1999 Chevy Silverado Brush Truck

[LAV25]

I've been sitting on this project for a few years, but I've finally got a plan. It'll be a scale/trail rig、 rather than a crawler, since the body is a 1/15 licensed Chevy Silverado Crew Cab that came off a cheezy piece of Toys R Us junk:



A friend of mine found it in the trash and passed it on to me. I salvaged the body and ditched the rest. It's got a drop bed with a working tailgate (I need to make wheel wells for it still):





I'm going to do everything in my power to keep that drop bed intact and visible. The roll bar that it came with looked as toyetic as the original wheels did, so I junked it. I may or may not replace it, we'll see.

Like I said, it's 1/15 scale, which means that it's about the same dimensions as a Clod:





However, the Silverado is a 4 door crew cab, and even 1.9s with Tamiya Hummer/Blazing Star tires show up as a problem:



So, on to the plan:

Specs
Body:　1/15 1995 Chevy Silverado hard body (will try for an interior, first time, wish me luck!)
Axles: Losi MRC
Driveline: Losi MRC, may try for a front mounted engine and a transfer case
Chassis: TCS L-Trail
Wheels: RC4WD 1.55 steel wheels
Tires: RC4WD 1.55 Dirt Grabbers


I'm going to turn this into a Fire Department Brush Truck. The body is great, but I just don't believe the newer trucks in a serious offroad role. Plastic body panels, leather seats, surround sound, all that, it just doesn't fit, it's not a truck. And they don't look plausible banged up, either. Just my opinion, of course. The only people I could think of that would have a newer truck, in great shape, that would still be offroading with it would be the government, and the crew cab fits the Fire Department.

I'm going for as stock of a look as possible, definitely Class One. This means keeping the tires and wheels small and tucked in. I've got a Losi MRC in the mail, should show up next week. The outside faces of the hex are supposed to be 140mm apart, and I picked up some RC4WD 1.55 steel wheels and Dirt Grabbers.

The wheels and tires on a piece of allthread, hexes at 140mm:



Front arches need to be a little bigger, but I think I'm going to redo the bumper anyway:



Rear arches are OK, but I still need wheel wells in the bed (the rear bumper is somewhere on my workbench, it'll be back):



I'd like to do leafs, but I may stick with 4 link, I've got to get the chassis and drivetrain in hand and see how things match up with the body before I order anything more.

And a couple of inspiration/reference shots I found on Google to round things out:








Wish me luck!

[LAV25]

A sharp eyed (and modest) member pointed out to me that the hood was wrong for a 1995. Checked my notes and yup, it's a 1999. Still the same plan.

-val

[hotrodsonoma]

cant wait to see this one done.i have had one of those bodies.they make a great scale truck.

[sweli]

That's a great looking project!
How long and wide is the body?
What brand is it - Nikko, NewBright?

Can you keep the flares, but trim them open just a little?

[hotrodsonoma]

Originally Posted by sweli

That's a great looking project!
How long and wide is the body?
What brand is it - Nikko, NewBright?

Can you keep the flares, but trim them open just a little?

not trying to thread steal,but the one I had was EZ-something.cant remember now.

[LAV25]

Originally Posted by sweli

That's a great looking project!
How long and wide is the body?
What brand is it - Nikko, NewBright?

Can you keep the flares, but trim them open just a little?

I don't think (fingers crossed) I'll need to mess with the flares at all. The rear wheel arches are fine, and if I ditch the front bumper and make the new one come back just not quite as far, I should be set. Maybe open them up just a little:



Edit: Sorry, forgot to answer the question about the brand. I have no idea, a coworker of mine found it on the curb waiting for trash collection in Kyoto about three years ago and passed it to me. I don't recall that the running gear portion had a name on it, and I pitched everything but the body. Sorry I can't be of more help.

-val

[LAV25]

Postwoman came today! It looks like this is going to work out just fine:



Things are going to have to get longer though:



Still waiting on my chassis, and I figure I owe the good folks at Losi at least one stock run before I start pulling things apart, so in three short hours (why didn't you use a standard Tamiya or Dean's plug Losi?), I'll have a full charge and go for a quick spin on the local bumps. More in a couple days, I hope!

-val

[Crawford]

lav, looks like a cool project, one problem. Fire dept. Doesn't use chevies, they use fords.

other problem is ALL "brush" trucks pretty much use utility bodies now. At least in Cal-fire's case.

The only time you'll see a truck without the utility body these days is an f350 diesel for a command vehicle or supervisor.

Either way, I still wanna see you build this.

[LAV25]

Originally Posted by Crawford

lav, looks like a cool project, one problem. Fire dept. Doesn't use chevies, they use fords.

other problem is ALL "brush" trucks pretty much use utility bodies now. At least in Cal-fire's case.

The only time you'll see a truck without the utility body these days is an f350 diesel for a command vehicle or supervisor.

Either way, I still wanna see you build this.

Probably true, but I'm going to paint this up with Hirakata/Neyagawa Fire Department markings. HNFD being in Japan, they don't use ANY American equipment, and those cities have absolutely no need at all of a Brush Truck.

So that's about seven problems with the idea in total. Anything that wrong has to be OK .

Thanks for the info though

-val

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by LAV25

Probably true, but I'm going to paint this up with Hirakata/Neyagawa Fire Department markings. HNFD being in Japan, they don't use ANY American equipment, and those cities have absolutely no need at all of a Brush Truck.

So that's about seven problems with the idea in total. Anything that wrong has to be OK .

Thanks for the info though

-val

Right on man, I'm looking forward to the build.

[Unfadingpyro]

Originally Posted by LAV25

A sharp eyed (and modest) member pointed out to me that the hood was wrong for a 1995. Checked my notes and yup, it's a 1999. Still the same plan.

-val

actually since its a crew cab it would have to be 01 or newer

[LAV25]

Originally Posted by Unfadingpyro

actually since its a crew cab it would have to be 01 or newer

I give up! The original body paint says Silverado HD 2500 4x4. The sticker on the bottom, inside the battery compartment, said that it was a licensed Chevrolet 1999. It's got four doors. It's going to be a brush truck, in an urban area with streets too small for it to fit down.

There.

-val

[Unfadingpyro]

Originally Posted by LAV25

I give up! The original body paint says Silverado HD 2500 4x4. The sticker on the bottom, inside the battery compartment, said that it was a licensed Chevrolet 1999. It's got four doors. It's going to be a brush truck, in an urban area with streets too small for it to fit down.

There.

-val

sorry, just saying if it was extended cab it could be 1999, but for some reason up until 2001 the crew cabs were the older body style. call it what you want lol i dont care i was just pointing that out.

[LAV25]

No need to apologize. I haven't spent more than 2 months stateside in the last decade, so I've got no idea what American cars and trucks look like anymore, just going with what I've got.

-val

[unknownhero55]

this will be a cool rig despite the fact that its a chevy

[LAV25]

Some progress. Amazing how long the basics can take sometimes. I got my links and chassis braces done:





For the front, I used the stock lowers, and the stock lowers from the back to be the uppers on the front:



Made my own rears, no new ground broken:



You'll notice that I have the rear shocks leaning back and connecting to the rear of the chassis rather than the shock towers. I've got this sweet drop bed that I don't want to either cover or have hacked out holes for shock towers, but the towers are too tall for the bed:



This pic shows a side view with the bed resting on the towers, as low as the truck can go:



I'm not going to chop the towers off until I've gotten to the bodiless runner stage though, I want to make sure that everything works OK. I plan to run droop to keep things low, so I took the springs off the stock shocks, and they seem kind of sticky right now to me. I don't know for sure if I'm going to get new shocks or not, the whole 2mm hardware thing is a problem.

Almost forgot, mandatory flex shot:



Now to muck about making a chassis mount for my steering servo, and figure out where the rest of the electronics will go.

More later!

-val

[LAV25]

It's a runner!

I was screwing around last night trying to figure out how to mount the battery and electronics. The L-Trail chassis gives you lots of freedom, but not much guidance.

So as I was messing around, I thought that maybe I could chop up the upper tray from the stock truck and use parts of it. Then I realized that, since I wasn't using it, the 3mm loops that the upper shock mounts go to make perfect hinge loops on a 3mm crossbrace:





Since I have a hinge, I can mount it upside down, to keep the weight of the battery low:



The only thing you have to be careful with is to make sure that the ESC is forward, towards the hinge. This keeps you from ripping your motor leads out (I swear that's not how I did that earlier today!). Access to your battery:



In order to keep the hinged battery/electronics plate from flapping around, I just left the rear upper shock ball ends on, and took an elastic pony tail tie and looped it around the center rear crossbrace:



Things I still have to do:
1. Get some longer flathead 2mm bolts so that I can make a mini plate to attach the ESC to, it doesn't fit well where it needs to.
2. Bigger pinion gear! This thing is &%*$# slow with 3 inch tires and stock gearing. Does Losi make other gearing options? Suggestions are welcome.
3. Get serious about the body. I'm making wheel wells now, once those are done it needs paint and decals.
4. New shocks. The stock shocks are very bindy in droop. Suggestions here are also welcome.
5. Chop off the rear shock towers. Only once I'm perfectly satisfied with everything else.
6. Figure out how to mount the body. Something to do with magnets, I guess.

Anyway, thanks for looking!

-val

[LAV25]

Rear wheel wells almost done, just have to figure out where I left my tube of putty:









Not so pretty on the bottom side:



more later.

-val

[LAV25]

Paging Dr. Dremel, Dr. Dremel to surgery please:







Not the cleanest cuts ever made, but not bad. I also trimmed just a bit out of the front wheel arches, it should sit like this:



I need to adjust the wheelbase a little, I guess I didn't measure perfectly. Still, I'm happy with how things are going, it's starting to look like it should.

More later

-val