went rogue on me:
 

After taking my time with various slow, deliberate passes with my scriber, I had my cargo doors:

Once I was happy with the door itself, I had to scribe out the piece shown below:

If you'll notice, I accidentally obliterated much of the detail on the tailgate latch through the epoxy filler sanding stage. To give this area more definition, I scribed around the latch to give it deeper lines and drilled in a keyhole.

Here is the final result after sanding things smooth with 600 and 3000 grit pads and re-priming:

The real thing for comparison:

I still have to scribe the cargo windows into the kit glass to complete the look, so that job will be next. In retrospect, it may have been easier to create a mold out of the door latch and then add that mold to where I needed it. This would have prevented a lot of the plastic surgery and I may have been able to get the latch more centered where it should be. I might try that next time I have to do something similar. 

 

[slusher]

Nice work on your tailgate!

[DJMar]

Nice work!

It's a little late for this tip now, but I'll share it anyway. I did a similar conversion around 2008 or so, for a friend who was a volunteer at a rural FD. Their battalion chief's truck was a Tahoe with barn doors. To get around the handle problem, I made a mold of the tailgate handle out of silicone and cast it in regular 5 minute epoxy. The mold was regular black Permatex, and I applied it directly to the bare plastic. I made two, just to be sure there weren't any air bubbles. After I cast a few pieces from the epoxy, I picked the best one. It was a bit tricky because of the handle "undercut", but I managed to get a nice piece to work on. The kit handle was simply sanded away and the new one glued into the proper position.

I've seen folks make similar things by using tinfoil to press around the shape they want to duplicate, filling it with epoxy or sprue goo, and trimming/sanding the piece to shape after drying. It's not high tech at all, but good for one-off stuff when you can't find what you need in resin or photoetch from the aftermarket.

As a visual, here are some molds that I made sometime in the late 1990s. They are instruments from the dash of the Monogram Owens Corning Corvette kit. Permatex silicone, and they've survived 20+ years. Definitely on the crude side, but they worked for me at the time.

[av405]

On 11/12/2024 at 3:30 AM, slusher said:

Nice work on your tailgate!

Thanks!

On 11/13/2024 at 3:15 PM, DJMar said:

Nice work!

It's a little late for this tip now, but I'll share it anyway. I did a similar conversion around 2008 or so, for a friend who was a volunteer at a rural FD. Their battalion chief's truck was a Tahoe with barn doors. To get around the handle problem, I made a mold of the tailgate handle out of silicone and cast it in regular 5 minute epoxy. The mold was regular black Permatex, and I applied it directly to the bare plastic. I made two, just to be sure there weren't any air bubbles. After I cast a few pieces from the epoxy, I picked the best one. It was a bit tricky because of the handle "undercut", but I managed to get a nice piece to work on. The kit handle was simply sanded away and the new one glued into the proper position.

Thank you. The mold is exactly what I should have done as an alternative, but didn't since I have no experience with molds. I will probably end up doing that next time. Thanks for the tips!

A little more WIP. This is what the kit glass' rear window looks like. Before turning it into a split window, the rear windshield wiper has to be removed:

I used a sprue cutter to remove the molded-in wiper. I then sanded the area with 600, 1000 and 3000 grit sanding sponges and followed it up with Novus 2 polish. After this, I took measurements, drew my cutting line, applied engraving tape and used my Tamiya scriber to create the split window:

And here is the completed conversion. I glued a thin piece of styrene to the rear door hatch to create a more prominent and defined opening handle. The rear window should look more convincing once I paint the black trim on the inside. I do realize there are some slight body work imperfections on the rear doors. I got as far as my skills and patience could take me. Some of those imperfections will eventually be covered up with decals for the Sheriff's markings. 

[BK9300]

Amazing work as always, Alberto - sure coming along nicely!

[av405]

On 11/15/2024 at 7:06 PM, BK9300 said:

Amazing work as always, Alberto - sure coming along nicely!

Thank you, Brian!

[kymdlr]

Great progress with the conversion.

[av405]

On 11/27/2024 at 9:52 PM, kymdlr said:

Great progress with the conversion.

Thank you, Ron.

[spkgibsonfirebird]

Looking forward to seeing more of this, I'd like to find out more about getting the grill for these kits, I'd like to build a Michigan State Police version of this one day. Looking great so far!!

[av405]

On 12/28/2024 at 12:49 AM, spkgibsonfirebird said:

Looking forward to seeing more of this, I'd like to find out more about getting the grill for these kits, I'd like to build a Michigan State Police version of this one day. Looking great so far!!

Stephen, thank you for the kind words. For the grill, send a message to Andy Lesiak. He is a member of this forum @zaina . It is not his design, but he modified and printed it out for me to fit the Tahoe. Andy is an upstanding individual.

As for progress on this build, it has been very slow. I painted the black frit band around the front windshield using tape and Mr. Surfacer 1500 Black Primer along the inside. After this, I dipped the windshield into a bowl of Future Floor polish to give the clear plastic some extra shine. My bottle of Future is about 15 years old now and is yellow. If you're in the same boat, do not let this deter you as the Future does not dry yellow. 

As for the frit/black borders around the rest of the windows, I will brush paint those from the interior. 

I also primed the entire body with Mr. Surfacer 1500 White Primer. The white primer will serve as the base white color. Next up, I will tape off the white portions to paint the black parts and then clear coat the entire body. This is basically a shortcut for me as it takes away some of the labor of having to tape off the body twice to paint both the black and white portions separately. Since I always clear coat my bodies, this last step will give the flat white primer the gloss look it needs. 

Edited January 1 by av405

[av405]

I finally got time to do a paint session today. I masked the body off with various sizes of Tamiya masking tape. The paint edges were masked off with bare metal foil. For crisp edges, I have found no better solution than BMF. 

Here's everything after applying 3 progressively heavier coats of Tamiya TS-14 Black. 

I'll give it about a week to dry, after which I will clear everything evenly. 

[BK9300]

Looking really good, Alberto.

[EliBuildsModels]

Sweet. Won a auction today for a Tahoe promo. Hope to make a 2 door GMC Yukon.

[av405]

20 hours ago, BK9300 said:

Looking really good, Alberto.

Thank you, Brian.

19 hours ago, EliBuildsModels said:

Sweet. Won a auction today for a Tahoe promo. Hope to make a 2 door GMC Yukon.

Very nice. Make sure you post a WIP thread, I would love to see the progress.

[slusher]

Great looking paint,your getting close to the finish!

[av405]

On 1/7/2025 at 9:50 PM, slusher said:

Great looking paint,your getting close to the finish!

Thank you, Carl. 

While the body is drying, I worked on the rear arrow stick. Here is the real thing for reference: 

I grabbed a spare arrow stick from the Lindberg Crown Victoria Ohio State Patrol kit. The design isn't exactly the same and it had a blemish. I decided to use the blemish as an excuse to strip the chrome off and make it look closer to what I needed. Here it is before:

And here it is after stripping:

I used a piece of evergreen stock to fill in the rear of the arrow stick. This is not filled as the arrow stick is meant to attach to the Lindberg kit's Vector light bar.

I painted the entire piece with Tamiya AS-12 Bare Metal Silver. I then cut out a piece of clear plastic, painted it with Tamiya TS-73 Clear Orange, and glued it on top of the arrow stick. Some flat black was applied to the sides of the arrow stick to match the real thing. And here it is:

Not perfect but it looks closer to the real thing.

[av405]

I cleared the body today with 4 progressively heavier coats of my favorite spray clear - Mr. Super Clear UV Cut Gloss:

I think it's a bit hard to tell from the pictures, but the clear definitely gave the flat white primer the pop I was looking for. Maybe it's just me, but it doesn't seem as glossy as spraying white gloss paint with clear coat. It's fine for this build since it's a police vehicle, but I may not use this method for something "nicer." I'll see how it continues to dry. I'll give everything 1-2 weeks to dry before wet sanding and polish. 

Over the weekend, I also dealt with the side mirrors. For some reason, AMT gave the Tahoe and the old and new versions of the C-3500 dually kit side view mirrors from the S-10.  PPV models used the "aero" style mirrors. Thankfully, the most recent issue AMT 1992 Silverado kit has the mirrors that I need. This is the second time I rob the mirrors from one of these kits for another build.

I snipped away the mounting pegs, applied primer, and then Tamiya TS-14 Black:

While the clear dries, I will finish painting the black border portions of the kit-supplied plastic "glass." Stay tuned. 

[slusher]

What primer do you use?  I have cleared Tamiya fine white surface primer and it looks great for me.

[av405]

22 hours ago, slusher said:

What primer do you use?  I have cleared Tamiya fine white surface primer and it looks great for me.

Mr. Finishing Surfacer 1500 White Primer.

Edited January 16 by av405

[av405]

I finished detail painting the interior glass piece. The piece has well-defined ridges for the black borders around the front and black windows, so I just brushed Vallejo black acrylic paint on the inside and wiped away any excess with a pointed cotton swab. Since I scribed the rear window to convert it into 2 barn door windows, I had to paint the black border down the middle. The horizontal lines along the back window are raised ridges along the interior, so I had a hard time taping the area to paint it. I used an old roll of flexible black pactra tape and placed it down the middle. I then blended it with Vallejo black. 

The rear side windows have no ridges, so I placed the glass inside the cab and used Tamiya tape to eyeball and create my own borders. I then brush painted with Vallejo acrylic black again. I love Vallejo black as it is very easy to brush on. Since the area is so small and I'm painting along the interior of the glass piece, there are no brush marks visible from the outside. 

After completing the black borders, I brush painted the roof with Testors Flat Gray enamel. It's a bit darker than the gray I used for the interior tub, but the contrast shouldn't really be visible from the outside and I just want it too look close. I find Testors enamel to be very easy to brush on once it's been thoroughly mixed. I'll use the same Testors paint on the inside of the body, particularly the interior pillars. 

I'd say it looks pretty good:

After this, I addressed one final issue with the grill. The 3D printed aftermarket grill I'm using has open vents, meaning that the obliterated front end of the body will be visible:

My initial solution was to glue black styrene sheets to the back of the grill, but I did not leave any clearance between the grill and the mounting holes/pillars that I left on the front end. I opted to use Hasegawa flat black finish tape along the back:

And here's the result:

With this done, all that is left is to wet sand/polish the body and then final assembly. The body is now dry, but I will have to find the time to sit down and go through the tedious wet sand and polishing stage.

Edited January 23 by av405

[DJMar]

Looking really, REALLY good!