History of Monogram's Squarebody GM Pickups

[Foxer]

This was a great writeup on these Monogram trucks! Not a trucker by nature and having two of these kits (?) I appreciated the info and only came on thisr esearching anew build I'm considering.

I thought the truckers here might be interested in what I found ... I have the 1972 issue of this kit and I found .. really .. that the frame and suspension is almost a drop in fit to .. the Revell '49 Mercury Woody Wagon! There were only a few things that had to be remover, the rear of tailpipe and those side pods .. anyone now what they are? Here's the proof ...

The wheelbase is only off by a small fraction of an inch.

[Jordan White]

The side pods are the fuel tanks.

[Foxer]

The side pods are the fuel tanks.

Thanks, Jordan .. I suspected as much but it also has a fuel tank in standard place at the rear.

[stavanzer]

So, Mike. Any progress on that Woody 4x4?

[2n3/4 SFPD]

One thing about the Blazer (the burgundy one)--that tool broke in half in the door section. When they restored it, they had to retool the door handles, and they did them too small. I've been looking for an original with the right sized door handles for years.

 

Bob Johnson was the one who told me what had happened to the door handles, so that's probably pretty accurate.

 

Terry

I built that kit in '80

bought it at a "People's Drug" store somewhere in the D.C. metro area.

I still have many of the parts in my parts boxes, but I don't know where the rest of it went.

If I run across it; it's yours!

 

Edited March 20, 2016 by 2n3/4 SFPD
Shortened reply

[unclescott58]

Chevy Sport Pick-Up 4x4 kit's contents:

 

 

 

 

I really wish the above kit would be reissued. I really like 70's Chevy stepsides. 

[JTalmage]

What about the Sneaky Pete, Midnight Cowboy, and other variants that had the flip nose pete front end, and had the tow bed or step side bed? Aren't they loosely related to these original trucks?

[Fabrux]

The only thing that is shared between the Monogram and Revell squarebody kits are the subject material. Check out my history on the Revell kits: http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/topic/75490-history-of-revells-squarebody-pickup-kits/

[Casey]

The most recent issue of the 1/24 Monogram (now Revell) Chevy/GMC Squarebody kit, the '78 GMC Big Game Country Pickup:

 

[Casey]

And another in the line of Monogram's 1/24 Chevy K-series pickups has been reissued as kit #4486:

 

[Casey]

On 3/6/2012 at 8:43 PM, Fabrux said:

The Blazer tooling was revisited in 1982 to represent a pulling truck.

 

After the purchase of Monogram, Revell decided to revisit the Blazer tooling in 2000. 

Not sure if this was touched upon in this topic or not, but I re-read the five pages and didn't see it mentioned, so here goes. Is they Chevy Blazer/GMC Jimmy gone for good, never to return? I am assuming when the mold was modified from the Blazer/Jimmy into the Pulldozer (Blazer/Jimmy body sans rear roof section being the most obvious change), there was no going back and the stock Blazer/Jimmy version. I know it was mentioned the Blazer mold suffered some damage and the re-engraved door handles were now smaller on the later versions, but perhaps there was more or additional damage that was deemed too great to repair? Maybe it was decided to scrap the rear roof section and significantly re-tool into a pulling style truck as a permanent change at that time.

[mikemodeler]

1 hour ago, Casey said:

Not sure if this was touched upon in this topic or not, but I re-read the five pages and didn't see it mentioned, so here goes. Is they Chevy Blazer/GMC Jimmy gone for good, never to return? I am assuming when the mold was modified from the Blazer/Jimmy into the Pulldozer (Blazer/Jimmy body sans rear roof section being the most obvious change), there was no going back and the stock Blazer/Jimmy version. I know it was mentioned the Blazer mold suffered some damage and the re-engraved door handles were now smaller on the later versions, but perhaps there was more or additional damage that was deemed too great to repair? Maybe it was decided to scrap the rear roof section and significantly re-tool into a pulling style truck as a permanent change at that time.

I have the Sherriff's Jimmy and one of the Mad Mudder kits and while there is a lot of similar parts, if they damaged the molds for the roof then that is probably the reason why we haven't seen a stock version since. The hood, bumpers and other miscellaneous parts could be sourced from other kits like the pickups but the roof is biggest holdup.

 

 

[Lordmodelbuilder]

Does anyone know if any of these pickups,Monogram or MPC had the rear bumper that matched

the factory stock front bumper?

 

 

 

Edited August 4, 2019 by Lordmodelbuilder

[Casey]

On 8/3/2019 at 11:50 PM, Lordmodelbuilder said:

Does anyone know if any of these pickups,Monogram had the rear bumper that matched the factory stock front bumper?

The just released 1976 K-series Sport Pickup kit does.

 

[Lordmodelbuilder]

That is a stock rear bumper for a stepside truck.

A fleetside truck, Blazer,Suburban would have this bumper.

[Casey]

11 hours ago, Lordmodelbuilder said:

That is a stock rear bumper for a stepside truck. A fleetside truck, Blazer,Suburban would have this bumper.

There is no Stepside-specific bumper that I have seen in any of the Monogram (now Revell) 1/24 '73-'80 Chevy/GMC C/K series kits, only the bumpers found in the recent '76 Stepside and '78 GMC Big Game Country Pickup (Fleetside) kits:

Looking at the box art from previous issues, you can see how far the rear bumper sticks out beyond the sides of the Stepside box:

 

The Monogram GMC Jimmy and Chevy Blazer kits include bumpers with rub strips, so no idea if that is correct for a Fleetside or not.

[Atmobil]

So, I have tried to read my way trough this thread and also looked at other threads about this series of kits but I don't see it mentioned anywhere. Is the engines in the different versions of the kits the same with just different intake/carb bits? Is it supposed to be a Chevy small block? 350cui?
Looks like there is some fuelinjection bits on the GMC snow plow and Big Game kits I got.

[Fabrux]

Yes, the engines are your generic small block Chevy. It seems only the stepside and Blazer kits got the stock intake setup. The fuel injection thingy doesn't really resemble anything from that era, more like the Rochester setup from the tri-five era.

[Casey]

Monster truck fever was apparently still going strong in 1988:

[Casey]

 

If someone has a 1982 Monogram catalog, please scan and share a better image of the pre-production version:

[89AKurt]

Asking the Admin team, any way the title can be improved by adding SQUAREBODY?  I know this is an old thread that was dredged up, but come on people, try to be specific when starting a thread.

[Luc Janssens]

35 minutes ago, Casey said:

If someone has a 1982 Monogram catalog, please scan and share a better image of the pre-production version:

have one, will scan and post later this evening..

[Casey]

3 minutes ago, Luc Janssens said:

have one, will scan and post later this evening..

Thanks, Luc. There's an even better (additional?) image on the page with the other truck models, too.

[gray07]

why couldn't you make the pull dozer stock using everything off a truck, I know the back cover is off but how many people used top drive these with the cover off, I had a 76 ramcharger that I always drove with the top off.

[Luc Janssens]

4 hours ago, Casey said:

Thanks, Luc. There's an even better (additional?) image on the page with the other truck models, too.