a vintage gravel hauler

[dptydawg]

Hi folks

Here are a few pictures of my latest build. This 1953 ford tractor and gravel hopper are replicas (as close as my old memory will allow) of the trucks that my uncle owned back in the 1950's. The trailers were shop built in his maintenance shop. As a kid my cousins and I used to log many an imaginary mile on Sunday afternoons hauling imaginary gravel in their yard.

The tractor is a GearBox diecast 1953 Ford wrecker. I modified it slightly by adding parts box suspension, flathead engine and rookie rods on the bumper. Also added door windows and no-drafts. The tires are the stock tires with AMT 1000 X 20 retreads glued on top to bring them up to 7.75-8.25 x 20 tire size. The saddle tanks are scratch built also.

The hopper is entirely scratch built with the exception of parts box wheels and tires

The trailer has been lightly weathered but the rattle can paint job I did on the Ford looked so good I haven't weathered it yet. Used TSC tractor paint. Best rattle can paint I've found yet The dump gate trip and closure mechanism is functional. the gate opens if the string is pulled

Thanks for looking

Carl

[locoengr]

Thanks for posting Carl. You did a great job!!

Bruce

Edited May 14, 2009 by locoengr

[Kostas Parchas]

Hey Carl,

Nice truck you have made!!!

Kostas.

[airhorn]

Good job but have a question. What's the wire or cable going from the cab back to the trailer? Does it release the hopper doors? If it does thats some inovation.

Win

Edited May 14, 2009 by airhorn

[Brizio]

Very nice!!!

[dptydawg]

Good job but have a question. What's the wire or cable going from the cab back to the trailer? Does it release the hopper doors? If it does thats some inovation.

Win

Hi Win

Your right on about the function of the rope. This was a '50;s vintage truck, so technollogy was simple and mostly mechanical.

this is a close-up of the trip mechanism. These pics are during cunstruction of the trailer. The spring loaded dog kept the gate closed. pulling the rope released the catch. The trailer was used to spread gravel a couple inches thick on township roads. Depth of gravel was controled by the trucks speed.

The Gate is latched closed in this pic

The Gate has been tripped. The handle on the latch was to reclose the gate. The chain length could be adjusted to control gate opening.

These trailer had juice brakes operated by engine vacuum to a brake booster unit that operated a master cylinder. I have not instaled the braking set up yet. It will mount on the rear subframe

Thanks fpr looking

Carl.

[mackinac359]

There is a similar trailer to this still in use in Munising, Michigan by the Alger County Road Commission.

I've seen it pulled behind Ford LTS9000 and other similar trucks.

Nice work on the scratchbuilding!

Tim

[dptydawg]

There is a similar trailer to this still in use in Munising, Michigan by the Alger County Road Commission.

I've seen it pulled behind Ford LTS9000 and other similar trucks.

Nice work on the scratchbuilding!

Tim

Thanks Tim

This type of truck is still poular in Ontario also. The only difference from the one I modeled is size. This one has a capacity of 10 cubic yards. Modern ones run about 25 cu yd. They also have a lot more wheels on the ground these days to.

Carl

[SpreadAxle]

Very cool, Carl.

[N1095A]

Very nice, especially the scratch build which I'm a huge fan of.

[dptydawg]

Very nice, especially the scratch build which I'm a huge fan of.

Thanks Everyone for the compliments . I to am a big fan of scratch building. Since there is not a lot of choice available for trucks and especially trailers, scratch building is about the only option to get some models. Once I got my head around the fact that any project is just a series of small projects building these scratch jobs became a lot less intimidating.

I have one more model to build for my gravel pit diorama. That would be a surge bin that holds the gravel from the crusher and dumps it into the trucks.

The surge bin will go at the end of this conveyor belt off my Sandy crusher

Somewhere else in this forum is the story on the crusher but I haven't found it yet to post a link.

edit note:

I tracked down the tread on my crusher build. If your interested it is here

http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.p...rusher&st=0

Thanks

Carl

Edited May 19, 2009 by dptydawg

[mrglubaum]

Great job, Carl!

I love this era in trucking! It brings back memories of riding with my Dad, and the kind of rigs that I started out driving. Thanks!

Lee