hexnut

Next Step, The Trailer Bullnose....
 
The kit part......

Pretty standard for a '60's period Van trailer, The corners are radiused 12" and the structural beading wraps around and crosses the width of it. So what did the Trailer in the movie have?
 

Smooth corners, so the beading detail has to come off....

Both sides... now the question all the way to the top?

Yes all the way to the top.... But, notice another thing, the beading does not go all the way to the top  on the face of the bullnose either... so we count the beads up the front. 46 corrugated beads up the face of the trailer. This is assuming that they are the correct size.  So we need to count the beads on the kit part...
 

50 beads lines, so we eliminate the detail around the corners and four lines from the top......

But wait a sec, the area at the top of the bullnose is flat, for at least a foot and a half above the last bead line..... what's going on here... Obviously the Trailer Height is too short.
 
So I take a shot from the movie showing the height and width of the trailer and calculate the aspect ratio. Guess what? the Trailer is a foot too short. Doing my research, I discover that most trailers from the early '50's to mid '60's were 12'6" tall and measuring the bullnose added to the trailer deck height of four feet comes out to a perfect scale 12'6" where the aspect ratio of the trailer in the movie shows the trailer needs to be 13'6" in height.
 
I need to add a half an inch to the height of the bullnose..... (which means I need to add a half an inch to the height of the sides also)
 
Razor saw to the rescue.....

I cut a half inch off the other kits bullnose and mate it to the standard bullnose after sanding off the bead detail.....

Now it looks the proper aspect ratio......
 
So now I have to raise the trailer panel sides this extra height...... I have enough detailed plastic from the remaining kit sides to do this, but have to figure out how to make that long long straight cut and still be able to match the beading detail. It would look awful funny with the beading only going up the sides part way.....
 
So, the prior step was scaling in the horizontal, the next step, scaling in the vertical.....
 
Beginning to think I would have been better off scratchbuilding the thing.....
 
Onwards, and thank you for reading.......
 
I hope you enjoy...
 
EG

I thought of that, but unfortunately, this is what I need to build.....

Minus the collector and grille of course, unfortunately there is no aftermarket for such.... Even if there was, it is a simple box, much cheaper to scratch it....

Yeah I have the artwork.... A composite from several screenshots of trailer #2. I had to recreate the upper right corner myself.......

Still need to scale it a bit and a tad more cleaning up but I'm good here. Not sure if I'm going to print it myself or have a custom printer do it on an Alps printer....
 
Oh and those two Moebius Kits? they are current production, you can get them from amazon..... or your local Hobby Shop if they stock them.... The AMT Coca-cola kits are also current production if you want to duplicate what I'm attempting to do. The Reefer unit is incorrect for this build so I'm probably going to have to scratch build it anyway, so much for needing the old classic Watkins kit.
 
EG

Tractor build is unfortunately on hiatus waiting for parts......
 
So we continue by starting the second half of this build, the trailer.......

First off the kits.....
 

The kit at the top is a 2019 AMT holiday Coca-Cola van, a 40' Fruehauf model FB. The kit at the bottom is a 1970 AMT Watkins reefer trailer model FB. believe it or not, except for the reefer unit in the '70 kit, they are identical.
The instructions....

As the base model I'm using the newer kit and the older kit for the parts to enlarge the trailer to the proper scale size. (the older kit is a builder and not a collector grade kit)
 
The parts.....

The trailer measures 19 1/16th inches long not counting the reefer unit, this is a hair short for a 40' trailer in 1/25th scale.

And I need to lengthen it to a scale 48' which should be 23 1/16th inches long so it's four inches I need to add to get to the correct scale length. Well let's examine the parts....
The parts are highly detailed, actually amazingly detailed....

Side beading and rivet details......

Looks just like the beading details on the side of the movie trailers.....

The inner roof panel....

Shows the cross ribbing to support the roof.... (very glad this detail is there makes the decision on where and how to cut easy)
 
Why does this aid the rescaling of the trailer length? Well, on the real world trailer those ribs are on 2' centers so if I need to add 8 scale feet, and the rib distances are in scale, all I have to do is cut and insert 4 sections from one roof into the other.... so are the ribs to scale?

Laying the rule down next to the roof, we see that the ribs start out pretty much on 1" centers, at 1/24th scale, 1" centers are perfect, but we are working in 1/25th scale....  the centers should be gradually falling behind the inch marks on the ruler...

Checking the other end, and yes they do fall a little behind the ruler graduations as they reach the length of the trailer, the ribs are in scale... I need to cut out four bays.....

I don't count the first bay because it carries the door jamb for the rear doors so I take the next four bays off the old trailer roof. Next is taking the first bay off the new trailer roof..... (trusty razor saw works great here)

Then cleaning the edges, mating them, and checking the length......

Ahhh!, 23 1/16th inch long and perfectly straight. but while they were seperated I used both pieces as templates to cut the sides and floor of the trailer.... (you can see the parts under the razor saw in the above picture)
So, how did we do with the bead details on the sides of the trailer following this procedure?

The joint line won't photograph, the older kits plastic is seriously yellowed over time compared to the newers pristine white and that is the only way to tell where the join is....
So what does a 48' trailer side look like compared to a 40' trailer side?

Extending the floor panel.....

And the other side.....

Now, I have a trailer that is the correct length.... Next step, accurizing the trailers bullnose..... and checking for scale height......

Next up, Wheels and Tires.....

The Truck had ten hole Alcoa aluminum wheels..... In the kit they are chromed which had to be stripped off before assembly.  Chrome is applied to plastic parts the same way it is applied to car parts, Electroplating. What they do is spray the rack of parts with a conductive lacquer which allows the electrolysis process to take place. So when stripping you need to remove both the plating and the lacquer. This is not an easy proposition. back in the day the usual product used for stripping chrome was concentrated Chlorine Bleach. Good old Clorox. Pour some into an open container and allow the parts to soak til the chrome was gone, a process that usually took a couple of hours. Except this is 40 years later and the concentrated bleach isn't as concentrated as it once was. After three days, there were still large patches of chrome remaining and it wasn't touching the lacquer.  Time to find a new stripping medium. I knew of all the other suggested mediums which work to some extent, (oven cleaner, brake fluid, windex and a brush, etc. etc.) I discovered a relatively new product for completely stripping chrome off plastic parts. It is called "Super Clean" I use it in a closeable jar, (1pt mason jar) and just drop the parts in. Within three hours soak, the chrome is gone, overnight the lacquer is gone. No scrubbing, no unpleasant smells, simple and easy, a clear water rinse afterwards and your good to go. And the mason jar of super clean is good for several kits before it needs changing and another plus it is biodegradable and non toxic, I mean, I wouldn't drink it after all it is a powerful oxidant chemical but it will not hurt the septic system or anything in nature... Modern chemical technology.....
 
The stock AMT wheels consist of 20 parts. A rim and a seperate front bead. Ten vinyl soft tires mount to the rims much like the real thing. The first step is to clean the flash from all the parts. that is what I'm doing with the pin vise, drilling out all the holes.....
Then we glue the individual front beads to the rims.....

In the back of the pic above the frame you can see the two front wheels already done with their tires mounted. (test fit)...
 

Wheels all glued up and cured overnight, one of the problems with AMT split rims is they do not stand up to mounting and remounting the tires, the separate front rim will split off, so this is a tricky part. and they are ready for initial painting....
 

Painted and Tires mounted, actually beginning to look like something here. The fronts are slipped onto the front axle temporarily and I'm getting ready to assemble the duals. and, I run into another major problem.... (two problems in fact) First, the drums mounting flat does not match the flats inside the rims they are a full eighth of an inch too large! The rims do not fit the drums out of the BOX!!! Looking inside the drums, there isn't enough material to simply turn the mating surface down to fit the rims. Major surgery here to fix this...... The second problem is with the vinyl tires, they stretch, particularly around the bead area when mounting and unmounting them which means they do not stay where they belong on the rims.... Very poor situation for such an expensive otherwise well made kit. Also no way to correct this easily with the kit parts. Now I'm sure that Round 2 will replace the bad parts, but they will be sending the same parts that do not work now. So that is kinda defeating the purpose.... So I'm stuck now I cannot continue until I resolve the Wheel/Tire issue. Probably go aftermarket and replace the entire set of rubber.... Besides the vinyl tires in these kits have a habit of not ageing well. remember the old vinyl car seats and what happened to them after a few years? all cracked and split? well the same thing happens to these vinyl tires over time, they dry out, split and fall apart..... Yeah, Aftermarket is the way to go.... Resin wheels and true rubber tires....
 
So the tractor build is now on hold..... awaiting suspension parts and replacement wheels and tires...... Don't know what else to do at this point......
 
But then again, I have an entire 48' trailer to kitbash......
 
Next up, kitbashing a 48' Hobbs reefer van trailer......

Step 2, The Frame...
 

13 parts, fairly well detailed. one of the things I've noticed about these early AMT kits is the level of accurate detail. It is right up there with many of today's models in the accuracy department. There are other issues with this late '60's injection molding tech, but they didn't short the details.
 
First step checking for rail straightness....

As we can easily see the left hand rail is not straight, (they are upside down in the pic) but I can work with it. (this was after several hours of hot water bath and gentle persuasion to bring it back straighter than it was out of the box)
 

The cross members are in two halves believe it or not, this makes it easier to assemble. I've painted them black on the interior sides cause you will never get spray into all the nooks once it is assembled.... Note you can still see the curve to the left side rail laying flat on the table....
 

Now the instructions say to mount all the cross members to the left side frame first and then cap it with the right side, But doing that with a bent frame rail with result in a bent frame. We of course need this frame to be as straight as possible.... So what I'm doing here is taking the strongest cross members and mounting them first..... (you can still see the curve to the frame)

Glued together and left to fully cure. the tail is square and the long sides of the crossmembers give a large contact area to pull the two sides straight..... 
I mounted the four remaining cross members one at a time, using the rule to set a straight edge while the glue set. this allows the curved left rail to be drawn into alignment with the right side and hold there... the end result? straight as an arrow with no warps.....

At this point, I check scale, and it's right on the nose! at 1/25th scale it should be just under 12" long
Next step is adding the suspension parts Standard leaf spring straight axle front end and Hendrickson Walking Beam rear end. Now I'm not mounting the rear suspension cause I will be changing it to the required Torsion Bar suspension... I'm using it to support the frame while assembling the front end.....

Front suspension completed except for painting, I took the pic here so you can see the detail. once it is painted black it will disappear....

Aftermarket Torsion bar suspension, comes out of Australia.... on the right there is a second Battery box step from Round 2 models for the curbside of the truck.

Laid out you get a general idea of what the torsion bar suspension actually is, they ride outside the frame rails and connect to the axles by way of linkages that twist the bar when one side or other need to travel up or down... a very smooth riding system I'm told but many truckers especially heavy haulers say it doesn't have the load carrying capacity of the walking beams. Hence they don't like it....
 
But this also reveals my first hitch/hickup on this build, the linkages to attach the axles to the bars are not in the package everything else if there but the four parts needed to make it work. The gentleman from australia tells me that he will make them up and get them out to me. but it may be a while. The guys who do the aftermarket in the truck modeling world manufacture to order. Which means that when you order you go on the production list behind those that ordered before you... The suspension kit took a full month to get to me... and now I have to wait another month for the linkages.... so to save the gent the shipping, I ordered a few more parts I would eventually need. another month later, they arrive in good shape. I'm sure you guessed it, no linkages... Turns out he got his orders mixed up and sent the replacement linkages to another modeler. I'm now waiting on the linkages... but I figured that I would go ahead and assemble the Walking Beam suspension so I can at least continue the build.....
 
Thank you for looking in and following along....
 
Next up Wheels and Tires.......

Now the cockpit is done as far as it can be at this point.... (still need the dash panel painted and detailed)

Next comes the body, firewall and hood.....

Now, with the body set on the chassis, it's beginning to show it's potential.....

Masked up and ready for paint.......
 
Onward.....

Here is an example of stripping enamel paint with super clean....
 
I was going to go with an interior approximately this color.....

Kinda goes well with the body work doesn't it? but since mine is going to be red & silver this is too light.... But I had already painted the cockpit and the drivers seat, so it needs stripping....

After 12 hours bath, most is now loose and could be brushed off.. but I'm going to leave it for another couple of hours while I decide what tone I want the Leather to be, probably a more deeper brown toned leather....
 
A lot of these cars had a black interior, or white interior, and neither of those appeal to me. They were manufactured in any interior finish the customer wanted, with color matched carpet and leather seats & door panels....
 
I have leather paint and a few other colors... still considering it...... But it's confirmed Super Clean does remove paint albeit a bit slower than chrome....

Onward, Floor Pan and fenders mounted.....
 




Now, after a few paint details, we move to the actual coachwork........
 
EG

It's now 4 hrs later, and one completely clean part.....
 


No chrome anywhere and ready to paint.....
 
Nothing advocates better than the end result....
 
Thank you for your patience..... (and indulging me by following along)

At 1 hr 40 min, she was done on that side....

So we flip her over....

And 40 minutes later....

Almost done.... we will be right in at three hours for a complete strip and that was doing it in two stages, If I had completely inundated it in Super Clean,  it would be done already....
 
I have no affiliation with Super Clean or any of it's parent or subsidiary companies and no financial stake at all in this product... My interest is solely in that it works for modeling better than anything else I have ever seen....
and I would recommend it to any one needing to strip electroplated chrome off of plastic without damaging the plastic underneath....
 
Now when this is done in a few minutes I wash it off, dry it and now, in three hours, it's ready for paint....
 
EG

WE have an engine, now we need wheels for the engine to do its job.....
 
Wheels and Tires.....
 

I normally don't partake of wide whitewalls, but in this case, on gold rims, they really look the part.....
 
But the point is to put the engine power to the wheels and for that we need a frame.......

For this edition, I stripped the chrome off the frame and running gear, the previous one I didn't and had to deal with constant touch ups cause paint doesn't stick to chrome that well. Paint adhesion here won't be a problem. Now this car had a frame that the engine crankcase was an integral part of the structure on the forward end. here I've inserted the engine between the frame rails to align the two sides so the rear cross members are assured of being square. It was removed for painting..... Overall semi-gloss black.......
 
Assembled....
 




Next part, the lower body pan & fenders....... (dressing out the underworks)
 
EG......
 
 

Last construction update..... Finished the Generator and mounted it. Manufacturing the lifting lugs proved to be a bit fiddly but I got it done.
 

Lifting Lugs constructed and attached to the clevises and cables....

Preparing the attachment points....

Putty fills the holes on the ends of the half-round skid bumpers....

Sanded flush and Lugs mounted....

Generator mounted to the lift and raised halfway to full height.....

Opposite side view......

Fully loaded position, the fit appears to be perfect....

Painting off the corners and touch ups....

Another test fit....

Cables painted off gunmetal, the Cables, although when manufactured were painted OD Green, in a very short time with moderate usage the paint flaked off leaving the oiled cables exposed. the cables were oiled to prevent corrosion....

Left side profile with the Generator in it's final position and the cables superglued to their lifting hooks.......

Left Front view.....

Right Rear View......

Right Front View....

Rear view with the generator permanently in place..... (and one touch-up still to do) Mount the drivers door mirror, body hoops and the antenna and she is done....
 
Complete......




With its M-51 Skysweeper hooked up..... I decided not to load up the body with details, I could have gone another couple of weeks building and adding stuff. This would make an excellent diorama subject not often built... I added a tarp, folded in its storage place above the ready ammo lockers, a simple piece of napkin trimmed to appropriate size, rolled and folded to fit it's space, then drybrushed in field drab with olive drab highlights.... An issue vehicle would have it's tarps... And no the M-51 didn't travel with ammo in the autoloader, it's just that sitting on the shelf for 4 months has caused the rotation mechanism of the ammo holder to freeze up. I couldn't rotate them to remove the shells. So I left it this way cause I didn't want to break it just to take a pic as unloaded.....
 

FINISHED!  
 
Thanks for the comments and likes, this was my first major project in a long time and I hope that you enjoyed it.... (even the wife was impressed)
 
EG

Well we are now going to finish off the M-18 Generator, it's all in the details....

It's pretty much laid out in the pictures above what the details are, most of them are fairly simple and can be reproduced in similie with tidbits from the parts box except the very distinctive louvers, the three power receptacles, the lifting lugs on each corner and the radiused bullnoses on both ends of the frame bottom....
 
We will start with the Louvers very small and difficult to reproduce. Fortunately, Archer Fine Transfers has come to the rescue.....

They make a set of very fine cast resin louvers on decal paper. now these are "O" gauge railroad scale which translates into 1/48th scale for those of us not familiar with rail scale.... Problem is I'm working in 1/35th scale, an oddball metric scale designed to fit plastic models around little electric motors to make build your own toys.... so what we have to do is figure out how long a louver we need and see if something will match the length.....
 
Well my trusty scale calculator told me from my scaled drawings that I needed louvers that were approximately .125 inch long and I would need twelve of them in each of eight vertical columns on both sides of the generator housing.... the vertical column measures .75 inch. In the picture above the shortest louvers on the sheet measure exactly .125 inch and at 1/48th scale that makes a pretty good representation of a 6" louver..... The louvers I need are somewhere between 4-5 inches long so I settled on 4.5 inches long which in 1/35th scale equals .128 inch.... but, in the vertical space allocated for louvers, I cannot fit 12 louvers I can only fit 8.... so we are looking at impression rather than absolute accuracy... the louvers are there and in certain light conditions are very apparent and would be missed by anyone familiar with the equipment.... So, lets see how we did....

This is the left side, sorry it's a little blurry... (they apply and lay down just like decals cut dip in water and when loose, slide into position on a glossy surface, and let dry)

The right side in a much better pic.... Now I know they look like black lines, the real effect comes when you paint over them.....

Another blurry pic, (I've got to get a better camera) the receptacles mounted on the left side, these are the electrical connections for the gun and director....

This pic of the right side rear shows the frame bullnose, fuel filler and gauge and the radiator cap the hinge detail added above the side doors.... we are now ready for painting......
 

First coat of paint, left side, given the light angle the louvers are hard to see, they are there but almost invisible.. (which was expected given the color and light conditions)

Right side, again the louvers are there, a bit easier to pick out here but still almost invisible... which is what you would see in real life in similar light conditions.

Subtle, but effective and very scale appearing in my opinion.....

Up on the mount in loaded position the slight light change casts a bit more definition to them.  I think they are spot on as far as effect.... but that is just my opinion....
 
Next up, lifting lugs, mounting to the tractor and finishing off....
 
EG

As mentioned before I was able to obtain the US Army Tech Manuals for this particular piece of equipment, it is a 35Kw continuous duty alternating current generator. Usually it was supplied to the antiaircraft units using the 90 & 120 mm antiaircraft guns during WWII/Korea and postwar to the M-51 Skysweeper battalions. Capable of supplying the power requirements of an entire battery of guns, (4) including their directors. Additional units were supplied to support the radar companies that were attached to the AA battalions. Little known fact, all of our heavy antiaircraft weaponry from about mid 1942 on, has been power laid and radar guided, accompanied by the VX fuse, they became the deadliest AA guns the world had ever seen. This was the power unit that made it all happen for the US Army.

This is my attempt to recreate in 1/35th scale one of these absolutely essential pieces of equipment.
 
Time to hack some plastic......
 

Basic box parts used as a frame. the original frame was built of steel channel and plate, for this a simple box will do.

Base glued up, I'm using .040 sheet styrene to make the foundations and basic profile shapes.

Tabs added as stiffeners and locators for the interior bulkheads

Rough cut radiator in place along with the end bulkhead and sidewalls for the fuel tank compartment.

Forward bulkhead glued behind the radiator, core support sections added around the base of the radiator, two more bulkheads in the middle to support the side panels to go.

Fuel Tank cover in place cut from .010 sheet....

Radiator built up with doors and side supports out of .020 sheet....

Once the radiator was added the whole thing started to develop a narrowing towards the top, so I added a strut to push the top opening wider and back into vertical alignment.

Center support build up out of .020, this is needed cause the side panels are split fore and aft forming the two access doors and side covers.

Forming the hood out of .010 sheet. (wrapping it around a file handle to set the curve)

Hood glued on the left side.

Gluing the right side of the hood around the profiles.

Beginning to take shape, but note the wrinkle that has developed in the middle of the hood.

Sorry for the blurry pic. But even such, you can easily see that with the right edge glued down around the side curve, a major issue shows up here, the glue (MEK) is too strong for the .010 sheet styrene and has caused warping and deformation of the sheet on the ends. Also note the edges of the hood over the openings, the tension in the sheet has caused the hood to bow outwards. This isn't going to work. I need to support the hood on the ends and middle where it contacts the formers also over the openings so it doesn't warp.......
 
I need to rethink how I'm going to form the hood..... It needs support all along the top edge and an alternative way of gluing it down so the glue doesn't destroy the edges.....
 
Next up, the solution......
 
EG
 

Well it's time to start the process of accurately modeling an M-18 Generator... first step gathering images, overall images and detail images.... All scale scratch building starts with preparation..... 

This is what I need to create, it measures 
Length, over-all ................................... 100 1/2 in.   in 1/35th Scale     ...... 2.87 in.
Width, over-all .....................................  41 5/8 in.                                 ...... 1.189 in.
Height, over-all ....................................  56 5/8 in.                                 ...... 1.618 in.
First thing to do is get an accurate profile so I will need two sides and a vertical....



The images above I've posted before they definitely give an indication of the details required and come from the US Army Tech manuals for the unit....


These two images come from the US Army Tech manual for the M-7 Generator set, the M-7 is just an earlier model of the same capacity and size just not s refined.... It's good to get a design history so one can see what the engineering principles were for the particular piece of equipment. These two generators were used interchangeably during WWII, but the M-7 was phased out by the Korean War in favor of the M-18.
 
Although good for details, these images do not give me what I really need, which is profile drawings/images..... for that we have to turn to the operator's manual TM 9-617....


Page 26 and 51 of the operator's manual gives exactly what is needed, direct face on profiles....
 
The first step we need to do is clean, correct their sizes and scale them... For example look at the radiator and core support image above, it is stretched vertically.... the fan opening need to be a circle.....Ve
I prefer to use gimp for image processing, the vertical profile is now corrected and scaled as well. It was squeezed narrower that it really was. This was easy to fix in Gimp by scaling it out wider till the fan opening in the shroud was a true circle....
 


M-18 left & right side cleaned, cropped and scaled. The fan shroud pic above also has the radiator core support so it was an easy job to scale it to size matching it to the left profile in height from the core support up to the radiator cap, this also gives you an accurate width once the vertical stretch was removed.

Frame image cleaned and scaled. Once all this is done we can assemble and print out a scaled construction guide......

This image shows all necessary views needed to build a scaled replica.....
 
Next part, cutting plastic.....
 
 

Decals;
 
I build my armor at it's issue point, markings wise it will only have the registration numbers and national insignias at this point, unit markings were the purveyance of the field commanders and his designates. There wasn't a uniform method of marking until around '43 and that wasn't strictly adhered to, this is why you see different colors for the national insignias, (yellow and white predominated but there was also blue and red and orange colors used) and the unit designations were all over the map a combination of symbols and alpha-numeric designations. A real hodge podge.  This is why I prefer a simpler scheme and outside of dust and the occasional ding, no need for intense weathering. I know this isn't the norm for armor modeling where grit and grime is the rule, but it is what I like....
 
That being said, these vehicles didn't have much in the way of markings, even when they were in service..... Reg numbers and white stars were the norm.....

Basic stars and designation number, In my research I found from an army manual dated 1995! that had an image of what the national insignia's should be on an M8 HST......

An 18" star on each door, a 12" star on the front engine cover plate, and a 24" star on the roof over the drivers compartment. Now as you can see, my model has the spare tracks on the drivers roof so the star would be obscured and on images of the real thing when the tracks were there the roof star was omitted as we see here......


And the designation numbers on the side. "11A" has been observed on every M8HST that served in the field. Doesn't matter where it served it had the "11A" number on it's side below the air cleaner covers. It has to be a type designation of some kind but I have found no explanation for it. I replicated it using single digits decals... The number is feax, in actual usage the numbers ran from 500- 899 so 756 is a viable number and probably was actually assigned to a real vehicle. I've seen photos of these with numbers on both sides of "756" but this usage is completely fictitious. Above the number was usually a "US ARMY" or a "USA" I used the shorter version cause I had a decal for it that fit the space. This is what you would see on a basic issued vehicle before the unit numbers/symbols were applied in the field.
 
Tracks:
 
The most tedious part of the build, they come in individual links that snap together pivoting on the interior pins on each link. the links are plain, representing the cast steel plate that makes them up. The rubber road pads are separate pieces that need to be glued to each track link.....

One complete track, partially padded. Now most people use super glue to adhere the pads to the links, I found that SG is too brittle for the flexible vinyl pads and even after a short while they tend to fall off..... I chose Formula 560, the clear canopy glue to affix mine, it is white when applied, form fits to the parts and when dry is flexible and completely clear/invisible.....  I have yet to have a track pad fall off yet.....

On the upper left is one finished length of track and gluing up the final length of track pads....

Left side track mounted, now the way to mount these is to connect them all together and carefully hang them over the sprocket bogies, and road wheels using the rear idler wheel to tension the track as you slip the axel in.... It took me a couple of tries to get the right feel for it but when you do as you can see they fit beautifully, sag appropriately, and just look "right".......

And sitting on its tracks, you can see the distinct sag between the two middle return rollers just like the real thing... I like these tracks, a bit of a bore assembling, but terrific when complete, well worth the extra work... (especially as this is a custom application)

Almost completed body on the almost completed chassis, as you can see the glass is in place reels installed great looking tracks , you can even get the hint of a slight forward lean while sitting on the tracks, (it's natural stance with the dozer blade installed) more to come,  machine gun, antenna,  and possibly a tarp for the body bows.....
 
Final assembly and scratch building the M-18 Generator set coming up.....
 
EG
 

Paint has dried and cured, first a fitting to make sure everything is copacetic before I start on the details......
Still in subassemblies, fitted to make sure everything is straight and tight....

Right front view....

Left front view....

Closeup of bow & sprocket details....

Side details.....

Skid lift & rear hull details......

And a low angle left quarter street level view......
 
Next up, Decals and Tracks.....

Final prepping for the second spray session, TRACKS! 

Two sets of AFV Club AF35046 T91E3 workable track.... (same track used on the M41 Walker Bulldog)

The tracks are high pressure injection molded in individual links, 160+ links with separate rubber track shoes. My impression is it is lucky I needed two sets,the number of links with flash is high about 15% of the set, I tried to clean it off but unfortunately that didn't go so well, it is hard to distinguish the flash from the pivot pin so trimming the flash usually results in trimming the pin also. the track links cannot be forced together cause they come apart when it is time to bend them around the wheels. So essentially those flashed links are useless. It takes 87 links to make a single track for my M8, it would be less with an M41 so I guess they send extras. Good thing given the rate of unuseable links.

One set assembled, the long length is what is needed to track one side.

Very flexible, you do have to be careful as they will separate under pressure

Looks and movement are very close to the real deal....
 
There is one more part missing from the kit. The M18 Generator that is usually carried on the back on the skid loader. Not all M8 HST's had a generator, in fact within a year and a half of entering service with the AA battalions the M18's were shifted to M7 generator trailers and the skid was used for personnel supplies or more ammo. An M18 Generator was a 30KW power supply, it was capable of powering a whole battery of M51's (4 guns) plus it's director (also mounted on an M7 trailer) This is why they discontinued carrying them on the back of the M8.

But I'm building an example of the complete system as initially issued/used.

So I need an M18 generator..... Luckily I have both the operators manual TM-9-617, (trailer mounted) and the depot repair manual TM-9-1617. Thank god I found them online because it is the only source of pictures of this particular piece of equipment.

Also to my great enjoyment the depot manual has a scaled measured drawing of the base frame and a picture of the finished frame weldment. Now the resulting model has to be scaled to the model of course. (we do want it to fit don't we) which will be a tiny bit shorter than the dimensions called out in the print.... That is one of the vagaries of scratch-building for an already designed model you have to adjust what your adding to fit the model....


Right Front

Left Rear

Left side open panels

Right side open panels

Frame weldment

Measured Drawing of the Frame....
 
Next, A basic idea of where we are at this point in the build....

Final subassembly before paint....
And, as a teaser, A shot of the subject model at this stage of assembly. Still in subassemblies, just prefitted before paint to make sure everything fits the way it should. After this we will be in it's first drab dress....

Cab pre-fitted to the deck, deck fitted to the hull with some of the body superstructure fitted in place.... I built the blade as a subassembly cause like the front plate, there is a lot of detail that will not be readily seen once assembled.... And at this point a note. this kit is right up there on the accurate detail end of the scale, equal to ANYTHING produced today. I am very impressed at the level of detail and the crisp clean molding. I would recommend it to anyone as a fine example of the M8A1 HST. This effort by Nitto is far and away better than their M4 HST in accuracy and manufacture.... Unfortunately it is not manufactured anymore, but Bluetank has the Nitto molds and has re-released this kit several years ago, it is still available at a reasonable price, and makes a fine addition to any artillery prime mover lineup.
 
Well, here she is, a new suit of clothes.....

I pulled all the superstructure off the back as they need to be painted individually. There are underneath places that need painted which wouldn't happen with the body completely assembled....
Need to let the paint cure for 24 hours before I can do any details or touch-ups.......
 
At this time I went thru the Kit from this point forward looking for any problem areas that may be laying in wait while the paint cured. Noticed that the M2 .50 cal was missing, the mount is here, what they call an ammo box is here but the gun is nowhere to be seen. All I can think of since the bags were sealed closed (mfgr. stapled) it must have fell off during bagging. OH Well! I went and found a replacement online... Asuka Browning M2 Machine Gun Set B w/Cradle. Said to be the best, better than resin & photoetch so I guess we will see. As I was prepping the remaining parts for spraying, I was looking at the body and thought something is missing....... but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.... 

Reels......

The M51 Skysweeper used two main sets of cabling, one set ran from the Generator to the Gun and the other from the Gun to the Director. And the kit has no reels.......
So where do I find reference to period US Army cable reels???? Google doesn't help, it shows current reels and those commercially available, nothing WWII/Korea vintage.....
So who in the US Army used Cable Reels? the Signal Corp of course! I searched on Signal corp operations and imagery and came up with two photos of what I needed to make....

France 1944, Signal Corps troops repairing the telephone system. A standard 22"dia cable reel is at the base of the pole.

Korea 1952 I believe, telephone work at an airbase. four standard 22" cable reels in the back of a cable service truck.

Making reels is fairly simple, two disks and a tube, 3/8ths tube and .020" sheet styrene cut in a 5/8th circle drilled thru the center to accept the rod......

Mounted in the Reel Holder, looks like they will suffice, but need more details.

.025 styrene rod used to replicate the six stiffener spokes on the reel....

Showing the method of glueing the stiffeners in place using liquid cement......

Almost finished with the stiffeners, a simple six spoke pattern flush with the disk edge....

Inner bearing disks glued over the center of the spokes and drilled, and the beginnings of attaching the rims of the reels.....

Mounted on the rod in the reel holders.

Ready for final sanding and paint..... The wide reel held the power cable and the narrow one held the director cable. Now I need to find a suitable material to simulate the cables. Standard wire doesn't cut it....
 
Next up, more Painting and Assembly, Tracks and looking forward to the Generator set which is not included in the kit.....
 
 

Renwal didn't do the M-8 they did quite a few but not the HST's. Nitto did the HST's with this one and an M-4 (which was wildly incorrect and out of scale to boot) They were doing things no one else was even thinking of like a 1/32 scale Atomic Annie.... (which is a HUGE kit, I have it in my stash) and of course what was considered the most detailed armor kit of the day.... (the kit that got me into modeling dreams)
 
This of course is the revel re-release box art... I never got to build this one but it did set of my muse.... Then I saw this one...

Again a re-release Revell box, but I have an original in my stash now.  Revell acquired the Renwal molds way back in '76.... Only recently have they started re-releasing them..... Thankfully, they haven't changed them...
 

This kit has been out there for a while, initially it was a motorized kit and had full operating suspension and a true rubberband track. The kit I have has everything from the older kit except the electric motors and drives. Reading reviews of this kit numerous reviewers stated that one needed to acquire a Walker Bulldog kit (Tamiya) to get the correct sprocket for the track which would have to be aftermarket, and, more than one set because the M-8 has one more road wheel than the M-41 making the track lengths 15% longer... So I bought the M-41 and the two track sets.... 
 

As you can see it is a full blown M-8A1 with the T-48 Body and Dozer blade.... Perfect fit for my M-51 Skysweeper
As I had been working on it, I decided to lock the operating suspension in place taking the ride height off the Tamiya M-41 hull....
 

Road wheels and return rollers on, unpainted, it's close to the point of painting it overall Olive Drab. I found out that the return rollers did not have rubber tires on them so they will be painted steel, the road wheels of course get a coat of rubber....
 
I build model armor as a series of sub-assemblies, Hull, Deck, Superstructure, Gun, Turret, Tracks etc. once the major subassemblies are done they are painted. (usually rattlecan for the base coat) US army vehicles of the period are painted the ubiquitous US Army Olive Drab overall as the base coat of paint from the manufacturer. The only markings being the registration number stenciled to the sides. (insignias and unit markings are added in the field) as I'm building I check what I have for decals and what is needed on the field units.... I don't build combat mud hogs or specific units so I need a clean set as an example of general usage to get the right look. So yesterday I spent half the day searching the internet for generic US Army stars & lettering, WWII/Korean war vintage in 1/35th scale. I settled on the Microscale #13-11 stars & letter/numbersets. One would be enough, but Microscale has a $20 minimum so I had to buy three sets. which is ok cause I have a number of old kits (and some new ones) that do not have US markings. (or what they do have sucks so bad I wouldn't embarrass myself by using them)

Nitto unfortunately does not offer US markings in decals. or rather they don't include stars as depicted clearly in the box art. I checked this out with the M4 HST kit I also have and they provide the rising sun flag for the Japanese versions but no US Stars. (and the reg numbers would look like they were painted by hand with a small brush) Totally and completely unusable.
 

Forward body, crew & engine compartments, upper left are the internal bulkheads, upper middle right are the engine compartment grilles, they will be hand painted black and dry brushed OD Green to show the grill structure.
 

This pic shows the sub-assemblies at this point, Cab in the upper right glass installed in the bulkheads upper center and below that the incomplete front engine plate which gets mounted to the lower hull before painting. All that is left is the copper rod and hooks to be installed.

Completed cab structure, all the little bits in place (those brush guards around the windows were a bear to get correct. the windows will be installed after the paint job. you'll notice the scuffed up look on the top of the drivers cab, it had three molded on track links that I had to take off, they were out of scale and looked like blobs besides they were upside down. with all the extra track links I have they will look much better and have the correct number of 4 links.

Before you can paint the hull, we have to mount the idler wheel and sprockets. this is an image comparing the rubber track sprockets, (in the center) and the scale Tamiya M-41 sprockets. I had an issue with the scale sprockets cause they didn't mount to the axle the same way the operating sprocket does. The hole in the scale sprocket is too small, so I drilled it out a bit larger than the operating sprocket, cut off a 1/8th inch length of mocha straw pushed it into the hole which now slips over the axle with no play. A little Formula 560 to affix it all together and we are good to go...

And finally the lower hull with the idlers & drive sprockets in place and a completed front bulkhead. At this point I would start mounting the hydraulics for the dozer blade and it would get a bit crowded so this is where the paint comes in.....
 
More subassemblies coming......
 
EG

The M-8 HST started life as a test article. The T-43 HST. which was a new design utilizing the running gear of the M-24 Chaffee Light Tank. Of course the M-24 was well known to be underpowered for a tank (even a light one) and as such, the T-43 HST did not survive automotive command testing. It was then ordered that a completely new HST would be developed using the complete running gear of the newly designed M-41 Light Tank known as the Walker Bulldog. Designated the T-42, it was eventually accepted as the M-8 high speed Tractor in 1945 with two development versions, the M-8E1 and the M-8E2, the main difference being the engine and transmission combination....... The M-8E1 could be distinguished from the E2 by the sloped windshields.....
M-8E1 with optional sandshields and general cargo body

M-8E2 on the Allis-Chalmbers test track without a mission body...
 
While standardized in 1945 the war had just ended and there were plenty of HST's to go around for a peacetime army so the design continued in development with the M-8E2 eventually being accepted as the current standard and authorised for production of 500 units designated as the M-8A1.

The A1 had several body adaptations that could be made for it. Standard was a full length cargo body, much like the standard cargo bed of the M-35 truck. 
There was a specialized body specifically for the Skysweeper batteries. Known as the T-48 body, it has provisions for carrying the crew, the initial loadout of ammo, the cables needed to connect the gun to it's generator and directors and a skid hoist on the back which carried an M-18 30kw generating set to run the gun. It also had provision for the T-84E4 bulldozer blade, but this wasn't mounted on all vehicles.....
 

M-8A1 as standardised with the T-48 skysweeper body, this unit also has the hydraulic connection for the dozer blade prominent below the drivers window.......

The same unit as above with the dozer blade in action...
 
Now, for the kit....
The Nitto 1/35 M8A1 HST
 
 

Well, my interest in this kit comes from it being the Prime Mover for the M-51 Skysweeper 75mm automatic anti aircraft gun... I built the Renwal 1/32nd scale Skysweeper earlier, (I don't have a build log for that, just images of the finished kit) and the M8A1 HST was the designated prime mover for all M-51's as issued. (please bear with me as I show you the motivation for the build)
The Renwal Skysweeper, OOB......








Fairly nice kit, an old classic......... 
 
When I build artillery, I prefer to build it with it's prime mover, basically the vehicle that moved it around from location to location.  It's like the German "88" and it's 8 ton semitrack to haul it around, the Long Tom had it's M4 HST.... Etc Etc etc....
 
That's the way I like my artillery and in as issued condition... (no muck, no grime, no damage maybe a little paint fade from sitting on the apron for a while but nothing major)
Once the subject is chosen I do my research......
 
Next post, research......