143 Mercedes Benz T1 209D from a cheap Toy to a Birthdaygift

[smartdriver]

Hello everyone, after I was unexpectedly invited to a club friend's 50th party and I didn't know what to bring, I came up with the crazy idea of creating a scene from her vacation. So the more than arduous search for a MB T1 bus began. Nothing to be found, a rather rough toy was found at Toms in Holland and the drama began. Here's the original vehicle

 

 

 

The children's toy, in a rough scale of 1/43

 

 

Disassembled, new roof, new interior with Kapaline panels, roof ribs and embossing added, doors "pimped up" with paneling and handles. The completely detailed dashboard with decals from the grab box and a bit of detailed paint

 

 

 

 

 

 

Luggage space or storage space under the lounger is filled with items from the grab box. Blankets made of tissue paper and cushions made of pieces of tissue, newspapers scanned and printed out, too small for my (actually good) printer to be able to read

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dogs from idontknowwhereigotthem modified with Greenstuff spatula to resemble the real ones a little. 2 reasonably matching 3D Duck figures were also found, and the armchair and lounger were made from leftover car seats. Supplemented, yes, wrong scale, with bottles and glasses

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Styrofoam board fitted into a picture frame, first test to see if everything fits together and what it looks like with LED light, background photo put together from 2 internet finds and printed on acrylic. Processed with AK Beachsand, painted wet in wet with various light brown color mixtures

 

 

 

 

 

 

first layer of AK resin tinted with acrylic paint...

 

 

 

........the second, lighter layer.........

 

 

 

 

......and the final, 3rd, almost completely colorless layer.

 

 

 

 

The end product, with small waves and a bit of "vegetables", doesn't look bad at all, in any case the celebrator had a lot of fun with it

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Greetings from Vienna ?

[TarheelRick]

Extremely nice work. Great rebuild of a toy into a believable model. The scene tells a story very well.

[riverart]

Dude...wow. Congratulations!

[smartdriver]

Hello mates, after a 3 Week Journey to https://www.scalemodelchallenge.com/ in Einhoven,NL and the Modelcarshow  https://namac.nl/ i post a little teaser. This Birthdaygift is featured in our new IPMS Printmagazine "Modell Panorama 1/2025  ?

[ChrisR]

Looks great.

[Belugawrx]

Nice attention to detail there👍👍