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Stickframe

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About Stickframe

  • Birthday 23/04/1965

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  1. @dnl42, thanks very much. Considering how big (long and heavy) and awkward to hold this is, I really enjoyed building it. It's too bad that it's done! I would have liked to keep going, as opposed to at least one other project I have which has been patiently waiting for me to finish for quite a long time 😄 @Pete in Lincs isn't he the guy who uses Tabasco Sauce for eye drops?...and still doesn't cry??? 😄 But let me ask you, could he install numerous .7mm rivet heads in a straight line? He doesn't need to! he'd kick the model straight off the bench and go for pizza in his big truck! @triumphfan, hi Steve, thanks very much, I appreciate it. Not much of this project comes from a kit, so your comments mean plenty - just getting the chassis and suspension worked out to sit level on all six tires was a challenge! Cheers, and thanks for having a look - Nick
  2. Hello model builders, After a few weeks of rain and clouds slowed down painting and progress, I was able to finish this project, and as today was sunny, well, the truck and I went for some pictures. If you're interested in seeing the process, please see the following: And on we go: As you can see, not a subtle truck - this is model of a Kenworth 963 Super. These are all wheel drive, heavy construction/oil field rigs - the tires/tyres are 6'/2m tall! This project involved a fair amount of scratch building. The front axle is from KFS but the suspension is scratch built - as is the hood/bonnet, chassis and bed. A guy went ahead and made the butterfly operable, using small piano hinges. And a couple of indoor pics - no distractions or bright paint: I really like how the bed and winch worked out - those of you who build model race cars might recognize the the cable - the same Top Studio we use for the hoses on 1/20 F1 cars - worked perfect for this! The tires/tyres are supposed to be used for a 1/16 scale model MATV - they are resin and quite heavy! And for fun, I cutout some images and set them in the appropriate landscape: And there you have it. I'm a bit disappointed this project is done, I really enjoyed it - ok, thanks for having a look. Cheers Nick
  3. I'm glad to know that fellow builders enjoy seeing some of the real world too! It can become too easy for me to stay huddled over the model, fussing about with things that I enjoy, that really have nothing to do with the bigger picture, specifically, the 1:1 world! @busnproplinerfan, hi Bus, yes, I'll look around my work area and try and find the producer of those eye bolts - I really like them, and they took a long time to find! I usually use them for suspension and steering parts, but as you'll see below, they did the trick here too. @dnl42 😄- yes, the joy of painting! My advice here is to just keep trying - I know that sounds obvious, but it helped me. Over time I have become a lot more strategic about painting than I was when I started. By that I mean remembering what did and didn't work, and planning ahead, in terms of the actual painting process, masking things off in an order that works for you (or me!) and reassembly, and as you highlighted above, figuring out the best way to hold objects while painting. (as shown above, well, sometime bad thigs still happen! 🙃) Having now painted a few kits, I think about this well before I go about painting a project. I can advise to not rush - for whatever reason, in the past I felt obliged to really attack a model with paint - moving rapidly with primer and paint. I concluded that this approach leads to problems (for me anyway). Instead I try to take it easy, dusting on and building up colors, even taking a few minutes between sprays/coats. This has resulted in fewer blobs and streaks, and better overall coverage. I also try and paint in sunlight (in my mind this seems like something I would have read about, saying not to do this, but I do it) - as the actual results are much more evident than when painting in the shade. While moving at a moderate pace, I am not moving slowly, so there doesn't appear to be an effect caused by the sunlight - such as paint drying in irregular patterns etc. As for what works best for you, just keep at it, and you'll find an approach you feel good about. Once the paint above set up, I went about refinement by adding PE and whatever bits needed to be attached, and painting on some chrome: The hood/bonnet and air cleaners are still only dryfit, but they fit. The only strange turn of events I experienced, is that the "wings" on the hood have flattened out. That is, when I built them, I established some gentle curvature to match the cab and radiator shell. The match was spot on as unpainted styrene, but the fit is less close now. I have tired to recurve the material, but have concluded that I can live with this fit. I'd hate to cause more visible damage in the process of readjusting the parts. I am pleased to report that the hinges work fine, and happily, I was able to maintain a nice distance between the parts with layers of primer and paint now applied. I scraped the paint off of the small "bridge" that runs between the cab and nose, and dis the same under the hood/bonnet. I'll use regular styrene glue to hold the two together. I thought about using CA, but as the hood folds upward on both sides, I think that it would eventually snap apart. @busnproplinerfan, Bus, you can see how the eyebolts worked out as stanchions. And as noted before, the chrome/silver - still just OK, and not brilliant and chrome like. Also, as you asked about before, the grill mesh worked out too. I found some PE specified to be used for model truck radiators. By itself, the screen/mesh was too wide for this, but, it has a vertical bar in the center, which I planned for, by adding .02" x .02" vertical sticks, at the centerline of the opening when I built the nose. You can see them best in some of the process photos. I then cut the radiator mesh on each side of the vertical center, and glued the center bit of PE in place over the now painted "sticks". Then went back and cut the remaining mesh to match the width of the openings on either side. Not exactly easy to do, but the results are OK with me. The mesh was hard to cut, and I don't enjoy gluing parts with CA onto paint, as the slightest error can look awful. Happily, no catastrophes to report. Naturally, I had to dry fit this and see how it worked out: These giant photos seem to be good and bad - you can see it all, and you can see it all - the good and the less good. There are few areas on the engine that need some touchup before more weathering. As a side note, the older 953 version of this truck had radiators on each side of the "nose". Apparently as an homage to the 953, the 963 design keeps the nose shape, but only has the single, central radiator. As for next steps, I am waiting for more primer and paint to arrive for the bed, so in the meantime I'll add a faint dust wash to to the engine, chassis, and tires/tyres. My idea being that this tuck might have seen some miles, but, it is taken care of. The size of the tires remains intimidating, as I have added washes to many resin tire and wheels before, but they are very small in comparison. With other tires, I use a specific method for getting enough "dust: (Life Color Dust I acrylic) on to dull things down, but not so much as to look like the vehicle has just rolled in from the desert or a mud patch. Thanks for having a look - Cheers Nick
  4. Well gents, I've stuck with painting, and for the next few days, the weather is said to be glorious, including this afternoon: So, this morning, in earnest, I went about detailing the parts I will share below, but along the way - it occurred to me to get a life! As I was sitting at my workbench, drinking coffee, listening to music, with an optivisor firmly attached to my head, and model parts in hand, I happened to look out the window - and well, it was sure a nice day! And as it turns out, I live pretty close to the San Francisco Bay, so a guy concluded that well, I could sit inside, and keep going or...."GO OUTSIDE" I know, crazy talk, but that's exactly what I did - went to the marina, went for a walk, got some sunshine and fresh air - even treated myself to lunch! I almost forgot, the 1:1 world can be pretty nice too! And not to worry, some of the news stories you might have heard about the demise of California, they might be exaggerated. On the left you can make out several towers of the Bay Bridge, with the San Francisco skyline in the background, and on the right, the Golden Gate Bridge - with Treasure Island in the middle ground on the left, and Alcatraz in the middle ground on the right. And it was warm, with almost no wind - as you can see by the still water - indeed, a glorious day! OK, enough fun and games, and back to serious business - model building. Over the last few days I have stuck with my regiment of running outside to paint between rainfall, and was able to make some good progress: Very much to my surprise and delight, the paint went on well. This is Tamiya Italian Red over, Tamiya Pink Fine Primer. I'm pleased, if not shocked to report no runs, blobs, streaks or orange peel. And made some headway on chrome parts: As this image is zoomed in quite a bit, you can see some seepage of CA from the eyebolts onto the handrail, but in "real life" this is unnoticeable. For this I went with Tamiya grey Fine Primer, followed by Tamiya Bare Metal, and then, using an airbrush, Vallejo Metal Color Chrome. While this is "fine" for this, application, it would not pass on a classic car, race car, or hotrod. The color looks more like stainless steel or bright silver. I understand that Alclad would have probably been a better choice, but I also understand that those colors are quite fragile, and probably not ideal for a guy like, say, me: Oh, what a treat - you might have noticed these two air cleaner housings in the group photo above - all painted up with that Tamiya Pink - ready to get hit with some of that nice Italian Red - easy enough! Except, as I was outside, merrily painting away, confident of more great results - well, both fell off of the wire I was holding them with - not to worry, the concrete sidewalk below broke their fall(s), and just to add some real interest, knocked off one of the intake tubes! Not only knocked it off, but pulled it and the styrene it was glued too :clean" off! Ahh - what a delight. As the disaster was obvious enough, I went ahead and picked the parts right up. Maybe you noticed my fingerprints? A real surprises is that despite this calamitous event, none of the numerous PE parts (there are several small clasps and brackets out of view) were damaged - there you go. So, before treating myself to a nice walk along the Bay, I cleaned up, fixed, and repainted them! Now, adding PE, painting on more chrome etc. to the cab and hood/bonnet. I ran out of paint and primer, so the bed will have to wait for a while - OK gents, thanks for having a look - Cheers Nick
  5. Continuing with paint, and rainstorms - both have been steady. As such, I have continued with my unconventional approach to painting - wait for the rain to stop, run outside and prime, wait some more, run back out and add a base coat and repeat. And while a bit erratic, I have been able to get some basically good results. I painted the engine in-frame, a bit like an armor project - tape/mask off parts I don't want to paint, then hit it with Vallejo Sand (Ivory) with the airbrush to match Cummins tan. Then went back and picked out some hoses, wires and other odds and ends with various shades: I'm pleased to report there was very little overspray - in obvious, and less obvious places - which was a nice surprise. Then, those Tires/Tyres and wheels - well - quite a PITA. Having made several armor kits, I've worked with several sets of resin wheels etc so this process is not new to me - but, as these are so big, no fun at all. Primed with Tamiya fine pink, then templates made for each wheel - then red via rattle can, then painted the adjacent sidewall with a brush, then, paint the tread with an airbrush. The flip over and repeat for each - or until you don't want to paint anymore! The steps are hand painted using a blend of Vallejo Steel, and Vallejo Metal Chrome, and I am pleased with the results. As you can see above (pink primer on the insides) I didn't paint the wheels at once - it was very slow going. Once wrapped up, on to some of the frame accessories: Happily the paint went on to the frame accessories much more easily and consistently than on the wheels - who knows why? same primer and paint - but this is a good sign, as the cab and bed are built of the same materials. Next will be the cab interior, body and accessories. Thanks for having a look - Cheers Nick
  6. I enjoy seeing your builds very much. The end results are always something very special (as is the case here), but I think I enjoy watching your process even more. It's interesting, helpful, and inspiring to see how you bring these together! Cheers Nick
  7. Wow! that chassis took some work -looking good now - Cheers Nick
  8. @Pete in Lincs, you're right - I'm far enough into this to use at least some restraint with paint and (real) weather, not weathering! still deciding on the latter - lol @dnl42, well, yes, the rattle can....please see below! @JeroenS - ha - the Dude - not much help at all! skulking around and knocking things over - perfect. @Chaz Gordon and @busnproplinerfan - oh, now there's an idea! LOL - a 1/16 scale Pete - I didn't know that was even out there! You know, while I have not clue how I'd find another set of these tires at what would be about 40% larger than these - no way. BUT, a guy could decide to make a Kenworth C500, (the slightly smaller version of this, that runs on bigger "normal" tires), using the same tires as this build - but come on! do I really need another unusually large, flatbed truck??? 🧐ðŸ˜ĨðŸĪŠ Probably not....not right now anyway 😄 @keefr22, well, yes, and unhappily, I need to add one more separate low hanging step on each side....never ending joy.....😄 @Toftdale, right - you are indeed right. I don't know what I was thinking - this will not be painted in one session considering the amount of paint required, the various steps required for detailing, and some sub assemblies. Painting will take some time - Speaking of painting: I took this screenshots just after I got the chassis primed and painted! I came in right as the can ran out, and rain started coming down! Taking a stroll down armor building and painting lane - primed the full chassis and engine, then taped off the engine and went about painting with Tamiya Sea Grey. It's a nice color, with a hint of blue that shows in the right light. And btw, it just started raining pretty hard. I can hear it coming down on the roof. And here we have it - @dnl42, yes, painted with the rattle can. I think having practiced and painted quite a bit with an air brush, I've found that I am now better with a spray can too. Not to worry, I have ruined a variety of builds using an airbrush and rattle can along the way, but now feel better with both. Just like using an airbrush, I now make it a point to dust on the first layers of primer and the base, then progressively add enough of either to do the job. I used to get streaks, runs, and drops of paint hanging on edges of parts - not good at all. I concluded this happened because I applied too much paint and/or/ held the can or airbrush too close to the surface. These observations seemed less obvious at the time 😄 just concluded that more paint was better - it's not. Those problems sill happen now and then, but I can avoid them for the most part. Also, for this and other big builds, I've taken on a two part approach for handling while painting. I start by holding (if possible) a low detail area with my hand (in this case, mid chassis), allowing me to rotate the model freely for painting (airbrush or can), then, when the time comes, I'll hang/hold the model from a wire or two to get the rest. You can see the wires in the back. I hope this paint stays as nice as it looks now. I waited about three hours between priming and painting, using Tamiya for both. I'm pleased that despite many cuts, sanding, filing, drilling and mix of materials, the finish looks pretty good. I hate it when I add all sorts of sassy bits of PE and they just gets lost once painted, or errant blobs of CA get a beautiful and obvious coat of the base color. At this point, I can't abide any of those problems, as this required a full can to paint, so now I'm out. And on to next steps: Back to days of armor, painting sub areas within larger painted areas. I haven't decided if this will be airbrush and hand painting, or just hand painting yet. As much as I'd like to get right after this work, I will hold off for a while and let the base color dry. I've figured out that even with careful handling, paint will easily scrape off of corners if it is not fully dried. So, I'll wait. Thanks for having a look - Cheers Nick
  9. Well guys, the only thing this truck lacks is subtlety! ðŸĪŠ It is a big brute. Over the last couple of weeks I've kept after adding details, like grab bars, roof mounted beacons, exhaust stacks and when materials arrived, finishing the bed. It's ready for paint, but the weather thinks otherwise! We have rain, and will for the next few days. In addition to humidity not being ideal for painting, I will prime this using rattle cans, and well, rain isn't ideal for outdoor painting! The following images show the beast dryfit: And yes, this is really big! I include the Dude, to illustrate the point. With the roof rack, fuel tanks, front bumper, storage boxes, and 6x6 it almost looks like a giant safari truck - Those vertical tubes in the bed are apparently used to help guide the cargo when loading, but they are removable, maybe for wider loads? Anyway, they are tethered to the bed with chains, so mine are too! If you look carefully, you'll see a clear plastic tube just above the bed. These are rollers that can be raised and lowered. They are used to help cushion the load when it is being loaded, then used to slightly raise the load to assist with unloading. Unloading evidently relies on inertia, as in the object is raised with these rollers. When the load is raised and winch cable slacked, the truck accelerates, causing the load to slide off the back. You get a pretty good view of the cab grab rails, which are small dia alu tube, with three eye bolts, and the roof beacons, made with alu sheet, stube and colored rod. The gaps in the bed will be filled with wood. Believe it or not, there are still a few bits to be added here and there, which I will do while waiting for the rain to pass. And, to further illustrate the size of this, a few scale comparisons: Compared to normal rigs, this looks like a small building. The red Peterbilt flatbed is, by normal standards, big - it is a 6x6 with big tires, and a long bed, yet it looks pretty tame by comparison. The service truck looks like a sporty runabout! and it's a big 4x4. The more I worked on this, the more comfortable I became with what it looks like, for example, thinking to myself that the tires don't really look that big - well, they are! In fact, all of it is that big. Oh, and you can just see in the last pictures, I used some PE letters to add the vertical spelling of Kenworth in the nose. Albeit a somewhat, apparently simple task, it wasn't. I wanted the letters to be evenly spaced and level - easy in theory, less easy with tweezers, individual PE letters, and CA ðŸ˜Ĩ😄 At this point, it looks like the next post will go into the ready for inspection area. I don't think that will be too soon, because in addition to the basic painting problems, I hope to paint the engine in a convincing way, will add nameplates, and various parts will be painted to look like chrome or stainless steel. On second thought, maybe there will be a few more posts here. So, on we go - thanks for having a look - Cheers Nick
  10. Great build! what a rig. Your overall weathering looks spot on - just enough - Cheers Nick
  11. HI Jeroen, well,. it was worth the wait! this rig looks great - the nae plates and weathering make it look just right 🙂 Cheers Nick
  12. @busnproplinerfan, yes Bus, that piano hinge. You're right about the pin - the supplier provided you with soft wire to make it - really? I didn't even try and use what they provided and went straight to some material I know and trust. As for the CA, I have made PE piano hinges before, but a lot smaller/shorter, using brass PE in 1/35 scale, and figured out pretty fast that they seem to work once, then flick off whatever they are mounted too. As such I added the rivets. I also roughed up the underside of the PE material with a coarse sanding stick. I was surprised to find the CA bond (between PE hinge and styrene) was pretty strong. I glued the pre drilled hinge onto the hood, then went back and drilled the holes into the styrene for the rivets, and there was no movement. If I had to do it again, I'd use the rivets. @JeroenS and @busnproplinerfan - ha - this project is indeed eating up all the materials! But, in California or otherwise, we have access to on-line hobby shops! I rarely, more like extremely rarely buy anything from a local shop - essentially because there aren't too many around here. There was one about 40 minutes away, but the guy who ran/owned it, would hover around too much, looking at everything I touched or looked at, which was annoying. There is another place, a bit closer to where I live, and an ok place to go for many supplies, but they are expensive. On the other hand, we also have a lot of art supply places to pick from, and unlike the hobby shop owner, the green haired kids working in the art stores are usually interested in what I'm doing and are helpful - guess where I go more?? Which brings me to this update. As I have been waiting for materials for the truck, it occurred to me that I might want to build a load for the bed, and back to reference pictures I went: If it's big and clunky, these trucks move it. In very broad terms, I found three categories of cargo - big boxes/tanks, big pieces of machinery, and towing big things. While I pondered making one of those giant trailers, I managed to get a grip on myself NO - that's a bad idea!! what are you thinking??!! which left making a box or a machine. I'm sure the pieces of machinery are remarkably heavy (as illustrated above), but decided they look too normal, sort of what you'd expect to see on any flatbed, and instead decided on making a really big box. This brings me back to art store supplies. It turns out, I've built a few dioramas, and have an assortments of materials at hand, which I decided to use for this: We now have a big box. I looked at several photos of these to make this. I'm embarrassed to report that I know nothing about oil extraction - be it from sand/shale or otherwise - but, I can say that these boxes can be seen in oilfields all over the world, from chilly Alberta to sunny Saudi Arabia. They also seem to have numerous variants from simple boxes to those subdivided and with decks and ramps. Just to keep this interesting, I went with this. Again, no idea what's going on here, and relied on a gut sense of what looks about right - industrial, complicated, and simple. Yes, very precise method 😄ðŸĪŠ Perhaps the most gracious flight of stairs ever applied to industrial design! 😄 well, it's done. As for the rest, taking a cue from our Sci-Fi model building friend (ie @Pete in Lincs) plenty of greeblies - strategically located to suggest something is going on here. Again, what it may be? I just don't know! I didn't go overboard with bits, as the real things don't have many, but they do have a few - just enough. The box itself is make of thick cardstock, framed with basswood strips, atop basswood sheets for the base. I added a few styrene I beams for the skids. This was not hard to make per se, but was/is big and unwieldy to handle, just like the truck. Next this will get some paint. I am going to use an institutional/pale green shade - good and ugly! I ran to said art store, and picked up a can of spray primer and acrylic paint. The primer is said to be gesso primer - no idea what that means, but I was assured it would work on a mixed media project, so there you go! Thanks for having a look, Cheers Nick
  13. Well guys, the week wrapped up, real work remained slow - only a few calls etc but, not much in terms of actual work to be done, so, on the big KW I worked instead. I was able to get quite a bit done, including something I was not looking forward to, the hood/bonnet. This truck does not have a single sheet, and instead has a pair of doors that open in the center, like gullwing doors. The task was two-fold 😄 first, making the body panels, then making up some piano hinges. The body work went remarkably smoothly, but the hinges took a long time and a lot of patience: I used .040" styrene for this, because I didn't want it to sag or twist. I would have otherwise done this with .020" thick material, which is a lot easier to use, but also somewhat flexible. And as you can see, both sides are posable. You might be able to tell, I've kept adding elements associates with the engine. But, back to the hinges. As you can see, they are made up of universal PE parts, which means the comb/fingers (?) that wrap around the hinge pin, need to be cut to length, matching the outside diameter of the pin. While not hard to do per se, the process is tedious - each needs to be marked then cut off with a knife. Early on I realized the hood would be heavy, and CA alone would likely not work to hold it all together, so I deiced I would make it more secure by adding really small metal rivets - ten per hinge. This was an awful task, The PE material is hard, making it difficult to punch/drill evenly spaced holed that would accept a #78 drill bit. OK, enough words: Should you decide to do this, I can say it's important to stay patient - and not get too annoyed by the relative unpleasantness of the task. As you can see on the upper photo above, once punched through the hinge and body material, I used very small diameter alu tubing to make the equivalent of small nuts, each glued in place over the rivets, then cut to height. On the lower photo, you can see the rivet heads, which are .8mm dia, emphasizing the importance of remaining patient while making holes in the hinge - over do it, and they will pop through. Next up, the bed. It turns out the bed is mounted atop another frame rail, making a total of three in the rear of the truck. There are then several crossing channels/ribs to support the bed above. I opted to not make this authentic for two reasons, first, the bed has a couple of dozen ribs - and I will use fewer. Second for framing purposes, I wound up adding a fourth pair of frame rails with the channels projecting perpendicularly from them. I did this so that I could establish a clear center line/spine, that did not vary, and which I could easily keep oriented over the primary, two rail frame. Sorry if that was wordy and confusing - here's what it looks like, starting in the rear: So, the rear has a roller at deck level, and seven smaller, underside rollers - and on and on - and from above: The deck is pretty straight forward - continuous sheet, except, when it gets close to the winch, where a portion of the bead will be filled with boards. Nothing on this truck is typical - you can see a new pair of connectors, which align and hold the bed and it's rails, and the chassis rails below. There's also some sort of air ride element (to the left in this photo), which I don't understand) - nonetheless, there is a larger rib and pair of cushions on each side. Next, back to tedious: Naturally, ðŸĪŠ the winch has a pair of linkages that operate the clutches - perfect. While they look giant above, they are actually pretty small, and now they are installed! They should have hydraulic lines feeding them....ðŸĪĶ‍♂ïļ Finally, we needed one more big box: As I struggle with making boxes, I decided to try making this starting with copper sheet - that is, laying out the outside walls in a single sheet, then bending it to match the desired shape, then infilling with styrene. In the end, I don'[t know if this was much easier than just using styrene, but, there you go. It is located outward from the frame, and below the deck ribs. I'm not altogether sure how the door mechanism works - there is clearly a handle, and what appears to be a big latch/lock? who knows - it's done! OK gents, thanks for having a look, and happy model building! I'll have to stop progress for a while, as I ran out of materials - lol - 😄 Cheers Nick
  14. I thought for a minute you snuck over here and decided to help with one of my projects - lol - "I can't tell why this isn't parallel? - measured twice, glued once, why isn't it parallel?!" If you did any big hacking to fix this, it sure turned out nice and clean, there is no sign of "surgery" - looks great!
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