Phew- finally an update! Most of my time has been devoted to the rear suspension and drive train; it is quite complex. Practically every component is its own piece: brake air chambers, their mounts and actuators, the rocker beam and it's two hub ends, spring seats, torque rods (upper), torque rod brackets, rocker arms (lower)....you get the idea. For as many parts as there are it all fits well and gives a good representation of the real thing.
Things get even more interesting when it comes time to install the drive shafts. It's a veritable spider's web between the frame crossmembers and the rear suspension assembly so installing the drive shaft that connects the two differential carriers that sit on top of the two rear axles, and the two U-joints that connect to the differential carriers, takes some time and patience. Tolerances are very tight so I had to carefully shave off some material between the carrier and U-joint mating surfaces, although I didn't take any material from between the U-joint to U-joint.
All the U-joint assemblies that mate to the differential carriers/transfer cases/transmission are separate pieces (the drive shafts and their U-joints are one piece), and it's at all these mating surfaces that I had to remove some material to squeeze in the drive shafts just like I did between the differential carriers.
For anyone building this kit (or considering it), the keyhole that aligns the forward differential carrier on its rear axle is cockeyed- it's supposed to point straight ahead- but I wasn't thinking ahead at that point and I didn't correct the alignment.
Here's what it all looks like now:
The front axle rotor assemblies are engineered to allow the builder to pose the front wheels, but the tie rod is to be glued in place rendering the wheels in a fixed position. I wanted to take advantage of what I thought was some cool engineering, so I drilled out holes in the tie rod ends (destroying the hex nut detail) as well as the mounting points on the back of the rotors and inserted wire pins. The wheels will now turn left and right; the pin locations are circled....faintly (sorry)....in yellow:
Here's the attached front axle, and the whole chassis/suspension to this point. Only a few minor bits remain to complete this assembly:
I added the plug on top of the winch motor. Yes, it's a tiny white square bit on top of a round disc:
The engine spark plug wiring is complete. The copper wire I began with gave me a bit of a hard time so I used 10 lb. fishing line for the other five wires. The fishing line was much more cooperative. I couldn't find clear pictures of how these wires ran from the distributor to their respective spark plugs so I'm going to employ a little creative gizmology: I'm going to wrap the middle of the bundle in a bit of discarded white curtain material and call this an asbestos wrap as some wires are laying right across the valve cover and block. The mesh in the curtain is very fine so I think I can pull it off.
Finally here's the main cab body and the firewall area. The seats I covered with.....umm, 'tissue' paper to represent canvas, and the levers between the seats are, driver to passenger, transfer case shift, declutching lever (front axle engage/disengage), handbrake, and Power Take Off. The firewall unit has the gas, brake, and clutch pedals attached, as well as the PE part on top which represents a closed cab fresh air vent.
The round brake and clutch pedals came as smooth discs, but the real things have circular grooves. I used a drafting stylus to cut grooves in my pedals, which I had temporarily fixed to the end of a dowel:
That's all for now. Thanks for looking in; comments/critique welcomed.
Dave