Wheelies in Valhalla! The GigaM38

[emory70 153]

OK OK OK. Enough of us telling you how to build your rig. On with the updates!

[Dojo Dave 889]

OK OK OK. Enough of us telling you how to build your rig. On with the updates!

Now now, sounds like someone is suffering from update withdrawal. Lol, let's have the next installment before tremors and sweats start....

[Mad Ax 9311]

Great stuff so far and truly inspirational - I will be using this thread for ideas as I crack on with my next project

[Kevin_Mc 411]

Never mind a seatbelt, never forget to zip your flies when lying on a supercharger..........................

:lol:

[s2-g2 432]

OK OK OK. Enough of us telling you how to build your rig. On with the updates!

Now now, sounds like someone is suffering from update withdrawal. Lol, let's have the next installment before tremors and sweats start....

Ha! OK, ok - Following is an installment that hopefully helps!

Great stuff so far and truly inspirational - I will be using this thread for ideas as I crack on with my next project

Thank you!

>>>>

WOOO HOOO! Shapeways package arrival today. Many things to work on!

But, first - this last week I fashioned some metal straps to hold the fuel drum in place:

Can't have that bouncing off during a high-speed chase. Safety first in the Wasteland!

I need to burnish the straps and weather them, but I'm pretty happy with how they fit and hold the tank on-board. Gotta work on the fuel hose that dumps that tank into the stock one.

Now, back to that delivery...

My motor additions came in and they fit together nicely. Results are a much more respectable presence on the hood. Immortan seemed happy...

Mmmmm, fresh engine straight from the printer...

Vroom! I say vroom-vroom, son.

Now I just have to figure if I'm going to cut the hood or black out a "recess" - also, what do do about the hood body-mount I've buried - and I gotta make a belt to fit all those pulleys...

I'm happy with how the 1.5" wheels printed out - and the stance they give the rig (more on that in a minute). But, I'm still desperately searching for the right rubber. The tractor tires I bought off eBay are a little too skinny... Since the 1.5's are small up front, I'd like a little width. The FAV rears I have on there now are close to the footprint I want, but the tread is obviously ALL wrong.

Whew... measurements for the bearing pocket were right on thanks to a planetary alignment...

The bearing cover lined up nicely...

Stock upright in place... Too puny for this rig!

Wasteland-class heavy-duty basher upright in place...

Those rims sure are purty... time to rust them and uglify them for the post-apocalypse!

Soooo.... I'm still looking for tractor tires.

Also - I've been watching stuff like this on eBay:

I'm thinking these -might- work, but they're +++ $$$

Know an aggressive tire design that might fit the bill? I'm still up for suggestions from anyone!

So, here's the GigaM38 as it sits right now. You can see the raked stance with the smaller 1.5's up front.

Also - the roll-bar cage parts printed out and fit just right, so I need to print 3 more of them. I'll likely modify the screw flange I added to that part since it stands out quite a bit.

As you can see, I have a tire tread issue going on up front.

#$@#!$ motor slid forward in this pic... I'm gonna fire the photographer.

Try finding a parking place for that thing...

Time to start some more paintin' Also... gotta look at those undercarriage parts and treat them to match the rest of the rig.

More soon!

Stuart

[emory70 153]

Dual 1.5 tractor tires up front as well?

I'd do an eBay search for 1.5 rc tires. See what pops up.

I'd avoid spikes or anything that doesn't look like a "real" tire.

[s2-g2 432]

I'd avoid spikes or anything that doesn't look like a "real" tire.

That's a very good point. Even though this is a comic build (Can Willy not be?) so far the tires ground it in reality. Well... post-apocalyptic Mad Max reality at least.

I actually have several variants of "1.5 Tire" saved in my eBay preferences with real-time alerts. Yes... I have an addiction...

[emory70 153]

I'm glad you get what I was saying.

[Mannyp1980 49]

This looks absolutely amazing. This is gonna be a beast!!

[emory70 153]

Those weird Pro Lines you posted the pic of might look OK with the spikes shaved off.

You could also maybe cut/groove/trim the tires that you already have

[s2-g2 432]

This looks absolutely amazing. This is gonna be a beast!!

Thank you! I really appreciate the feedback. Keeps me motivated!

Those weird Pro Lines you posted the pic of might look OK with the spikes shaved off.

You could also maybe cut/groove/trim the tires that you already have

Check it out. I stuffed the eBay (John Deere toy tractor) tires I bought with foam and managed to widen them enough to look OK on the rims. I'm gonna keep looking, but this is what I'm gonna run for right now. They're a harder plastic, and result in some skids in turns, but right now they'll do.

And I'm still not tired of tires.

Also spent some time painting the roll-bar connector. Looks good, so I've ordered three more from Shapeways. I dropped the height of the rear cage hoop by about half an inch. I didn't like how high it was sitting. Looks more streamlined now. I'll post a side shot of that change soon...

Roll bars... The monkey bars of the Mad Max universe.

And I spent some time assembling the motor/blower and starting to paint...

Gotta mount/recess this soon or Immortan is gonna get indigestion again.

Onward to Valhalla!

Stuart

[whahooo 465]

The Gigahorse reminds me of the nikko Drago Dragster...

Super nice build by the way!

[s2-g2 432]

The Gigahorse reminds me of the nikko Drago Dragster... Super nice build by the way!

Cool - Never saw one of those before. And that reminds me - I gotta start designing the exhaust pipes!

[s2-g2 432]

Motor time

Spent some time this weekend properly installing the new motor engine in the GigaM38. I'll just let the pictures do the talking.

Measure once, cut twice. (or maybe the other way around...)

An old radiator will do nicely for the recessed engine deck.

Engine deck glued in place.

... and also puttied in place. (I want the deck to support plenty of weight/stress)

Grille out, front view of the engine's recessed posture in the rig.
Engine is screwed down to the recessed mounting plate here via two screws from the bottom up.

For my main belt, I used a soldering iron to pre-melt it to contour around the pulleys.
I tried several other belt ideas before settling on the zip-tie as the final one.

I fashioned a main pulley out of some drywall hardware and screwed/puttied it to the bottom of the engine mount.
Then I painted that to match the rest of the engine.
I want the belt to look as if it actually goes down around a main shaft/pulley from the top of the hood.
Here you can see the pre-melted drive belt going around all the pulleys. I melted the belt together at the bottom of the main pulley.
I also super glued the belt once it was in place to make sure it stays where it is supposed to be.

Here's the engine with belt installed with the grille back in place. I'm happy with the effect.

Potato-camera quality (the engine is very reflective), but you can see the painting to dirty things up...
Cool unintended effect: the back of the drive belt (zip tie) has grooves.

So, now I am without a front (hood) body mount. To fix this, I designed a scaffold to relocate the hood mount to two new mounts further back and to the sides of the hood. This piece will fit on the mount that normally holds the spring and hood mount:

Just waiting for it to come in from Shapeways...

Why yes. Yes it does.

[Nitomor 2122]

A lot of those pics aren't working for me but might be because on surfing with my phone. Would the tamiya front tires of the tumbling bull/kumamon tractor fit the bill?

[kontemax 1725]

Maybe if narrowed.

Max

[s2-g2 432]

A lot of those pics aren't working for me but might be because on surfing with my phone. Would the tamiya front tires of the tumbling bull/kumamon tractor fit the bill?

Maybe if narrowed.

Max

Oooh! I've been wanting to try the whole tire narrowing procedure I've seen done on TC. These might just fit the bill. Off to eBay for me. Thanks for the idea guys!

[kontemax 1725]

Here the technic I use to cut the rims.

http://www.tamiyaclub.com/showroom_model.asp?cid=121602&sid=24

Max

[MadInventor 3884]

Oooh! I've been wanting to try the whole tire narrowing procedure I've seen done on TC. These might just fit the bill. Off to eBay for me. Thanks for the idea guys!

Just be careful, if these are the same tires as TLT-1 tires, the sidewalls are 2 different diameters on the inside and outside edge, and also you can get left and right sided tires, so if you cut the tires down you will probably also need matching tumbling bull / TLT wheels to cut down. Unless of course you combine 1 left and 1 right tire to make 1 narrowed tire with a common sidewall diameter on both sides.

[InsaneJim69 1584]

Wow, awesome work Looks fantastic so far.

James

[emory70 153]

I was nervous about how your engine was gonna look, but now that you have it mounted, I really like it.

I figured the notches were why you used the zip tie for the belt

[s2-g2 432]

I was nervous about how your engine was gonna look, but now that you have it mounted, I really like it.

Thanks! ...and me too! I was worried it might look too toy-like and silly, but I think it turned out ok...

...

Got a Shapeways package this week and did some more detail work...

First, my scaffold idea for the relocated hood body-mounts came out OK, but I made it too wide to fit inside the fender walls... So, I had to cut it and narrow it. I'd re-print it narrower, but ($$$) so, I just cut it and "improvised"

Here's how it looked when it was too wide:

and how it fits on the chassis:

I had to narrow this, but forgot to take a pic... I'll post that sometime later.

The scaffold bolts down to the stock mount platform with nuts/screws.

That scaffold moves the body mount to two new mounts at the back and to the sides of the engine blower cavity. I decided to do something different with the hood pins...

The tension against the hood and between the two mounts keeps the retainer bar in place (at least so far) - so, I'll stick with that design.

I just need to grunge up the hood "pin" retainer rod now.

Heh... It pinned right through the bad weld that fixes the front-to-back hood crack. (Such a Frankenstein build...)

Next, I fashioned a new plate for the extra fuel tank to connect to the on-board tank. I "riveted" that in place on the fuel drum with brads and superglue:

and then dirtied it all up and connected the dump-hose into the on-board tank:

Gravity-fed extra 55 gallons of high octane guzzoline, baby!

I'm having fun with making a tire combo to approximate the real GigaHorse inspiration for the build, but one of the best parts of having an M38 beater/runner is popping on the stock tire/wheel combo and running it just as the big T intended.

Those old paddle wheels just look so right on this body, I can't help going back to them for play time.

Lucky for me my runner wheels are a mess and fit right along with the MadMax look!

I had an idea this week and bought some flint-tipped welder spark-igniters. I'm making a set of wheelie bars that will put the flint to the concrete and hopefully make a light show out back. More on that soon...

Stuart

[MadInventor 3884]

I like that idea!

That one too!

More progress...

So... here are the steps I followed to distress the GigaM38's body (after reading so many good write-ups on this forum)

1. Paint the body with a rust-colored primer, dampen some areas and salt them with a coarse grain salt.

Like a really bad pretzel.

2. Agitate some salt off, but mostly paint over with a gray primer coat, dampen spots, and salt again.

Tamiya brand seasoning salt works best.

3. Paint over with the final coat (in this case black) and then agitate salt off of the multiple layers until desired effect is achieved.

there's something sticky on that plate... So, concentrate on the awesome rust effect, please.

4. I also burnished the riveted plates with a dremel wire brush.

Starting to look pretty gross.

• I'm pretty happy with how the body is progressing...
• The chassis is as-is (finished) and is used almost daily as a runner...
• Immortan Willy is relaxing while I find some medals for his armor...

And - Now I've found the rear tires that will get mounted on dually wheels in the back. So, I ordered 4 of them.

RC4WD Mud Basher 1.9 Scale Tractor Tire Z-T0115's

Something smaller will go up front.

I also picked up an extra fuel tank for all the guzzoline Immortan will burn doing wheelies in the wasteland:

Guzzoline or Aqua-cola?

I have an idea to mount the oil drum horizontal on the rear with a hose running into the on-board fuel tank/cell.

Oh! I still have to detail my ideas for wheels too.... next post...

Can I ask where you got the oil drum from ?

[s2-g2 432]

Can I ask where you got the oil drum from ?

Certainly! - Search "1 10 scale oil drum" on eBay. Got mine from a seller named VRCHobbies. I'm on the US eBay, but looks like sure there's several on the UK site right now.

[s2-g2 432]

"Modified" my wheelie bars today.

My son's Razor Scooter gave me the idea. It has a kick-brake that has flint embedded in it so it makes a shower of sparks...

So, I bought a set of spark igniters for a propane torch or welder. They come in a 5-pack and are threaded.

The thread matches the thread on a Hotshot antenna base... So, I bent banged/pried/clamped a Hotshot antenna into a crude wheelie-bar and added some threaded bar so I could connect the spark igniter.

Then I installed my "flame pipes" on the GigaM38.

And I went for a test drive. It works!!! (Pardon my inept videographer skillz)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOEbq8G6eXY

and in slo-mo

This is a first stab at the project to prove if it worked.

Now I just need to spend some time perfecting the antenna-bend-into-wheelie-bar process.