TOPIC:

If I had to assemble I would do it with this.

if you put a small rubber ring in between and secure it with a body pin then it looks like the fenders are flexible just like the real tractor. let them vibrate by the vibrounit
easy removeable

Managed to snap off part of the front axle so reinforced it - then thought I'd do a bit on the underside too






Lots of filler on the seat, thought I'd tidy the chassis at the same time. I used AK Grey Putty - and I really don't like it. Low (almost no) odour, but it doesn't bond well, and shrinks very badly. I slapped it on thick, but you can see how visible the gap I was trying to fill still is






Mudguards screwed on, belts are red bootlaces, also added a tube for holding a flag

Thanks poebe - I don't think those fixings wouId work due to the angled block, but I think the mudguards will still shake around If not I ca use longer screws & add some O-rings or grommets  

Had the desk clear - very briefly so took the opportunity to get a clear pic of the progress so far

 

Haven't touched this in months, couldn't really say why - I think it's mostly that I only have the dashboard to do, then it's cutting holes to try and place the electrics, which I'm not really looking forward to

Another point was that I wasn't happy with the velocity stacks on the inlet manifold. If this is anything, it's a tour de force in how silly you can get in styrene - but it has these rattlely, bought-in spun steel cups ... I want to have a go at remaking them from sheet styrene


Step one - make some lumps of Milliput in 30ml plastic medicine cups:




Face ends:




... drill & fit M4 studding to taper turn the Milliput plugs: 






I've mentioned the "Unimate" head realignment widget before, it really does do a better job than doing it by eye with the two OE dead centres


 

You may have been wondering why I didn't make those in aluminium ... it would have been more work, but the real issue would have been accurately cutting them (almost) in half for step two - followed by grinding them properly flat on my Aldi Bench (Belt) Grinder.










Threads removed, and I have two (kinda) matching bucks for vacforming:




 

Step three - vacform, make small cuts to release just the styrene that's got pulled in the thread holes (having destroyed the first pull when making longer cuts encouraged tears), and remove the bucks by rotating them. Repeated until I had a pile of 11 of them that I have to cut out, sand, and fit together at some point ...










I didn't think I was pushing the vacformers motor too hard by doing 12 pulls in 90 mins, possibly 2 hours - but I suspect I've seriously shortened its lifespan

It began to get noticeably warm around pull 8, noisier around pull 9, smoke came out of the bottom on pull 11, but I did pull 12 anyway I would guess it was up to 77, 75 Celcius at the end & sounded like all the grease had come out of the bearings as it came to a stop

I gave it several hours to cool off & tested it again - I could smell grease/smoke briefly, although not see it, it was still noisy, and just sucking - not pulling a vacuum - the case started to warm up after just a few seconds.

I've always felt the motor was overpowered for this application, and that half the motor would produce half the suck, and better (or at least the same) quality pulls - and require less cooling. When there's no airflow at all, the motor is getting really overworked ...


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Marking centres of ends:



Parts cut out, I sanded one pair indoors to check I wasn't wasting my time in taking the rest out to the shed to do on the bench sander:




Rest of the pairs bonded: 




All sanded & fat ends dremelled out - two needed a touch of filler on one side, but I'm pleased how they all came out


 

Oooohh.....  You have a vacu-forming table thingo.  Very nice!

Last few details - I was sure I'd made a buckle release for the seatbelts but couldn't find it, made another, found the original & liked it better, so took the back off the new one & used it as a detail on the dashboard. Also on there is the sanded down cover off a Buggy Champ headlamp & a cut down & straightened Wild Willy gear lever. 

I also made some bigfoot pedals, I thought I was doing them to a slightly silly scale, but they turned out to be "correct" for the driver boot size so I probably should have gone 50% bigger.
Number plates are not a real layout, even if the DVLA allowed such a "rude" one

Next step is to cut some panels out of the top cover - I'm thinking exposed ESC between the drivers knees, RX in front of the dash, and a small capacity 2S Lipo pack (and two AA cell holders for the engine fan & shaker motors) at the front under the "V" - it would have been easier to cut that before installing the V though