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GMC Clodbuster Body Grille and Working Tail Lights

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I have been asked to make a new grille for the Clodbuster. Not owning one, I was sent a body and chrome tree to start to measure off it. The plan is to make a nice and scale Clod grille to replace the re-re 4x4x4 version as well as give it better lighting options. On top of that, thanks to micro fine 3D detail printing, I can have a grille that is actually a grille!
Here is the plan.
1. Main grille housing - made of standard white ABS. Cheaper and easy to detail and paint.
2. Grille - Fine detailed grille design that is glued in from the rear once painted
3. GMC Logo - Fine detailed emblem that will glue in place. Couple reasons for this. We might not want the emblem installed and its easier to paint this way.
4. Lighting - Headlight and turn signal lenses will be installed on top of the main grill housing which will have the buckets molded in. It will have sockets for four five millimeter LED's for the head lights and four three millimeter LED's for the turn signals.
Tail Lights - Existing ones will be cut out (as per my Pajero Build: http://www.tamiyaclub.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=74167) and then lenses will be glued in as well as buckets on the rear inside of the body. They will have a 3mm reverse light openings and two 5mm tail light openings.
This should prove to be a fun project. Here is where I am so far. this is the desired outcome:
This is GMC Jimmy and/or Suburban variant grille only I believe:
16243663720_be22dea26b_z.jpg
Started with the main housing (i'm only modeling half of this since its a mirror part):
16244840529_7e52b5d060_z.jpg
Here is a shot of the rear mounts. This is a factory direct replacement with no mods to the body at all.
15808583234_a450ece120_z.jpg
Anyway that's where we are right now. Ill keep you posted on the progress.
Thanks!
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Not to put a damper on this (I would love to see more of your lights!) but are you aware that CPE make about 4 grilles for the clod buster body, one being a GMC?

I am not sure if it is the same model grille, if not, apologies and carry on :)

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Not to put a damper on this (I would love to see more of your lights!) but are you aware that CPE make about 4 grilles for the clod buster body, one being a GMC?

I am not sure if it is the same model grille, if not, apologies and carry on :)

Yes I have one but, um, how do I put this...it's not for me. This one will be detailed much better and have the correct body conformation that the CPE version does not. I know why they made it flat versus contoured to match the front of the body. The contoured body makes it infinitely more difficult to model all of the details. If this was flat I would had it done in 20 minutes. So far it's been two months. Ouch.

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Haha yeah fair enough. The more realism the better, I look forward to your progress B)

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hi alberto

I have put some pictures of my clodbuster grill on the main club page. I saw yours so thought I would give it ago. I have added some indicators pods at the bottom but other than that it is a copy of the original chevy grill.

tried to add the pictures on here but it says I have used my limits with the wildone pictures. I cant get to grips with the forum pictures. I want to put my build on but I have not got a clue how.can you give me a few pointers please

cheers

tony

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thats looking good - and i bet its fairly easy to change the emblem from Chevy to GMC too ? Being thinking that the Freelander is very close to the Fall Guy truck and all it needs is a GMC grill - yours or Pinto's might be the ideal way to go about it

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That looks great Boxartparts. What is you plan as to material to use to print? The standard plastic might not have the detail you need but the detail plastic might be way too expensive. Maybe making the grill seperate from the housing would allow two kinds of materials to keep the detail up but the price down.

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Here are some updates.


I pretty much have the main grill body and light lenses finished. There was a lot of detailing and contouring that I did not notice at first. This lead to a very slow and detailed build bit I am very happy with the result.


Here it is when I started with the main features :


16512136175_54a88471a6_z.jpg


Then some more details:


16326225977_b28af9f721_z.jpg


This was a lot harder than I imagined due to the fact that the turn signal light bucket was parallel to the front of the grill where as the head lights were not. The Headlights are both co-planer to each other but recessed in the main grill.


I added the light buckets to the main grill and made everything as thin as possible to reduce on price. The main body is just about 2mm thick through out. The headlight and turn signal lenses are 1.5 mm thick. This detail coupled to the material thickness means that the lenses are going to have to be model (not super) glued in place. The LED's on the other hand will have a retainer that I have yet to model.


Here is a cross section of the main grill, LED's and lenses in place:


16324674740_eab02b3d8b_z.jpg


Here are a couple more images. This is not rendered, just painted in Creo. Next I will make the LED retainer and mount for it and follow that with a insanely detailed grill insert made of different material to dramatically increase detail. Should be fun!


16325965339_a66061740d_z.jpg


Might be easier to see details here:


16511216832_6b4c809797_z.jpg


A lot of LED's:


16325965319_027c4f896d_z.jpg


I was surprised at the corner details on this front end.:


15889674334_b9f781a9b8_z.jpg


I will post more soon! Thanks.
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maybe changing the fine detail to a meshing could be another way to go. not sure on materials as yet.been reading lots on here for ideas.i haven't found a printer as yet in the uk.maybe I should do it!

not seen may chevy or gmc truck here in the uk so not sure of the variants in light positions etc. I have model the original to match the front grill. maybe some one could suggest ideas or post real trucks from some ideas.here is the model of the tailgate bumper and retainer

7_zpsqo2vjl8b.jpg

8_zpsll02mjhp.jpg

9_zpsdy1nmiai.jpg

10_zpsjkn4lqea.jpg

11_zpspu5fb5sf.jpg

12_zps7td0rh41.jpg

so any ideas for extras or mods?

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maybe changing the fine detail to a meshing could be another way to go. not sure on materials as yet.been reading lots on here for ideas.i haven't found a printer as yet in the uk.maybe I should do it!

not seen may chevy or gmc truck here in the uk so not sure of the variants in light positions etc. I have model the original to match the front grill. maybe some one could suggest ideas or post real trucks from some ideas.here is the model of the tailgate bumper and retainer

7_zpsqo2vjl8b.jpg

8_zpsll02mjhp.jpg

9_zpsdy1nmiai.jpg

10_zpsjkn4lqea.jpg

11_zpspu5fb5sf.jpg

12_zps7td0rh41.jpg

so any ideas for extras or mods?

Looks good! Maybe a roll pan rear pan instead of a bumper? Or even a tube version of the bumper would be a good one. I like the truck logo on the tail gate. I am making a GMC logo to glue onto the stock rear tail gate to, like you, match the front. Have you looked at shapeways in the UK for your printing? They are genuinely awesome.

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Some more updates. I have finished the grill insert. This will be 3D printed with a higher quality and finer detailed plastic for very high detail. It is glued in place.


16611105366_b8f256db04_z.jpg


The GMC logo is a separate part. It can be glued on top of the grill should you chose to do so.


16636028682_2749322b2b_z.jpg


The completed grill looks pretty good. I still need to make the retainers on the rear of the light bezels to hold in the LED's.


16635608231_d2dcb70af2_z.jpg


More posts soon!
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The retainer is done. I thought about leaving it off and letting people just glue the LED's in but that is pretty hack. I don't like the idea of that so I did it correctly. There is already enough gluing on this grill with all the lights and inserts as it is.


16637203102_710bff9d9d_z.jpg
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Awesome stuff guys! Really impressive!

How about a rear embellisher for that tailgate? That would be a bit different B)

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I have an old 75 GMC Sierra classic, I know there's lots of pics of these available on the net but if you need any specific pictures let me know and I can take them and send off to you

4AOtVd.jpg

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Amazing stuff.

I love how you're creating different parts for each component of the grille. It is more realistic. It also makes it much easier to paint without bleeding and thus a much better end result.

Is there a way to get printed parts polished and chromed as well?

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Awesome stuff guys! Really impressive!

How about a rear embellisher for that tailgate? That would be a bit different B)

Could you clarify? I am going to make a GMC insert for it. Is that what you are talking about?

Absolutely amazing work, from both of you!

Thank you!

I have an old 75 GMC Sierra classic, I know there's lots of pics of these available on the net but if you need any specific pictures let me know and I can take them and send off to you

4AOtVd.jpg

Thank you very much! I will definitely let you know.

Amazing stuff.

I love how you're creating different parts for each component of the grille. It is more realistic. It also makes it much easier to paint without bleeding and thus a much better end result.

Is there a way to get printed parts polished and chromed as well?

Yes I thought the painting would also be much simpler! You cannot get the plastic parts polished (though there is a printing method called polished) but I do not see why they cannot get plastic chrome dipped. That would be nice.

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Tail lights are done. Now Clods shells can actually have working tail and reverse lights.


These are a 2 piece combo unit. Lens is glued to the finished shell and then the inner housing glues to the inside of the shell. The 3mm reverse light drops directly into the lens so that the light is fiber-optically transmitted to the reverse light portion of the tail light as cleanly as possible. The brake/driving light is attached to the housing so that light dissipates.


16639633267_0ce63cd394_z.jpg


Housing:


16846939625_b78d0259d5_z.jpg


Reverse 3MM led plugged into rear lens.


16659356438_878c612b62_z.jpg


Better shot of the last:

16659578150_70f5d82ff9_z.jpg


Tailgate insert is next and then this project is complete.

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Superb!

Thank you! I am looking forward to seeing how they look on a body.

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Tailgate "GMC" insert is done. It is 40 MM wide and due to scale, 3D printing and realism, it is 8mm wider than it should be if it were scale. I did this simply because it would be horrible to paint and detail if it were smaller.


16660286220_00ddfe2b00_z.jpg


16661515239_c3d7c86b93_z.jpg


Ill order these in a couple weeks so that I can test fit everything.
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Can't wait to see the fit pics. That's some seriously cool work!

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Can't wait to see the fit pics. That's some seriously cool work!

Thanks! I can't wait either. I am looking forward to how this lights up. This front setup means 8 forward facing lights in the grille alone!

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