Build of IH Pumper

[Chariots of Fire]

2 hours ago, Warren D said:

I don't see any holes to pour the resin.  Am I correct that, at least for the parts you show, you fill the lower mold with resin and squish out the excess when you put the top on?  Before Jeff asks, I'll ask, what molding resin do you use?  (If I had to guess, I'd say something from Micro-mark)

No holes, but I do pour resin on the top part so completely cover it.  Once in a while I will get a small bubble of trapped air but if it is not in an important or incomplete cast I usually ignore it.  The casting resin I use is also from Micro-mark and is the CR-300 rapid cure resin.  They also make a 600 resin but it takes much longer to cure.

Edited January 2 by Chariots of Fire

[Warren D]

Thanks Charles.  I was looking at Micro-mark's info and the only spray I see is for rubber mold to resin cast.  The rubber to rubber stuff only comes in bottles.  In your experience, it would seem the stuff in the spray can will also work rubber to rubber?  Do you need to use the mold release on the mold before you pour the resin?

Edited January 2 by Warren D

[Chariots of Fire]

Warren:  I'm using Mann Ease Release 200.  You can purchase it through Amazon.  A bit less than at M-M.  It works well for me, either rubber to resin or rubber to rubber.  It's recommended to spray once, let it set and then spray again before pouring the last rubber.

[Warren D]

1 hour ago, Chariots of Fire said:

Warren:  I'm using Mann Ease Release 200.  You can purchase it through Amazon.  A bit less than at M-M.  It works well for me, either rubber to resin or rubber to rubber.  It's recommended to spray once, let it set and then spray again before pouring the last rubber.

Thanks, are you using that to coat the mold before pouring the resin as well?

[Chariots of Fire]

3 hours ago, Warren D said:

Thanks, are you using that to coat the mold before pouring the resin as well?

No need to do that.  You could coat the mold but then each of the castings would have to be well washed before painting.

[Warren D]

Thanks again, I appreciate your experience and your willingness to share it!

[Aaronw]

Always nice to watch you at work. 

[Firebuilder]

Charles,

looking good, and as always the tips on the molds are invaluable!  You would have my vote  this to be a companion piece to the reo 

 

Dom

[Chariots of Fire]

The wheels and tires are now set.  They just need the center caps but will wait until the last to put them on in case the wheels have to come off for any reason.  The cab and body are about the right stance.  Will be taking a short break on this build while the temperatures are in the 20's here.  The basement area where my workbench is located cools off enough to make it uncomfortable.  On to armchair modeling for a bit!🥶

[BK9300]

15 minutes ago, Chariots of Fire said:

The wheels and tires are now set.  They just need the center caps but will wait until the last to put them on in case the wheels have to come off for any reason.  The cab and body are about the right stance.  Will be taking a short break on this build while the temperatures are in the 20's here.  The basement area where my workbench is located cools off enough to make it uncomfortable.  On to armchair modeling for a bit!🥶

Might just be my end, Charles, but can’t view this pic?

[Biggu]

2 minutes ago, BK9300 said:

Might just be my end, Charles, but can’t view this pic?

Same here.  No pic

[Chariots of Fire]

Hmmm!  Interesting.  I will post again.  I made a few additions since the past post.  I was able to see the former pic but these show progress to date.

I've painted the cab, hood and inner tub.  Color is Ford light blue and is engine paint.  But I like the color.  I used Molotow chrome on the hood ornament and the headlight buckets.  The blue stripes on the seats are decals printed on the ALPS.  I used a chisel point magic marker for the windshield gasket.  Nice straight lines.  The windshield fits tight against this gasket thanks to the way Dave Natale was able to cast the cab from the master.  Wheels and axles are mounted on the frame.

A look from the side.  The international decal on the hood side was also printed on the ALPS.  Previously for two other IH builds I found some nice images on line and had also photographed one closeup that I could copy into a graphics program for printing.  The door handles will also be chromed but not until close to the end of the build just to keep my fingers from messing them up.

The body will be painted the same color blue.  Planning on a light bar for the top of the cab and a combo red light/siren for the top of the left front fender.

 

Edited January 8 by Chariots of Fire

[Gary Chastain]

Looking really good

[BK9300]

Your decals always turn out well with the system you have in place - good asset to have in your toolbox!

[Chariots of Fire]

Got a bit more done on the cab.  Little things have cropped up to show that I need to pay attention to the process.  The vent windows of the cab were a bit of a chore since I had to install the windshield and dashboard before the interior tub could be set.  I should have done those vents first as it would have been easier to get my clumsy fingers inside the cab.  Plan ahead, as they say!  

Other things have been completed as well.  I used a Zoet liquid chrome pen to do the turn signals, siren and door handles.  Same type of thing as Molotow but I think the results are better.  The engine has been started from the castings of the IH Scout 345 V-8.  The rear view mirrors came from the parts box.  In the photo the drivers side mirror looks cockeyed but it really isn't.  Must be the camera angle.  Looks like I need to ckean up the paint line on the running board too!  Whew!  I'm getting rusty!

The paint has polished out nicely, however.  It dried quickly and with some Novus 2 it shines.  Next is to get the windshield wipers done.  I'll do a quick how-to on them since I use common pins and some hex nuts on the installation.

[gotnitro?]

Excellent work 

[Chariots of Fire]

I got the windshield wipers done today.  Here are a couple of photos that show the finished wipers and how they were made.

Here is the beginning.  Four long common pins are used to make two wipers.  First cut each of the heads off the four pins.  Then bend the ends of two of the pins slightly and grind a flat surface on the outside of the bend.  Lay them flat like you see above.  Then, with a torch and a very small piece of fine solder connect the straight and bent pieces together.

They should like this when you are finished.  The angled piece is bent to form the part that will be inserted into the cowl.  You have to be sure and bend them in opposite directions because one is for the left side and one is for the right side.  Note that the wiper on the right has a slight curve to it.  This one would be for a curved windshield.  The straight one will work fine on a flat windshield.  At this point it sort of becomes a trial and error project of deciding how long you want the blades and at what angle the bend has to be made.  That part is left to the particular project and how the wipers fit against the windshield.  You want them to lay flat and at the same time they have to fit the angle of the holes that are drilled in the cowl.  Nothing like a bit of practice.

The finished product looks like this.  For each wiper I added a small hex bead to hold the wiper arm up slightly from the cowl and to add a bit of detail.  Some modern wipers are black and not chromed like these.  The blacking can be done with a magic marker before the wipers are mounted.  Paint tends to rub off whereas the magic marker is more permanent.  The blade length can be adjusted to some extent depending on the individual application.  I think they are superior to the kit blades that tend to be very clunky looking or that are molded into the plastic.

[Pete68]

Nice updates Charles wipers look great I like that pumper body looks good sitting on there. 

[Chariots of Fire]

Making a bit more progress, the front bumper has been given a coating of BMF and is mounted.  I used the same common pins as bolts as I used in making the windshield wipers.  Just the heads and about 1/4" in length.  Here are some other things that are in process.

The body has been primed for painting and work has begun on the Hale pump.  This came from the AMT ALF kit.  Hale and Waterous provided most of the in-line pumps for fire apparatus over the years and still do.  The AMT pump represents 1000 GPM piece as noted by the four discharge points on the top of the pump.  For smaller capacities lots of times all the manufacturer did was cap the discharge and not provide an outlet at the pump panel or on the opposite side of the truck.  Each discharge point is equivalent to 250 GPM so using 3 discharges would amount to a 750 pumper.

Also in the photo are the two hard suction tubes that will be mounted on the left side of the body.  Note!!  The AMT and Ertl box art for the ALF has the male and female couplings glued on backwards.  My good friend Greg knows all about this and once in a while we will get a laugh about it.  Also I have wrapped the tubes in masking tape.  Why?  Hard suctions of the era, and before, that I am modeling used hard suction tubes of rubber and were also wrapped in metal bands for strength and to keep them from collapse.  A hard suction tube is not supposed to collapse seeing as they are most generally used in drafting situations.  A collapsed suction hose means no water gets to the pump.  So simulating the wrap with tape will give them the look of banded hose when the tubes are painted.  The ends will be coated with chrome.  The tape also rends the final result with a rough finish look which is what the real stuff would have.  The hard suction hose trays need to be added to the body but only after the body is painted.  

Here's another look but with some other things in view.  A friend of mine builds 1/50 scale apparatus and asked me to come up with some pike poles and axes in that scale.  As you can see they are half the size of the 1/25 pike pole and axe shown above them.  I made printouts of the axe profile and taped them to a piece of 3/64 brass strip and cut them free using a Dremel with a cutting wheel.  Two of them were painted.  The other two were used for a mold so more can be cast.  The pike poles are made from the same old common pins, a piece of small brass tube and a length of plastic rod.  (Hope he likes them!)

[BK9300]

Lots of good information, Charles - thanks for all the earlier pics on your casting process, as well.

[hct728(Bob)]

Awesome progress so far, that cab looks great, and a good match for its little brother, the Reo.

Never would have thought to cut thin brass with a Dremel wheel, it opens up a lot of possibilities compared to shears

Thanks for the modeling lessons, LOL

[Chariots of Fire]

8 minutes ago, hct728(Bob) said:

Awesome progress so far, that cab looks great, and a good match for its little brother, the Reo.

Never would have thought to cut thin brass with a Dremel wheel, it opens up a lot of possibilities compared to shears

Thanks for the modeling lessons, LOL

You're right, Bob.  The shears would never cut the thicker brass at all.  I do use aircraft shears for cutting thin brass and aluminum flashing.   

[Scott Eriksen]

That old Binder looks great Charles!

[gotnitro?]

Fantastic work! Really like the tip about using tape for the hard suction lines

 

[Chariots of Fire]

The last posts showed the hard suction hose sans paint.  Here is the result of painting the hard suctions with Tamiya rubber black (TS-82) and then chroming the couplings with a Zoet pen.  The last thing I will do is run my dremel with a small cutter around the inner portions of each coupling to thin them out.

Also in the pic is the hose reel  made from the two ends supplied in the AMT ALF kit but with one difference.  I used my Dremel with a sanding disc to thin them way down.  The kit pieces would be about two scale inches in thickness which is all wrong.  Thinning them down to less than half that makes the reel look more like it should.  The last new addition is the lighting unit .  I took one of the better ones from a 1/32 scale Monogram Mack kit to use.  Some of these did not get chromed well in the inside but that was taken care of easily with the Zoet pen again.  Not sure exactly where this will get mounted, if at all.  We'll see!  There will be more to come.

And in this view there is one more little detail that will make all the difference in how the model will look.  One end of the hose reel has a circular gear pattern.  The reels were would in two different ways.  The first was with a hand crank that operated a bevel gear against the circular gear.  The second way was with the use of a small electric motor that has the same bevel gear.  An extra brake can will fit the bill for this.  Just snip off the long rod and set it against the reel.  A small piece of wire would run from the motor to the switch that would be on the pump panel.  Below is a look at what a finished one would look like.  One missing part of this one, however is the manual crank portion that would be located above the centerline of the reel.  Each reel has a motor and a piece of wire run toward the pump panel.

Edited January 16 by Chariots of Fire