Post by firemodelman on May 30, 2013 22:04:25 GMT -5
Here's a light bar I just finished today. It originated from the 78 Monaco kit. Almost the entire bar has had work done to it. Here's what I did.
I began by stripping the Chrome off of the center speaker cover.
Then the lenses were glued together, blue/red, once those had dried, I began to wet sand on the edges of the lenses that sit next to the center speaker over.
Once I had a nice flat surface on both pieces, I wet sanded both side's of the center cover. I then glued all 3 pieces together.
Letting them dry for several hours, I began to wet sand all 3 piece's to get rid of the parting line where the piece's join together. I also drilled holes on the outer edge of both domes to simulate ally lights.
Once I was happy with the parting line being gone, I began to polish the domes. This took about 2 hours to get a nice finish. I then moved on to the bar it sits on and the 'guts'.
The kit piece is OK, But after looking at a few pic's, I decided to try and improve on it. I grabbed a piece of .060 styrene, cut to length, it sits just under the light domes, and is not as wide as the kit piece. I then added 8, 5mm jewels to the base, to resemble the lights on the inside.
Once I had all that done, I drilled out the holes for the speaker in the center grill with a small template I made.
Foil was then added to the center, along with 2 take down lights. (that I'm not 100% happy with ). And a small trim piece for the top.
The mounting feet were made from short piece's of paper clip's, cut and bent to shape.
This light bar will be going on a car I am building for a soon to be retired deputy, here in the county I live in. It will represent the first patrol car he drove. Onto the pics, Thanks for reading and looking,Dave.
I began by stripping the Chrome off of the center speaker cover.
Then the lenses were glued together, blue/red, once those had dried, I began to wet sand on the edges of the lenses that sit next to the center speaker over.
Once I had a nice flat surface on both pieces, I wet sanded both side's of the center cover. I then glued all 3 pieces together.
Letting them dry for several hours, I began to wet sand all 3 piece's to get rid of the parting line where the piece's join together. I also drilled holes on the outer edge of both domes to simulate ally lights.
Once I was happy with the parting line being gone, I began to polish the domes. This took about 2 hours to get a nice finish. I then moved on to the bar it sits on and the 'guts'.
The kit piece is OK, But after looking at a few pic's, I decided to try and improve on it. I grabbed a piece of .060 styrene, cut to length, it sits just under the light domes, and is not as wide as the kit piece. I then added 8, 5mm jewels to the base, to resemble the lights on the inside.
Once I had all that done, I drilled out the holes for the speaker in the center grill with a small template I made.
Foil was then added to the center, along with 2 take down lights. (that I'm not 100% happy with ). And a small trim piece for the top.
The mounting feet were made from short piece's of paper clip's, cut and bent to shape.
This light bar will be going on a car I am building for a soon to be retired deputy, here in the county I live in. It will represent the first patrol car he drove. Onto the pics, Thanks for reading and looking,Dave.
What you have done here is the difference between us mere kit assemblers and you model masters. This is the difference between model kits and scale replicas. You do some awesome work Dave. Thank you for sharing it and the tutorials with us.
