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I finally had
time in November 2008 to start a new Model T project! Some time ago
Brian Austin posted a black and white picture (see picture below) of
a Forest Fire Department Model T on the Spotlight Hobbies Message
Board (http://wwwboard.spotlighthobbies.com). Well, I couldn’t resist (as usual...) and started with one of the most difficult parts: the pump assembly at the front. Almost all parts were scratch built except two brass and one aluminium part and the red valve handle at the top, I ‘stole’ that from an old Italeri Fire Jeep kit. The pump came out a bit bigger than on Brian's original picture, but it’s fine with me. One difficult thing was to figure out how the whole unit was mounted on the car . But that problem was solved after some heavy thinking. For the rest of the car I used only the spare Model T parts I had laying around in my parts stash. 'No complete model kits were harmed or used in the process of making this car' ;-) I added a small water tank and some bigger rear tires and wheels. I had plans to add some more (heavier) things to the Ford, but I remembered in time what my fellow model builder Art Anderson said about the underpowered T engine, so the only things I added were a couple of water hoses, a spare tire on the drivers side and some small things. I have two engine hoods for the car, a closed one and an opened one as seen on the original picture. I had to remove about a ton of plastic of the original hood to get the thickness right, but I got the job done. And it’s really, really thin now. And looking just right. I used all kind of parts for the kit. For example, the brass hand railing you see on the tank was made from 0.5mm brass wire and small stanchions they use on model ships. And the nice brass ends on the firehoses are actually portholes they use on… yep, small scale model ships. I had to ask a co-worker at the office, who has a lathe, to make the firehose nozzles. It did take some time, but early March 2009 I finally got them and I could finish the model. I added some wiring to the engine, made the lid of the tank functional, added a brass bell at the driver's side (just in case) and the spare wheel. I used a spare roadster body (from a 'glue bomb' kit) to get the extra door I needed to create the open door on the passenger side. The fire hoses are from my local Saab car dealer. It's just black electric wire from which I removed the copper centre wires. Simple, but it looks very good. This kit has a lot of added parts. To get an idea: the spare wheel assembly only was made from 31 seperate parts. The pump assembly at the front took a staggering 101 seperate parts because of all the little bolts and nuts I added for a realistic look. |
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