The Big Truck

Looks like there are no big truck builders on here.

Thanks for looking guys.

Mckay

Heres a two photos before I weathered the truck and when the Escivator was under construction.

Mckay

HI Thanks Years ago I worked on the big lowboy trailers and escivators and always wanted to build a model of one. So one day I said what the heck and started. I sure had a blast building it.

Mckay

Yeah, the auto section here can be a bit slow, I didn't see this the first time around. 

Very nice, big trucks are fairly rare around here. Is that RMR's resin Excavator? I can't see much detail on the tractor, is that one of the AMT kits a resin conversion. Looks like you did a nice job on the tractor as well, I'd like to see more than the one small pic you included of it. Looks like you did some extra work opening the hood etc.

I built the AMT dozer on a lowboy a couple of years ago, I highly recommend the kit if you are looking for something to go with the Excavator.

Aaronw wrote:

Yeah, the auto section here can be a bit slow, I didn't see this the first time around.  Very nice, big trucks are fairly rare around here. Is that RMR's resin Excavator? I can't see much detail on the tractor, is that one of the AMT kits a resin conversion. Looks like you did a nice job on the tractor as well, I'd like to see more than the one small pic you included of it. Looks like you did some extra work opening the hood etc.   I built the AMT dozer on a lowboy a couple of years ago, I highly recommend the kit if you are looking for something to go with the Excavator.

The truck is a old AMT Autocar kit that had the dump bed. I cut out the doors and hinged them using doll house hinges. Also cut and hinged the hood with doll house hinges. I did add a turbo to the engine from the Diamond Reo AMT Kit. I cleaned and fishplated the truck frame from the rear front spring hanger brackets to the back. The bed is scratch built out of Evergreen Styrene except for the winch which is resin, boomers that are photoetched, chains and the finders were from the spares box.

The trailer is scratched built with evergreen except for the wheels and tires which came from three AMT dump trailers, the floor is bass wood, The axle bogie's all work to equalize the axle load and all break lines are present. The goose-neck is removable so the trailer can be displayed in a loading or unloading posture.

The escivator is scratch built except the drive sprockets and the idler rollers that are from the AMT D-8 dozer kit. The engine and radiator are from the same kit. The seat came from the spar's box. The track links are made from evergreen and have eight parts to each link and there are 112 links in all. That took two months. The track carriers are both spring loaded to keep the tracks tight and both tracks are movable.

The hydraulic cylinders rams are stanless tubing with two quarter inch O'rings on each piston and put inside another stanless tube covered with evergreen so the escivator can be shone in various poses. All booms move and the escivator swivels on the tracks. the counter balance is full of weight so the bucket can be displayed off the ground.

Hope this answers some of your questions and if you have more I will try to answer them.

Mckay

I am really impressed by the excavator if you built that from scratch, it looks really well done and you say it moves too, great job.

I thought the Autocar might be one of the AMT Autocars but tehre are a few out there in resin so I wasn't sure. I have that kit in my stash and didn't remember it having a functional hood, but you say you added that feature so it makes since that I didn't recall that, it doesn't.

It would be nice if the model companies offered more heavy equipment, but you show it can be done without their help.

Aaronw wrote:

I am really impressed by the excavator if you built that from scratch, it looks really well done and you say it moves too, great job. I thought the Autocar might be one of the AMT Autocars but tehre are a few out there in resin so I wasn't sure. I have that kit in my stash and didn't remember it having a functional hood, but you say you added that feature so it makes since that I didn't recall that, it doesn't.   It would be nice if the model companies offered more heavy equipment, but you show it can be done without their help.

I found most of my information about the escivator on the Cat web sight. Thy give you most of the measurements. I also went and took photos of one and had a one foot square white cardboard  in all the photos for reference.

Mckay

Excellent work

I'm a big fan of construction models in 1/25th scale. The scratch built hoe is first rate. Congratulations a job well done

Carl

Super job, McKay.  The excavator is particularly well done.  I did some work on an EL 300 a few years back and ran it some.  We moved it on a Cozad lowbed that was a lot smaller than yours and may have been a little over on axle weights.

Well done!  Send pictures in to FSM!  A very interesting subject. 

Hi Thanks for looking and the posative comments. It was a fun project and I am thanking of sending in photos as you suggested.

Mckay