'60s Built '34 Pickup with Original Paint: Polished & Rebuilt

[John Goschke]

Late this summer I picked up this old '34 Ford pickup off ebay 'cause I thought the old paint looked cool and I was the only bidder at $9.99! It's an original issue of the kit, molded in red plastic. The paint appeared to be Testor's Burgundy Purple Metallic applied ages ago. When I got the model, even though the paint was a bit rougher than I expected, I still decided to disassemble the model, clean it up (smelled like an ash tray full of Lucky Strike butts!), polish the old paint and rebuilt it using some new-old parts from the stash.

Before the rebuild. Note the spare tire cover is a continental kit piece from an unknown kit. Revell U.S. Royal Master tires on custom Barris "flying saucer" wheelcovers from the kit. '32 Ford bumpers front and rear...


After, rebuild with polished-out original paint...


Custom taillights from an original issue kit, BMF on all the bed cover snaps. Wheels and tires from an old-tool Ala Kart. Covered the face of the old spare cover with some sheet styrene, smoothed it out and added some stretched sprue around the outside to represent piping before spraying with Tamiya Racing White and Dullcoat to make it look like a vinyl cover...


'49 Ford steering wheel. Dash and wheel centers painted with NOS Testors Burgundy Purple Metallic...


Chassis before. Brush-painted flat red. Underside of fenders brush-painted white...


After. New chassis, original fenders. Wheelbase adjusted, moving front axle forward, rear axle back. Scratch exhaust system from aluminum ground wire. Tamiya gloss aluminum frame, Alclad suspension.


Engine, before with oxidized plating revealing red plastic. Original worn headlight rims in painted buckets...


After. Engine painted Tamiya Lavendar with new valve covers. Headlight assembly replaced, with bracket, buckets and horn in Alclad, plus new radiator cap and emblem...

Edited December 18, 2012 by John Goschke

[gman]

Nice save- good looking model that preserves the style from when it was first built.

[ssroczyn]

I think this is a pretty cool post. I like what you did

with this truck, especially showing the before and

after pics! Very Cool!

The finished version turned out super nice! Great Job!

Question : How did you disassemble it, specifically how did

you get the previously glued parts apart?

Steve

[Zarana-X]

Nice rebuild. Half of my projects lately are rebuilds.

[gtx6970]

WAY cool.

I like the ' save the nostalgia' part the most

Well done !

[TooOld]

Beautiful restoration ! I like that you kept the original feel of the truck and restored it with common upgrades . Great job !

[rmvw guy]

I love the look and the story. Very Retro. Nice save!

[vintagercr]

That is a very nice rebuild.

[chepp]

Great save! Thanks for replacing those headlights with ones put on straight. The taillights look cool.

[thatz4u]

very nice work

[Silver Foxx]

Nice work , you have turned this into a really neat model.

[crazyjim]

Excellent.

[slusher]

Nice save and a great story. Thats a really nice color..

[Sixties Sam]

Very nice restoration. It's amazing how subtle changes can add up to a major improvement! You've kept the feel of the original model. Good work!

Sam

[A.R.C.]

Very very cool. I like that you saved the original paint.

[bondo bill]

cool i bet you were a goalie nice save

[realgone58]

This really came out awesome! Looks fantastic, love the original paint. It's hard to find old kits where someone sprayed them decently enough to polish out like this one did. Very cool and good looking truck.

[crazyrichard]

awsome , what a difference , i love it

[vaughn]

Nice job and post !

[Guest]

Great save on this model John! Great idea also on saving the paint. I have a '61 Comet that has a pretty decent paint job on it. I may give your idea a try on it.

[Jantrix]

Well done! It has a great 60's vibe.

[Pete L.]

Very nicely done...inspirational to say the least ! I really enjoy the look of the models built in the/style of 1960's, after all that's what got me hooked in the first place over FIFTY YEARS AGO ...

Thanks for the memories !

Edited January 4, 2013 by Pete L.

[Erik Smith]

Nice! Great work and cool project.

[John Goschke]

Question : How did you disassemble it, specifically how did

you get the previously glued parts apart?

Steve

Thanks for the comments, guys! This was a fun project!

To answer Steve's question... The model actually came apart fairly easily since the original builder, for the most part, hadn't observed the rule about scraping plating and paint from the parts before cementing. In a couple areas I did have to score the joints a bit before carefully prying them apart.

[krazyglu]

Wow John your work is really inspiring, I also love how you rebuilt this thing much like a 1:1 hot rod restoration. Everything you did improved the model without losing the original builders work. The color is amazing!

One trick to try when dis assembling these kits is to find a large zip lock freezer bag, run water over the entire model and place it in the zip lock bag (sealed) in your freezer. The water gets in all the little cracks and once frozen pop's the pieces apart. Not always going to work for every rebuild, but it worked great for me.