TOPIC:

Jonny wrote:

Anyone still reading this?

I am..

larbut wrote:

Jonny wrote:

Anyone still reading this?

I am..

Yes, me to

Gee, looking at those interior shots...it's so realistic looking

nodtec wrote:

Gee, looking at those interior shots...it's so realistic looking

Moving on, I've been working on the front body mount:






Styrene layers go inside the front bumper ...





... and Pajero MTW type chassis side bit gets fitted upside down, GRP piece lifts that a further 2mm & 10 forward:






Cutting out letters for the grille...





... and finishing the rear end of the mudguards ...






... didn't add up to as much progress as I'd hoped, but I suppose getting the cab back on the chassis (even if it's a long way from finished, has to be propped up with a bit of scrap, and is making the kit springs sag under the weight) is a bit of a milestone.

I know this looks like a trivial amount of progress, but getting the bares bones of the rear bed sorted has taken a disproportionate amount of juggling & rework to get some sort of compromise between looking like my source, and not looking too toy like.

I've already made it considerably less chunky than my source/drawings indicate, but I'm still not entirely sure about the proportions. I think my preference would be to take a further 10mm off the top of the sides & the very end of the rear light protuberances, but I have to remind myself that I'm not making a super accurate 1:14 scale model of an actual vehicle, I'm making a 4.4:1 model of a diecast toy, with some improvements - and some compromises.

Immediate next steps are stiffer front springs, fixing the bed to the cab, building a chassis extension (like the Unimog tanker), fixing that to the bed frame somehow & making a rear body mount so I can remove the screws holding it on rather than box them in











I've also been thinking a bit further ahead, I was always going to rule out hydraulic or pneumatic function of the rams, but making the loading operable mechanism was a possibilty - but I haven't been overly happy about the engine sound speaker size or placement in the last couple of builds (the RV worked well, but having to leave the roof of rear door open was a bit boneheaded TBH, the Fiat tractor was a bit of a fail because I hadn't really thought about how having a "scale" cab, engine cover & grille meant _everything_ electrical bar the motor had to fit in a tiny space; the Unimog was a pretty neat install IMO but the speaker & especially the enclosure size were quite a compromise) - so this time I'm not going to compromise on the speaker (88mm/3.5", 12w mylar unit in the bottom of the skip ), but will have to permanently fix the skip. That means an operable mechanism would be a bit of a waste of time.

A bit more progress... chassis extension made ...







... and fitted, along with an extra brace; the bed is also (partly) joined to the cab:






Infill panel added, with hole in it for speaker:





Extra bracing underneath:






Speaker fitted, along with rear bumper, angled bit and even more bracing - TBH this is turning out to be far heavier and tougher than it needs to be, but at least it'll come in handy if I ever need to lay it on its side and have two people stand on it






Speaker is cunningly hidden by making a big hole in the bottom of the skip:

You will need a safety net on that skip...

The problem is finding something dense enough that it doesn't look like it's come straight off a bag of satsumas ... I do have some netting that's thick enough to drape in a scale way, but then it looks too heavy. And it's light/mid blue.

Of course, as it's a 1970s truck it'd be more period correct to _not_ use a net - IIRC, load security was completely optional until the early 90s

Although the 70s is more commonly remembered as the Cleave Age, or The Decade that Taste Forgot, it wasn't very big on road safety either. For instance, my parents owned a Citroen Dyane.

There was going to be more to that anecdote, but thinking about it, that's kind of enough, isn't it?


Edit - I was wrong, it was a 1970 Ami 8. That's me in the foreground, and apparently my mum was going through a Nana Mouskouri phase

Excellent picture!

About the Ami 8, am I correct recalling that the Ami 8 took corners more or less like the 2CV?

For the net, maybe one of the nets some fruit/vegetable come in (like onions) could fit, if you choose to have one?

dyane, 2CV, ami 6, ami8, acadiane mehari.... have the same chassis. the poor dodoche chassis. A real rust nest