Here
is the Woody all finished..!!!!! Well actually it is the donor
body. And it IS finished.
Here
is the most important tip I can give you. Before you try a
technique, especially a new one, test it out first. This is
my donor/test body. I tested out lots of ideas on this body
including paint colors. It just happens to be a 48 Woody because
I brought two kits for this project. I usually do that for
important projects. Also, I wanted to open the back window,
gas cap and front vent the easy way. For example, I just cut
a hole in the real body (where the gas cap was) then I cut
the part out (the gas cap) of the donor body. ( I was going
to open the doors, but I decided not to. )
Ok
here’s how I repair chrome parts. When you cut them off
of the tree you get spots on them with no chrome. The best fix
is to send them out to have them re-chromed. The second best
fix is to strip all of the chrome off and airbrush them with
Alclad. Here is my third best idea. Make sure you leave lots
of tree plastic on them when you cut them from the tree.
Then
sand off the excess plastic. You can even sand off a little
of the surrounding chrome. Make it smooth….
Then
paint a little gloss black enamel on the spot. I use Testors.
It must be enamel gloss black.
I
let it dry for about 30 minutes. It must be dry enough so you
can touch it with a paintbrush and not ruin the black paint.
Then I dab a little Alclad on the black enamel.
Watch
the Alclad do its magic. It’s cool to watch it as it sparkles
and dries a shinny chrome color. It’s amazing stuff..!!!!!!
Then I let it dry overnight.
Because
I want the aged look, I sprayed all of my chrome parts with
clear dull coat. That will help later when I add a little rust
and dust…..
On
to the battery. You can do a really nice battery using photo-etch
parts, but I took the simple route on this one. I first drilled
small holes right under the existing molded on battery posts.
Then I painted the whole battery flat black. Then I added the
decals. I like that semi gloss look on the battery so I then
covered the whole thing with acrylic semi-gloss clear. This
also protects the decals and won’t hurt them.
Then
I paint the battery terminals silver and add the wires.
Just to add a little more detail, I use a .005 ink pen to make
the top of the positive terminal red. ( Is that obsessive or
what.? Bill G. made me do it….. )
And
here is the battery in the engine compartment.
Then
I added the snorkel. I originally had a small snorkel on the
side of the hood. But, one of the HHBoard members said a big
one sticking out of the hood would be cool. Yea, I guess he
was right..!!!
Then
I added some steps to help the Wimps get in. They came from
my parts box. I don’t know where they came from…???
Then
I added the opened gas door. I guess it’s old and stuck
open….. Yea that’s it, that’s my story and
I’m stick’in to it, it’s stuck open. And the
surfer boys who own this thing aren’t car guys so they
can’t fix it by themselves.
Nothing
looks more like real steel cable than real steel cable. So I
went and got some steel fishing leader. It comes in different
sizes.
I
wound the leader around the winch and glued it. After I did
that I realized I could have stripped the plastic coating
off. But hey it looks pretty good with the plastic coating.
And besides they probably have real winch cable with plastic
coating anyway……. Then I put the hook on using
tiny steel wire. Later on I will tie up the hook with rope
so it won’t bang around when this beast is on the road.
Hey, I goofed up…!!! Can you see where…???? Yep,
I glued on the bush guard and winch before I glued on the
headlight lenses….. LOL..!!! Well see what happens when
you design your own vehicle. You have no instructions to check
out the building sequence…… LOL
So
here I’ve put on the headlight lenses….. It was
a little difficult, but it got done……
