Ford

AMT Ford C900 tractor built pretty much straight from the box. I stripped all the chrome except for the headlamps, roof lights and air horn. The US Forest Service logos were photos reduced and printed on Bare Metal Foil decal paper. This little Ford would be fitting to have a Lindberg flatbed behind it pulling a 4th of July parade float with Smoky (the) Bear. 6/1/2008

1970s Ford LN 8000 tractor wearing Allied Van Lines Colors. Rusty but trusty! I carved spots into the cab and doors for rust holes, used a mixture of superglue and baking soda and rust colors for rust chunks. Cracked glass, dirt and grime and mismatched Peterbilt and Autocar mudflaps. To make the bottom of the door rusty, I used a Dremel tool cutting wheel cutting from inside the cab, when the wheel broke through the plastic, I let it melt the plastic a bit. Then I painted the gobbed up melted plastic rust-color. There was an old Allied truck that was always parked behind the Allied Van Lines agent terminal in Madison, Wisconsin in the 70s that inspired my model. 2000-2001 build.

Inspired by the Ford Transit Mixer built by the late Phil Jensen and seen in Car Model magazine and in Phil's book Building Model Trucks. I bought the Ford partially built from Tony Buck. I reworked the mixer and some of the chassis.

The wheels are from an AMT GMC Astro/95 COE.

The bumper is from the Paystar, actually the Mack pieces.

I shortened the fenders and the mixer drum.

The water tank supports had to be modified to clear the cab and to change the angle of the drum.

For comparison, here is the same mixer body on a Peterbilt 357 6x6.

The Plaskit resin grille really updates the face of the Ford.

Both of these Fords were partial built-ups.

I painted the mixer in March of 2005 and lost interest in it.

It is #4 for 2007.

1/23/2007

Dave "ModelKing" Burkett asked me to build the Ford pick up and the Mack DM800 for the AMT box art. I was quite proud that he chose to feature the models on the front of the box! In typical ModelKing style Dave photoshopped both my dog Rory and myself into the photo. The main photos were taken on a warm January day when the sun made a brief appearance.

I bought several partial built truck kits from Tony Buck who had started them back in the 90s never finished them. Tony did all the modifications to this, even painting it. BUT I attempted to clear-coat the yellow Tony had used and the paint crazed on me (not knowing what brand of paint he used back then). So I stripped the paint and reshot the yellow. This is when I decided to weather the truck as I have too many spit-n-polished trucks. I weathered the dump box with a mixture of acrylic paints. The cab and hood were weathered by rubbing weathering chalks into the not-quite-cured paint. 4/05/06

The final build for 2004 was this white and yellow Ford CT900 tandem axle sleeper tractor. I started with an AMT Ford Stake Truck (the stake body is on my blue Western Star). A swapped in a tandem spring suspension from an old junked White-Freightliner dual drive, scratchbuilt a sleeper cab, added bullet marker lights and big horns to the cab. Bare Metal Foil for the trim and nameplates, square fuel tanks from a GMC Astro kit, and polished wheels from a Peterbilt 359 kit. The blue Mack N was built in '03 and makes a nice comparison of the 2 cabs. The close-up photo of the front of the Ford shows the Bare Metal Foil nameplates and the scanned/reduced/reprinted AMT "Bixby" decals.

Manufactured Home Toter and half a house. The toter is a cut down AMT Ford Short Hauler kit, and the half a house is made from balsa wood. (photos taken in '01)

The local Coca-Cola distributor had a Ford L9000 single axle tractor in the Eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I made mine from the AMT Coke Short Hauler, shortened frame, Plaskit of Quebec resin hood, grille and bumper, resin 2 hole wheels and chrome metal horns from Spauldings Trading and Shipping and square fuel tanks from a Paystar. I painted the cab in July of 03, and finally got around to finishing it in March of '04. Who says I build quickly?

Ford 2 Story Falcon. What an ugly design! I used a Spaulding Trading and Shipping Ford H cab, scratchbuilt the drom box, and made the North American Van Lines logos on the computer. Handles and steps were made from bent brass wire.

1975 Ford WT9000. A resin cab from Spaulding Trading and Shipping, with Ben Wicker 2 hole Budd wheels, and a Spaulding Trading and Shipping cab guard. Ryder decals are from the Mack Cruiseliner kit.

Ford LTS9000 Dumper. This is an easy conversion. A Plaskit resin hood, resin front tires. I modified the dump-box for the big cab overhang.

AMT Ford C600 stake truck with scratchbuilt arrow sign and rear safety crash attenuator. I got the idea for this model when I was stuck behind a highway line painting crew. The truck I was stuck behind was the "shadow truck" protecting the workers and the freshly painted lines. I changed the single drive suspension for a tandem axle set up from an AMT Paystar kit. The arrow sign is all Evergreen plastic as is the attenuator. I shaved the emblems from the front of the cab for a newer look and to allow for the chevrons on the front. Way-back-when, I recall seeing trucks painted like this in Wisconsin and have always wanted to build one. 6/5/2007

I mated the AMT Ford Short Hauler with the AMT Peterbilt Wrecker kit. I cut down the wrecker body for the shorty wheelbase, narrowed the wrecker body by 1/2 of an inch (remove the excess from the center of the front and rear panels, and 1/4 inch from each side of the floor, this way the wrecker body sits nicely over the tires instead of the overhang the AMT wrecker body has). The wheels are resin from Spaulding Trading and Shipping. This wrecker was featured in Model Cars Magazine in the fall of 2004.

Ford LNT 8000. Built right out of the box. I added a sunvisor. This poor thing needs rebuilding. It's been whacked by the dogs tail too many times. This is the same Ford LNT8000 as seen with the orange mixer further up the page. I cleaned it and repaired some damage on 1/22/07.