Looking real good Hermon, glad to see you're getting some bench time !! Colour scheme sounds cool, what will you use for the pinstriping, decals or paint ??

Looking pretty good. I like your color choice, and that 8V71 is quite nice. A little clean for a Leak-troit! I do have one question: where's the fan?

Jim

It's a Mopar! Besides, someone needs to build Tommy Ivo's rail hauler rig -sans the vette on top!

Mmmmmm, just one pal...see those 3 sinks holes in both the exhaust manifolds.....otherwise nice work so far! I hate those manifolds!
Oh, don't forget the oil puddles under that sieve, I mean, motor...the last time the bulk oil delivery guy came I asked him if he charged us for what he was leaving on the ground....oh the look I got!

They don't call 'em "Green Leakers" for nothing! That's how they mark their territory.

Jim

I like the color combo. I think you should go with it. The engine is nice...and clean. What did you do, use an actual Mopar engine in GMC colors???

Thanks guys!

Damian, for the pinstripes I was thinking about using some gold BMF instead of trying to tape and paint the tiny little lines.

Jim, the fan and belts haven't been glued on yet. The engine is just sitting in the frame for a quick photo.

Bob, the sink holes............ ..........didn't even think about them, believe it or not. I'll fix them tonight.

Animal, thanks. I wasn't real sure about the color combo until I tested it all out on some plastic scraps. Should look pretty decent.

Hermon

Well after a 2 month break I decided to jump back into my yard bird build. After hours of sanding on the re-joined cab sections she was just about ready for primer. I cut and joined the interior tonight. A trial fit of the interior/exterior showed that I still needed to shave off 1mm of the interior. Being the idiot that I am, I decided to force the interior into the cab. The pic shows what happened. Now it's glue, fill, sand, fill, sand, sand, sand all over again.




Oh well, live and learn. I'll let the glued sections dry tonight and hit it again tomorrow night.


Hermon

I had a couple extra hours this morning before my sons football game so I decided to do some painting on the dash. It ain't professional but it'll pass.





I'll go back in and tone down the brown later on to make it look more like the simulated woodgrain. Also need to black out the air vents and touch up some boo-boos.

Hermon

Dang that's nice...what brush are you using for the detail on the gauges?...wish I could paint that small!
I hate when that {interior split} happens...I painted my mack MB cab inside and out{remember it's resin} and tried out the fit of the interior, which was painted too, and got them both solidly stuck 7/8 of the way in! Dang humidity around here...two days later I finnesed them apart...

Awesome job on the gauges! I'd go blind if I tried to paint that. Amazing. How did you do it? What color is that tan? It looks really nice.

Hey thanks for the support guys.

Bob, the gauges were done with a wittled down toothpick. I just dipped it in silver paint, wiped off the excess, then sort of dusted it around the gauge faces and numbers....kinda drybrush in miniature scale if you will. The orange needles were done the same way.

Jim, the tan is Tamiya Buff XF-57. I tried to make the interior look like the old 93 LN-9000 dump I had way back when. Even went so far as to use mixed-matched seats......air ride for the driver and elcheapo for the passenger.


So....I went ahead and shot a coat of Tamiya silver on the cab tonight just to see how much more work I'd have to do on the seams before the base coat of gloss white. As you can see from the pic I have LOTS more work to do. The seam line as of now looks like one of those big ass ice fissures in the Arctic.





On a brighter note, the finished cockpit.....er, uhh...enterior now fits quite well inside the cab. I'll plug along on her the rest of the weekend. Starting Monday morning I'm back to 60 hr. weeks.

Hermon

Awesome job in the dash 'Cuda, I love it !! I really gotta get back to my GREEN truck for this Campaign too. Too many builds, not enough hours,

Thanks for the tip, Hermon. Tamiya Buff XF-57, got to remember that. That's the interior tan I've been looking for fo tre years! So you know, Tamiya Deck Tan XF-55 is a pretty close match for Cummins Beige.

I hear ya about work. It get's in the way of so much fun stuff. A necessay evil, though.

Jim

"Toothpick"...that's cheating...and I like it! I'll have to try that seeing as the results are great to say the least.
We just came off of 60's...man, I can't believe they make you go in on the weekend...I never did that back when I worked for the district...well, one time I did for a saturday evening because of a retirement party for one of the teachers, but they paid me cash...shhhhhh!
Hey, are you going to replace the lost rivets up the back of the door frame...I could go look at the manufacturer of the lil plastic rivet packs I have and let you know who and what they are...
I should go work on finishing mine I suppose.....

I got some paint on the cab the afternoon. I'll be honest, after busting the cab seam a second time, then filling, sanding, filling, and sanding some more I just got burned out with it. As you can see in the pic's the seam isn't the cleanest in the hobby and it sure ain't gonna win any awards but I'm hoping the paint scheme will draw the eye away from the really bad spots.
I'm planning to used some very thin strips of BMF as an upper and lower "pinstripe" or border around the blue stripe. We'll see how that goes.





I'd thought about some custom decals like "Tarheel Hauling" or something like that since the scheme is Carolina blue and white.......but my decal making skills pretty much suck worse than my seam smooting.

Hermon

Here's a quick mock-up. I'm really not feeling the whole "blue whees" thing. Should they be white? Or maybe even gloss black? What say you all?




Hermon

Hi Herman,

This is a sweet build! That's gotta be the neatest model truck dash I've seen. It gives the aircraft boys a run for their money.

For what it's worth, I'd stick with the blue wheels, it gives the scheme a unity, like a good fleet scheme does. I reckon black would look too heavy and fight with the light body/chassis colours.

Graeme.

That does look really nice. It's coming along really well.

i agree with Graeme, keep the blue wheels. It does give it some continunity.

Jim

This is turning into one sweet stubby. don't stop now. get with it and finish this one.

It looks real good to me.
Keep the colors.

Erikssson.

Lookin great 'Cuda. Those "mad skills" are showing through for sure !!

Cheers, D

I agree...the colors look very fleet like...keep em.
As for less than usual decal making possibilities...try your hand in MS Word...you can use the different font sizes for different letter sizes, do them in different colors{see font type/size/color in the upper LH top bar} and then you have the possibility of importing a pic to insert in the lettering. Can't remember what file type the pics have to be though....when happy, print out on plain paper to check size and color...resize as needed. I've like using the modelmaster/testors clear and white decal paper{whole 2 times I've done it} but remember two things- anything you make will be thin/transparentish so make a white base painted area to place the decals on so color won't bleed thru and also you'll have to closely trim the white papered decals out or you'll a white ring around them{which could be a good thing if wanted}. Oh, use the recomended decal sealer or any "enamel" based clear...thin coat - thin coat - then a decent one to prevent color running{it does happen!!}. Remember my boxcar build, those german eagle crest decals you never saw on the piece only had one light coat of sealer on them and when I went to apply the setting solution the colors ran so I had to toss them both....never did have enough time to remake them so I did without them.

Thanks for the replies guys. Looks like the wheels will stay blue. I may like them a little better once the black wash goes on.

Bob, thanks for the info. If I get time later on I'll try your technique on making my own decals.


Hermon

Hey, give it a try,,,like I said, I've only tried it twice for simple lettering, but it worked nicely. If I knew what the pic format needed was I'd tell ya...well....maybe.