Hello all.
Some time ago I picked up the old AMT kit of the classic 60s showcar, the Dodge Deora. I puzzled over what to do with it. The original Deora's metallic gold scheme looked great full-size, but every small-scale version I've ever seen of it looked toy-like (think “Hot Wheels”). I wanted something a little different.
The long, flat, angular shape of the Deora suggested a surfboard, and after a little Googling I found a great photo of a Tiki board that provided the inspiration for a color scheme in burgundy and gold, with flame maple wood trim. I decided to embrace the “60s Surfmobile” for the overall concept, inside and out. I found a nice tropical design and made up some decals for the upholstery and carpeting, using the red and white for the remainder of the interior.
The kit's representation of the Deora's novel (and wildly impractical) pivoting front-panel door was reduced to a floppy “clamshell” design, but I wanted to try to produce something like the original. After a lot of test-fitting and trimming/relocating of components, I got a door which functioned more or less like it should.
I made wood panel decals for the side trim and some of the surfboard design bits, including the Tiki on the roof. I also found a cool “sunset” mural to decorate the door, which led me to officially dub my creation “The Sunset Surfer.”
My version of the kit didn't have the tonneau bed cover of the original, so I scratchbuilt one with sheet styrene and some more wood trim decal.
I was pretty pleased with how the thing turned out. I must confess I never quite got the sizing on the hinged strut for the front window right---it almost closes. But overall, it came out fairly well.
Part 2 – One Step Beyond
Rather than the missing tonneau cover, the kit provided an odd, interesting feature for the bed—a cap camper, with a “door” going right through the side of the vehicle.. (Since the original Deora design had to relocate the radiator and the gas tank to the pickup bed, a camper would have been, well, improbable at best.)
I had decided to scratchbuild a couple surfboards and a rack to jazz up the rear area (the one nod to the Hot Wheels version, but it worked), so I almost chucked the camper. But the more I looked at it, the more I realized the unusual shape suggested...TIKI HUT.
Painted-up Evergreen half-round for the bamboo made the “Gilligan's Island” style door. I faked some rattan screens (more Evergreen strip) to cover the windows. To even out the contours for the cliché “thatched” roof, I built up a frame from rod and strip, and made decorative end-caps (more home-made decals and trim strips) to hide the blank space inside.
Woodland Scenics field grass looked like the perfect material for thatching. I knew it was actually hair of some sort, but, never having used it before, I didn't realize just how fine and difficult to wrangle it is. After several vain attempts to come up with a workable technique, I finally managed to make “strips” of thatching by gluing the stuff to painted cardboard strips with craft glue, then trimming when dry. After that the actual assembly was pretty straightforward. Some patching and fill-in areas around the edges got a little messy, but, hey, it's a tiki hut on a truck---how neat could it be?
I added the surfboards and called it done.
Thanks for looking and reading along. Hope you enjoy the photos.
