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1/24 Terrible Transit Camper


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I've made a start on the interior by painting the front seats. 

 

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Ok, it's not all my own work: the upholstery is courtesy of Mr Model Diamond Pattern No.7 transparent decal. Ever so thin, you get one chance to lay it down or you're snookered.

 

Transits had all manner of different seat cloth so I've gone for something that looks generic 1980s Ford. The main colour is grey primer whilst the vinyl edges are a tar/grey shade I mixed up. Most Ford seats had grey vinyl edges but the contrast wasn't enough for "scale colour". This will look better. I still need to grubby them up and add seat belt sockets before mounting them on the seat frames. 

 

Given my slow progress, I don't know how the rest of you manage it. 

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Have we had a bank holiday? It doesn't feel like it! I did manage a couple more hours on the Tranny though.

 

If you build an Italeri Transit OOB it'll have a dragster stance, hence I reset the rear leaf springs earlier in the build. After adding wheel nuts to each wheel I got all four fitted and checked the stance. 

 

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That'll do. I've also finished the doors by fitting the trims inside and adding quarterlights. The kit OOB has full glazing that clicks into place but the tabs are too obvious and I wanted open windows so I made my own. I had a crack at making a partially wound down window on the passenger side. Moderately successful, but it's a good job I'm not going for showroom fresh. 

 

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I squandered a few minutes of my day off cutting the kit gearstick into three pieces and replacing the shaft with thinner rod that nobody will ever see or notice. Apart from now. 

 

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And the rear floor is now in place. This'll all be covered with camper stuff, when I figure out how...

 

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I like stuff like this, scratchbuilding off-piste. It's a 3D puzzle really. Now, where to start...?

 

ANTEATER

 

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Looks wonderfully hideous so far, I'd be tempted to use wooden stir sticks to make a suitably ugly 1970's/80's herringbone pattern parquet floor or something similar for the rear living area. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Now that's not a bad idea. I was thinking of a scaggy carpet but I could adapt your idea for the furniture and internal walls. I'm not 100% sure how I'm going to get it all the line up against the body sides yet but it can't be that hard... can it?

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2 hours ago, Anteater said:

 it can't be that hard... can it?

 

Nahh of course not and if it is a wee bit wonky then I'd explain it away by saying that it's been built on a shoestring by its owner using the old mk1 eyeball and lessons learned from the school of "yeah that looks about right" so the occasional bit of wonk and slightly misaligned components are to be expected. 

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I'm only just catching up on this build and I've got to admire the gloriously manky bodywork.  I've seen (and driven)so many of these old rattletraps back in the proverbial day and you've got it spot-on, the mixture of rust and red anti-rust primer in exactly the places that used to rust so often.  Great work.

 

As regards the rear floor area, as it's a homebrewed campervan what was most often seen was a patch of grubby mismatched old shagpile carpet.  Not sure how you'd simulate that though!

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Years ago in N London I had an older neighbour who had converted a Sherpa van like this.  He would drive it down every year to Yugoslavia for two weeks there then return.  But he was an engineer so it was all immaculately built inside, labeled drawers etc!

 

Nice Transit model by the way.

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Lots of good ideas from you lot, much appreciated, keeps me pointing forwards.

 

I think I'll start by sizing up the bed/sofa and use that as a datum point for the kitchenette. I've looked extensively online and poked around the Tranny Camper at the Great British Car Journey, and my primary conclusion is they were all built for short people!  

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It's a shame there's no kit of the Bedford CF van. There was no end of those brown and beige monstrosities in the 80s. Though, if you squinted, they did look a bit like the A-Team van. They were also seemingly the go-to choice for ice cream van conversations of that era too.

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Great work so far. I'm always up for a Transit build, especially if it's a beige camper van conversion.

 

@Bobby No Mac @Anteater Don't know why, but I always loved the look of the Bedford CF. Nice looking van in either the early or late versions. Got the itch to pick one up myself at some point. We just need a 1/24 kit of one as well. I'd buy several if that ever came to pass. The Sherpa was actually ok. I liked them. Driven enough of those during my time with Royal Mail in the 80s and 90s in the 150 and 360cf guises. The later Leyland DAF version was very underpowered. Still, I'd take a 1/24 kit of that too although I've got a bunch of the Roxley Models versions already. Mercedes 508. Has there been a kit of that? You'd think Revell would have jumped on that one. And yes! No more VW Transporters please.

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With a large family in the time before people carriers were a thing, my dad had a Bedford CF minibus in the early 90s. It had seen better days with a dodgy customised white/maroon paint job and it practically drank gearbox oil. I went on many trips with in him to McGuinness's scrapyard in Stoke to cannibalise parts from less fortunate CFs. After that he had a Dodge (Commer) van that cornered like a Weeble.

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3 hours ago, Bobby No Mac said:

After that he had a Dodge (Commer) van that cornered like a Weeble.

 

Jealous that your Dad had a Bedford CF! Funny that those Dodge Commer vans cornered like Weebles, because they certainly looked like weebles 😁

 

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Just fitted the cargo door inner and window (resin parts from Motobitz). It's important to get the level correct against the floor. 

 

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Sits about right. I made an inner door handle for extra detail.

 

Now I'm confident about the floor height I can crack on with making some furniture, but cracking on is a relative term as it won't be this weekend. 

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BOOM! And I return. 

 

The key to a good camper van is a rancid interior. In order to replicate the cheap/depressing/oppressive environs accurately I needed to replicate a tall cupboard and a kitchen area. Starting with the cupboard, I mocked up the shape using card from an old notebook that I use to list the personal details of my main enemies.

 

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Didn't really work though. 

 

So, I built a panel insert to make vertical a surface to compensate for the wibbly van side.

 

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Using coffee stirrers liberated from a secret source on the M1, I built this. 

 

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Didn't really work though.

 

Styrene worked better.

 

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Do you like my carpet? It's DC-Fix black velvet sprayed BRG and beige for that disgustingly infested vibe. I would have this colour all over my house/nest, no questions asked. 

 

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Gas bottle stove top mocked up. I had to remember how to do wood effect paint. In this case I sprayed it the same beige as the body then brushed some matt yellow on top. Once that was touch-sticky I dragged a toothbrush over it to take off most of the yellow and leave some texture. In hindsight I probably should have used an old defunct toothbrush, or at the very least my own toothbrush. 

 

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ANTEATER

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