Beer Wagon Progress, Part 1

Work on the Beer Wagon has been crawling along. Since I'm just getting back into building models, I need to acquire all the tools and supplies again. I had a few things here and there, but for the most part I'm starting over from scratch. Anyway, here is the some of the progress I've made so far:

The tires have been scuffed with a coarse sanding stick and scarred along the edges and side wall with a hobby knife. The Goodyear logos and blue lines on the slicks will be painted with Gelly Roll pens.

I added valve stems to the wheels using wrapping wire (purchased from Radio Shack). Caps are indicated by scoring the insulation with a hobby knife. The valve stem on the far left wheel is missing a cap! This was done simply by stripping the insulation off the wire.

The kit bed will be replaced with this basswood bed. I created the cracked varnish effect by using Ranger’s Clear Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint tinted with Burnt Sienna gouache. I also applied various washes to bring out the effect as well as adding water damage. I marked and chiseled out the holes using a sharpened jeweler’s flathead screwdriver. I made basswood support beams using the same weathered varnish technique.

I also used basswood for the bed side panels and posts, which I stained using Burnt Sienna gouache and India Ink. These will be painted yellow using the Mustard Seed Distress Crackle Paint.

I glued the cab back, roof, and sides together and filled the gaps with putty. The round red dot in the upper left corner is putty filling an ejection pin mark. I also sanded away the manufacturer’s mark from the interior of the cab roof.

I separated the hood from the cab using a BMC 0.15mm scriber purchased from Japan. I used a drill press to drill the hole in the front. This cracked the front when the drill snagged, but since I intend to have the Beer Wagon front-ended into a pole, this works to my advantage!

I removed the side grill using the BMC scriber. (I still have the other one left to do!) I intend to install new grills using fine mesh wire cloth.

The frame was a little warped, so I used a heat gun (on low, about 250 degrees) to straighten it. I opened up the areas between the frame and the engine bottom and transmission by drilling numerous holes and then filing and sanding. The red lines on the sides of the frame are putty.

I carved out the front lights to make them hollow and cut the kit’s molded springs off, leaving the tops and bottoms. I made new springs from .73 steel wire wrapped around a drill bit. After ensuring proper spacing between the coils, I cut them to length. I used part of the kit’s sprue to create the inner shafts.

I drilled out the intake stacks using a pin vice and thinned out the tops using a roto-tool cutter held in the hand. A few areas were so thin that they broke through, so I applied some kit styrene softened with solvent glue. After hardening, I filed and sanded the filled areas back into shape.

The taillights got the same hollowing-out treatment as the headlights. I’ll need to make lenses, but I’m still unsure how I will do these.

The rest of the parts all had their seam and ejection pin marks removed. That’s it for now!