PST/Zebrano Gaz-03-30 Soviet City Bus - bodywork.

 I started the bodywork by firstly filling some sink holes in the body sides with Vallejo putty;

In the photo above the upper side has been filled and rubbed down whilst the lower part has just had filler applied. The windows needed opening out and squaring off, done with a scalpel, and there are some panel lines that have needed deepening with a scrawker.

I fitted one side, then the other, followed by the rear. This needed narrowing to fit between the sides. In the photo below the rear is being glued in place, with the aid of a rubber band. I used a piece of sprue to hold the sides apart at the front to stop them from being pushed inwards whilst the glue dried;

The front can also be seen in  the above photo. I glued strips of .040" x .010" styrene to the edges as I wasn't convinced that the front was wide enough. Most of the extra material was in fact sanded away. I also used styrene strip along the top of the right hand side and at both ends, the register on one side was lower than the other with the result that one side was higher than the other. Adding the strips meant that the top could be squared off. I also had to adjust the size of the windows on the right side as they were smaller than those on the left.

Thinking ahead I added a couple of pads on the underside at the front, these are for the mudgaurds to attach to. I also removed the registers from the roof and sanded the bottom flat along with the top of the body, using wet and dry paper on a flat surface, marking the areas to be sanded with a black marker pen, then moving the body and roof back and forth until the marks disappeared. 

The rear needed some attention to smooth and match the corners and carry the panel lines around to meet up with those on the rear. Once I was happy then the body was washed in warm soapy water, allowed to dry, then given a light coat of Hycote grey primer;

Body roof and chassis posed together, note the panel above the windscreen;

So far there hasn't been one part that hasn't needed some sort of remedial work. The next jobs will be to fit and paint the interior and prepare and paint the outer body.

Paul.

PST/Zebrano Gaz-03-30 Soviet City Bus - chassis and wheels.

 The chassis comprised of 12 parts, four of which made up the engine and exhaust. The chassis rails, rear springs and axle and the front axle/radiator fitted together reasonably well, however locating the engine to the gearbox to the chassis proved rather troublesome, the fit being vague at best, not helped by the V shaped arms that run from the clutch to the front axle. In fact I ended up having to lengthen the prop shaft to get it to fit, cutting it in half and inserting a short piece of .040" styrene rod;

Painting started with a wash with warm soapy water and a soft brush, followed by a coat of Hycote red oxide primer applied with my Badger 200NH. For the top coat I used my Badger 150 and Vallejo 862 Black Grey, a nice dull weathered black. At this stage whilst searching for images of the bus online I noticed that the chassis had two rods running from the rear axle to somewhere in front of the propshaft, quite where I couldn't quite make out as the kit differs from the prototype in the chassis layout. However, I decided to add an approximation of these from .020" styrene rod, scraping part of the paint away to get a bond;

Of course this meant getting the airbrush out again to blend in the new parts and touch up the paint where it had been scraped away, but that did give me an excuse to use my Aerograph;

To give me something to hold onto whilst painting the chassis I drilled a small (.8mm) hole in the top of the engine and inserted a cocktail stick to act as a handle.

The wheels were cleaned up, sprayed with Hycote grey primer (through the 200NH again), then sprayed with a mix of Vallejo 866 Green Grey and black. Once dry the hubs had a coat of plain black on the outer side, and black grey on the inner. This was done to give the impression of a bus that is cared for.

Here's the chassis right side up;

I also painted the radiator surround and the front bumper plain black, which contrasts nicely with the dirty chassis. The exhaust had a coat of Humbrol Leather, with it has to be said poor results. Humbrol paint isn't what it used to be I'm afraid.

Body next.

Paul.

PST/Zebrano Gaz-03-30 Soviet City Bus - opening the box

An odd choice of model perhaps, but odd subjects do have a habit of catching my eye. The Gaz-03-30 was based on the Gaz AA truck chassis, which owed its origins to the Ford AA. Production started in 1933 at the Gorky Automobile Plant with the last bus coming off the line in 1950. The body was made from a wooden frame with metal cladding, and due to the poor roads and basic truck suspension needed to be completely replaced every few years. No heating was provided, but it was I suppose better than walking. This model represents a post war bus, after 1945 certain economies were made due to material shortages, hence the simplified angular front fenders (early buses had curved wings). See here for more information, and remember that Google translate is your friend. Information on these is pretty scarce to be honest.

This 1:72 scale kit is a collaboration between PST and Zebrano, two companies based in Belarus. 

Opening the box, the runners and instructions are sealed in a plastic bag;

Four runners are included. The parts look pretty good at first glance, with minimal flash although the detail is a bit 'soft', not as sharp as you would find on, say, a modern Airfix kit.
Here's the chassis and seats;

And the body;

There's no moulded clear parts, just a printed sheet of clear material;

Decals are included, but where do they go? The instructions are very brief and contain no information on positioning them, or even on livery. The exploded diagram does a reasonable job as far as showing where all the parts go though;

This is going to be an interesting build...

(It does strike me that this kit would make a decent freelance railbus in either standard or narrow gauge.)

Miniart make a 1:35 scale kit for this bus, and there are 1:43 scale die-cast models available on eBay. The die-casts all come in plain liveries with no markings.

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - finished.

 I've finally finished this tiny lorry.

After joining the main parts together the last few jobs were to paint the sidelights white and fit the mirror and headlights.

Both the headlights and mirror were made on the lathe. Making the lights followed the pattern described here, I did however paint the rear of the lenses silver (Vallejo) and the outer diameter black before attaching (using canopy glue), the black headlight surround is a small but noticeable detail on the prototype. The mirror was turned from brass, 2.2mm dia., with the reflective side recessed by .1mm using a 1.5mm slot drill before being parted off .3mm thick. This was then soldered to a length of .4mm brass rod which was chemically blackened before being painted and fitted into a hole drilled in the upper door hinge on the driver's side.

There is a slight twist in the chassis, so it doesn't sit flat on all four wheels, and the load bed is slightly tilted towards the rear (which I only spotted once it was glued in place), I will just have to live with that. 

I perhaps should have fitted windscreen wipers, but sometimes you need to say "enough" and just finish the thing!

This has been a pretty challenging build, but worthwhile I feel. As usual I've learned a lot, enjoyed researching an obscure (to us) prototype and I now have a model that, although flawed in some respects, I am pleased with.

Finally, one with the photo and owners manual that I found online;

Not the best photos today I'm afraid, but my little photo plank looks pretty good, and I like the effect of the sun playing on the white paper background. Taken in the garden with my aging point and shoot.

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - cab assembled, wheels attached, and a problem encountered.

Once I made up a new gearlever to replace the one lost (made is perhaps too strong a word, I just cut a length of styrene rod to suit) I glued the upper and lower parts of the cab together;

I used an elastic band to hold them whilst the glue set, which has left some marks that I need to remove. Ho hum.

Attaching the wheels was the next job, easy enough until I fitted the spare. This sits between the chassis members and the load bed, but is actually too wide for the space provided so there was a gap between the bed and the chassis when the wheel was fitted. The solution was to file down the top of the spare wheel and carve away part of the underside of the bed, as seen below;

Now the bed sits as it should;

Its getting there.

I bought, for a modest fee via eBay, a Czech magazine from a partwork on East European vehicles featuring the Lublin-51. I was hoping that it would include a decent photo of the rear end showing the light arrangement, but in that I was disappointed. There was however a decent photo of some hardworking Polish citizens fitting the wheels onto a wooden cabbed example;

The next jobs will be to touch up the paint on the spare wheel and load bed where I've filed and carved, make up a rear view mirror for the drivers side, and weather the chassis before final assembly.

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - painting the cab, decals and glazing.

Sometimes I do things in the wrong order...

I primed the cab with Vallejo grey surface primer, but not before I removed the raised circle on the drivers (left hand) side of the cab, and drilled a hole for and fitted the petrol filler. Then the cab could be sprayed with Vallejo 890 Refractive Green. This was followed by a coat of Vallejo gloss varnish along with the load bed sides and rear, ready for the decals to be applied. I had a few problems with the decals, probably my own fault, luckily only the large rear decal shows slight damage. That one, along with the drivers cab side and the front numberplate came apart when being slid off the backing sheet, but with patience and prodding I managed to align the separated parts. Another coat of gloss sealed them in place, and helped to hide the carrier film although it can be seen on the load bed where the decals haven't settled into the planking. I used Carrs Decalfix, but I think that I shall invest in a better setting solution.

Driver's side, this decal gave me trouble;

As did the numberplate, which separated into about five pieces, the smallest piece being less than a millimetre long;

The load bed rear, note the damage to the 'U' and how the decal sits on rather than in the gaps in the planks;

Luckily the decals on the passenger door and bed sides slid into place without issue;

After giving the cab and load bed a couple of coats of Vallejo matt varnish I turned my attention to the glazing. This is a job that I dislike, so I usually put it off until after painting. This was a mistake.

I used the front windscreen that came with the kit, but rather than fitting it from the inside as intended I filed down the outer lip so that it could be fitted flush into the cab, improving the fit and look of the windscreen. The side and rear windows weren't used as they were a poor fit, instead I made up 5 new panels from 1mm acrylic(?) sheet. This meant that I could make the glazing flush fitting like the windscreen. To reduce the 'prismatic' effect that you get when using quite thick glazing material the edges were painted body colour before fitting, and the windscreen surround was painted black. All that fitting meant that the cab needed a lot of handling, which despite careful handling wore away the paint in several places, most noticeably on the rear of the cab roof;

So I had to carefully mask off the cab door decals and touch up those areas that needed it, a perfect job for my Aerograph, which was also used for varnishing. In future I must remember to sort out the glazing before painting the cab, even if it is to be fitted afterwards.

With the glazing fitted;

The windscreen fit isn't brilliant, but it will do. The 'screens fold outwards on the prototype.

A drop of Johnson's Kleer sealed the glazing in place.

And another page from the manual;

Just so you know where everything sits...

The next jobs will be making a new gear lever to replace the one that I lost, glueing in the dashboard and steering wheel, then assembling the cab.

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - smoothing out the cab.

A lot of work has gone into smoothing the cab out;

There were a lot of large gaps to be filled between the bulkhead and the cab sides, for this I used microstrip initially followed by Vallejo Plastic Putty. I also used styrene strip to fill a gap at the top of the quarter lights, and a missing door hinge on the left side of the cab was made from a small piece of styrene rod.

The roof and cab back have come out well;

A starting handle hole was moulded into the grill. Although these trucks did have starting dogs the handle went between the grill slats, so I drilled the hole out, glued in a piece of styrene rod then went about removing any trace of it;

A dry run;

Its not perfect by any means but I feel that perfection will be hard to achieve on this build, so I'm just doing the best job that I can with what's provided.

The next job will be to sort out the cab glazing prior to fitting it together and painting.

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - starting on the cab.

A challenge.

These are the main parts;

I'm building the basic shell first, once that's done I'll mount it on the floor/wing moulding.

A closer look at the two sides;

With the front bulkhead;

The two sides glued together;

The fit wasn't actually too bad!

Bulkhead in place;

There's some gaps there but again the fit isn't as bad as I feared.

Radiator/grill being glued on;

Bonnet in place;

The bonnet has been slightly re-profiled, the front where it meets the grill should be lower and I had to shorten it by about half a millimetre.

Cab roof, showing the mould lines;

I reckon that it will clean up without too much filler being used.

Cab rear, lots to do here;

The rear of the wooden cabbed Gaz/Lublin-51s is flat, which will help matters...

The next stage will involve files, wet & dry paper, and filler!

Paul.

Military Wheels Lublin-51 - load bed and wheels.

The load bed is made up from 9 parts, and was a pain to assemble. Underneath there are two longitudinal and two cross members which have slots moulded into them for location. Those slots are far too big and not particularly accurate...

However after much messing and cursing I managed to build it so that it marries up to the chassis. Note the rather heavy sides.

The wheels have, as you can imagine, some heavy mould lines around the tyres;

On the front and spare wheels I just removed them with a file, but I decided on a different approach for the rears. The twin wheels were glued together with the inner wheel the wrong way round, that is with the dish facing the outer wheel rather than the chassis. This made it easier to fit the wheels onto a 1.5mm steel rod, held in place with a little cyano, so they could be held in my lathe and turned true;

This was the easiest way to clean up the tyres so that they match. I then used a graver to add some tread relief, as bald tyres are of little use even on 'braille scale' lorries. (I find it funny how military modellers refer to 1:72 as 'braille scale', to my eye its noticably bigger than the 1:76 scale that most of us railway modellers use.)

There's no rear lights on the model, so I spent a lot of time staring at photos and videos on t'web tying to work out the rear light detail, with little success. The majority of photos are of the front or sides, and it seems that most surviving vehicles have been modified in some way regarding those lights. However, I came to the conclusion that small circular lights set halfway up into the rear wooden bed crossmember would be somewhere near right, so I filed a couple of slots and used some 1mm dia. styrene rod to represent the elusive lamps. They can just be seen in the photo below;

I also added mudguards, made from .020" plasticard;

The white strips on the cross braces are there to help position the longitudinal beams.

I used Vallejo 70.601 Grey Surface Primer sprayed through my 200NH on both the wheels and the load bed, this is the first time that I've used this particular primer. Then the load bed was sprayed Vallejo 890 Refractive Green, which is a match for the Humbrol Olive Green specified. The mudguards and the bodies of the lamps were painted dirty black, and the lights themselves painted firstly white then orange and finally red.

The wheels were sprayed with Vallejo 866 Grey Green, with a touch of black added, then the hubs were brush painted with Phoenix Precision Dirty Black acrylic;

For the top coats I used my Badger 150. 

A couple more from the manual, first up showing how it all fits together;

And wheels and tyres;

Cab next, which I'm not looking forward to...

Paul.