Recycled Rubicon

[makaveliks]

I have been reluctant to sink into the flood of Jeeps for many years. Then one day I happened across this slightly damaged New Bright Jeep body to break even on a trade from a guy. I DO like Jeeps, they have just been done to death and there's nothing left to do that hasn't been done. Well once I saw it, I finally decided to jump in...

I have been sitting on this while I finished my last project and thinking of what I wanted to do to it. I never really liked the 4 door Jeeps so I was debating cutting this up.

Today I went beyond the point of no return! This project has started and will be a 2 door Jeep! As of now I plan to build a lightly modified class 1 Rubicon. That may change, but for now that's the goal!






Next I will to put this newly made puzzle back together so I can begin my light modifications! LOL

For the chassis I will be using my old beaten and modified SCX10 that got me into scalers a few year ago. By using this chassis, I mean not really using the chassis... Just the moving parts from it! I plan to build this budget friendly and use stuff I have. I will use an RC4WD transfer case, cut my own aluminum chassis parts, put the motor and electrics under the hood to keep the interior, make aluminum links, and use the stock SCX parts for the rest of the moving stuff and these RC4WD wheels/tires.

[Mike Flea]

This oughta be real good mak, anything you touch or put your mind to turns out a winner!

[makaveliks]

Thank you for the compliment! I just can't rest until until I'm happy.

Not much of an update... Work Work Work.. This weekend I should have plenty of time though! I did start cleaning up my cuts and glueing. The first 2 pieces are glued. I'll need to do some smoothing, reinforcing, and make this section more or less completed, then do the interior, then the roof last.

[makaveliks]

Got a lot done today! Everything is shortened and glued and smoothed out. I glued the roof to the body as well. I don't want to take it off, so Figured be better glued on for additional strength. I backed all the seams with .020" styrene, then filled any gaps in the seams with the ABS scraps. Once this was done, I cut off the fenders, rear bumper, and running boards. I then sanded all the cuts smooth, sanded the whole body for paint, and got it all ready for me to start the modifications tomorrow!

[makaveliks]

Most of the body stuff is done. First I wanted one of the 10th Anniversary hoods. I like them. I drew it out on the jeep hood, then got started!




While this was smoothed and drying I started the outer bump. Made it from leyers, then sanded it to shape and glued it down. Once that was smoothed and drying I made some Poison Spyder fenders. Got them glued on and then sanded the filler down for today's finish! I still need to make the vent inserts for the hood.

[mjc597]

Very nice looking styrene work..!! The hood is coming out great.!

[makaveliks]

Thank you?

The first coats of paint are on! I'm digging this color! In a couple days it will require some sanding and a few more coats before I move on to the black. I just used Krylon Pumpkin Orange paint and primer. It seems to have a nice gloss finish. It will only require sanding and more coats because you can still see through it, and where the original black paint was it orange peeled... I don't know why it must be an incompatible type of paint. I'll have to carefully sand it all off around the handles and then hopefully the black I use to repaint them works with them because I will have tons of trouble getting the original paint off in all the cracks and crevices of the handles.

In the mean time I'll move on to the chassis!

[Mike Flea]

Nice work on the hood, on the door handles, wouldn't it be easier using flat black Testor's paint to touch them up instead of trying to take the orange off of them?

[makaveliks]

Originally Posted by Mike Flea

Nice work on the hood, on the door handles, wouldn't it be easier using flat black Testor's paint to touch them up instead of trying to take the orange off of them?

Well the problem with that is that the orange is orange peeled and to paint over that it would still leave the orange peel texture and the black would appear orange peeled as well. So I need to remove the orange peeled orange. I do have many different types of flat black also, so now that I know that for whatever reason the black on this doesn't like Krylon, I will try another alternative I have on the back doors and roof pieces which I saved. I didn't know why I saved them, but now I do! LOL. Last ditch effort I have water based paint which I can airbrush that should work over any type of paint since it's water based, but it's more work and will take longer than aerosol to do all the black stuff, so I'll test some other stuff before I just go ahead and do that.

[makaveliks]

Today I wet sanded the Jeep with 600 grit and painted some more coats on the Jeep. It came out really good, but I got some bubbles in a few spots, and where the original was not completely removed around the door handles and windshield cowl the paint kinda got a funny texture... I'm assuming the Krylon is reacting with it. Now that I put a bunch mroe coats on it it is covered and you cannot see through it. I may have to give this a week or so to dry up, give one more wet sand, then put one thin coat to restore the gloss finish and fix these imperfections. We will see how it looks when it's all dried up. Perhaps it will get better as it cures? Hopefully it does not get worse! I know this has Toluene in it which is the same stuff in the Plastruct Bondene that I use so I'm assuming all these defects are being caused by that. That's the stuff that melts and bonds the plastic together.

This shows some bubbles around the cowl:



Here's a bubble on the passenger rear fender. The fender is made up from 2 layers of .060" styrene and this bubble came out of the seem:



And this rough looking area is where the original paint was still the thickest:



Here you can see the hood cowl bubbles and the rough area on the windshield cowl where there was still thick original paint:



Here is more area where there was thick original paint:



And this corner doesn't really have much defects:

[rustneversleeps]

I can see another great build MAK.Making those bubble might be a good thing it looks like it resembles rust. Maybe it could be theres clumps of think paint spraying out the nozzles or maybe you didn`t shake the can long enough..
I`ve use lots a krylon gloss paints in the pass and I fine the gloss tends to be the hardest to work with and to make stick. theres certain plastics krylon gloss paint doesn`t like..
but the other other krylon semi and satin krylon paints seems to stick well.
I`m also at the paint stage of my build and finally decided to try air brushing more time consuming and coats but great finish..using Fastkolor water base paint...
keep it up ...
Merry Christmas....

[makaveliks]

It was shaken well and no problems. It laid down nicely and I did a few coats. After it was sitting on there for a bit drying these spots began to show up. I'm fairly certain it's a chemical reaction.

[makaveliks]

Sanded down some allen screws into small button heads. Looks much better than the plastic nipples molded into the body.




Then I stripped down the old chassis




Cleaned off my dining room table, then gathered all the bits going into this Jeep.



Then I cut off some useless bits of plastic from the SCX10 transmission.




Cut some .125" aluminum for the frame rails.



After than I needed a template to drill a new motor/transmission mount. I like the GCM chassis, but don't know how it would fit my chopped up New Bright JK. So I'm kinda making a similar chassis. Of course I don't have one to go off, so just took the basic motor fwd idea and making the rest up as I go.




Motor/transmission mount made:





And got all my bits bolted together. I made the transfer case mount from delrin. The lower links also attach to each side of it.







I then fit the body to check it out. Wheelbase looks a tad long. Gonna make some new rear links for this at some point. The frame rails are long. I did this on purpose. I'll chop em down when I make my bumpers.

[makaveliks]

I got my shocks mounted and then moved on to steering. I mounted the servo right behind the grill. There is not much room up there!




This being said, it was not enough room for my servo winch to be mounted. To fix this I moved the motor mount as far back as I could. It's now close to the driveshaft and the interior.




But this gave me room for the servo winch!




So then I put it in. I also made a small aluminum tray to mount the rest of the electronics.





Last, I began making some bumpers. They are made from my kitchen countertops. I'll need to sand them smooth, add the tube to the front, cut the hole for the fairlead, and add some tow shackles.

[joe122]

Love scratch built projects. Awesome fab work, nicely done.

[makaveliks]

Today my 35% tint came so I got the glass all ready to go in! Did not tint the windshield, need to keep this street legal.




Then I block sanded the bumpers, got the fairlead mounted, and made the stinger. Still needs some tow shackles. I think I might order some.







After that I was running out of things to do, so I decided to mount the body. The front mounts use 2 existing screw heads to locate them, then one screw to mount them. The rears use one of the bumper bracket screws to locate it, then the other attaches it.





And now that the body is mounted it can do things like this!






Still needs sliders, a driver, some minor styrene work, and paint finished.

[Mike Flea]

It's coming along real fine like, good use of stuff around the house

[makaveliks]

Ya, I always knew I was saving the scrap countertops for something! I don't know how well they'll hold up. At least the front. It usually takes quite a beating. I think I might braze up something aluminum, or spend 50$ on the RC4WD one after everything else is done.

This is going fast!

Today I cooked up some sliders...






Then I think the chassis is finished... So I took it apart. I was very pleased with how easy it is to work on! A couple screws and all the suspension, axles, and transfer case just drops away!



Then a couple more and all the electronics are gone! Disassembly took me about 10 minutes!




After that, I sanded the chassis and sprayed it gloss black. Then just as easily as it came apart, it's back together! Just waiting for the rest of the electronics to be installed! I'll let the Krylon dry overnight before I start double sided taping the paint. After that, it'll be down to finishing up the body. Closing up the interior around the rear shocks, making inner fenders, making the small hood vents, a driver, and paint.

[makaveliks]

Today I wet sanded the body again, and tried to repaint...



And it came out perfect this time! I can finally sleep at night! Apparently contrary to the Krylon can, 24 hours is not nearly enough time to dry. It's more like 5 days! LOL

[makaveliks]

Today was about spraying black. I did the roof and hood stuff. Another day I'll do panel lines and handles and stuff.

First I used Frisket film which I had bought from Hobby Lobby to do the Hood stuff. I printed out some Rubicon letters in reverse on the backing of the film. Then I used an exacto to cut the letters. I removed the letters from the backing. Then I discovered that Blu painters tape makes a great transfer tape for this film. I stuck it over my mask, peeled the backing off, made some Sharpe alignment marks on the film so I could see through the blu painters tape. After that I stuck it down on the hood and peeled the tape off. The Frisket film masking was left behind on the hood. I also cut out the rectangle stripe on the top of the hood cowl.

To paint them I got to use my new Iwata High Performance Plus C airbrush, and my new 10 gal California Tools ultra quiet oil free air compressor. They were both great! This is my first good airbrush. For years I have been a testors aztec dual action airbrush. The difference is amazing! The Iwata trigger is much smoother, much easier to clean, and has a nicer more balanced feel in your hand. The spray pattern is great. You can do such fine detail, I think I may use it to spray the panel lines and door handles. The old used and abused Aztec went into the trash! The compressor is so quiet and it filled in a little over a minute. being 10 gallons, it didn't need to run again while I airbrushed these markings and cleaned the airbrush.

So here is the masking laid out for the lettering:





Once this was sprayed in flat black, I also masked and sprayed the roof with Krylon satin black.