Mack RW rebuild

Modeling Subjects Autos
1

Hello everybody!

I just finished my Porsche, so now I’m movin on to something that has been bothering me for a few years now. In 1993 I built a “U.S. Power Truck” from Italeri - a 1:24 model of Mack RW (Superliner), just without the logo (license fees?). It looks like this:

1:24 Mack RW Superliner

It has a lot of things I’d do better today. Just take a look at this:

1:24 Mack RW Superliner

As it starts to fall apart, I decided to overhaul it. I’ll gently pry it apart and rebuild it. What I want to do is to repaint the frame and the axles, stretch the sleeperbox and add some “boxes” along the frame, to give the truck better proportions (the frame is too long for it now). Build a new “wing” on top of the new sleeperbox. Reinforce the hood, as it is slightly warped. Repaint the cab & co.

Could somebody tell me what engines were installed in those trucks and their corresponding “house” colours? (alpine green, sand, blue). How about the tranny?

Thanks in advance for your help, please stay tuned and have a nice day

Pawel

2

The Superliners I believe came with the E-9 500hp. V-8

John

3

Thanks a lot, John, but what make would that be?

Pawel

4

Looks great!!! Nice job done!

5

Hello!

It’s been a long time, but I’m movin’ on with the project.

Brizio, it’s probably going to brak your heart [;)], but I already started carefully breaking my first truck apart, to be rebuilt, as written in the original post.

The problem I had from day one - almost - and I couldn’t remedy this as I originally built my truck, was the bad hood to cab fit. The hood didn’t want to close properly. The first reason for this is obvious after you look at this foto:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

What I did was to cut the entire top out of the hood and substitute a new, straight one out of styrene sheet. Of course it’s not that easy, after you find out the top isn’t entirely flat, it’s slightly curved. To get this curve I glued a strenghtening brace under the hood, this brace also helps to make the hood stiffer. Here’s what I got:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

While building the hood I read through lots of reference material and here comes the big surprise - this truck is almost no Mack at all. It rides on a stolen Freightliner chassis, and to top it off, the cab is incorrect too. That’s why it has no Mack logos on it. I’ll describe the modifications I’m going to do here as I work on them, for now only an outline:

-Hood - add Mack logos

-Cab - narrow thecab by 4-5 mm, redo the exhaust stack braces, redo the mirrors

-Sleeperbox - stretch to enlarge it.

-Frame - where the real fun begins - build new front frame portions, new crossmembers.

-Rear suspension - install Mack camelback suspension

By the way - the kit engine is a Cummins, should be beige and I think I’m going to keep it.

Now let’s see how it turns out. Thanks for reading, have a nice day

Pawel

6

Hello everybody!

I’m slowly movin’ on with my work. Today I’d only write about where I’m headed and ask for your help.

Now John wrote the Mack came wit an E-9. the E-9 is a V-8 engine by Mack and should be painted gloss black. Italeri supplies an engine for the truck, that looks a bit like a Cummins and should be painted Cummins beige. A Fuller transmission could work with the engine, my question - what colour would the transmission be painted then?

But the biggest problem I’ve got, is the shape and general appearance of the forward frame portion. I can’t find too many fotos of the forward frame of a Superliner on the net, so maybe you could post some fotos? That would help me a lot, so thanks in advance, have a nice day

Pawel

7

I have to follow this one. I’ve never seen a “Rebuild” WIP, and I figure it will help me out, since I think some of my older kits will need a rebuild soon.

I like tho original paint. Can you try to re-do it, too? (I love multi-color schemes from the 80’s)

8

Howdy Railfan233, thanks for your comment. It’s actually a second time I rebuild an old model. You usually need a really good reason to do that, because it’s almost two times the work compared to building it the first time. This truck is important to me, has been with me a long time and I want it to look good again.

As for the paint job - I could only take a shot at the same color scheme if somebody sent me the original decals… So if anybody got them, please let me know. If not, I think I’ll go with single color, maybe with some operator logos on the doors.

Thanks for looking, please stay tuned and have a nice day

Pawel

9

Hello!

I disassembled the cab and went on to tackle the interior. Here’s what it looked like halfway:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

As you can see I already stripped some paint. The big deal here is the cab has to be narrowed 4 mm in order to have almost constant width front to back whereas the kit supplied cab abruptly gets wider in the front, distorting the superliner lines. This is probably due to Italeri wanting to reuse the Freightliner cab floor. Bad idea[bnghead]. I already straightened the cab sides, narrowed the floor, and the biggest trick - I narrowed the dashboard 4mm without messing up my original 15 years old decals! I also removed the clutch pedal and it’s base - it is to be suspended from the dashboard. I still have to narrow the rear wall. I also build the padding around the cab doors, you can see some of it already in place.

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

I also worked on the seats - I removed the armrest and replaced portions of the somewhat heavy casting with copper wire. The second seat will follow shortly. The seat bases also have to be relocated, so that the steering column is in the centerline of the driver’s seat - otherwise the driver would probably get a bad backache after just a few miles.

Thanks for reading, have a nice day

Pawel

10

It looks great Pawel. I can’t wait to see the interior when it’s back together. The seats definately look better.

11

Railfan 223, thanks a lot. I’ll have the the cockpit fotos done soon, so please stay tuned. Thanks for reading, have a nice day

Pawel

12

You are doing a great job! Looking forward!

13

Brizio, thanks a lot for your comment, please stay tuned for more!

And here comes more. Recently I painted the cab floor and the front bulkhead with dash:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

As I already wrote, the seat bases were relocated some 2mm inboard. There’s still some smoothing left on the rear portion of the passenger seat’s base.

I also went on with the work on other cab walls. I made some padding out of milliput:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

The walls will be painted next, along with the seats. The rear wall still needs to be narrowed. I hope you like it, have a nice day

Pawel

14

The cab is looking great. I like the padding on the cab walls. I have herd of a trick used in modeling fire apparatus for simulating high-heat insulation in a cab (like for an airport crash truck) that accually involves the use of duct tape. I havn’t tried it yet, but it makes sence, because the tape’s fibre leaves a pattern that looks so much like the insulation and padding. Then again, it would be really tough to paint it (unless you want a metalic silver padding or insulation)

This truck is coming together and looks great so far. I can’t wait to see the rest of the re-build

15

Pawel : You are a very well rounded modeller ,keep it up!

16

Railfan 233, interesting remark, duct tape could be a very interesting material. I must take a closer look when I see a roll of such tape.

krow113, welcome to my thread, nice to have you onboard and thanks for your kind words.

I’ll go on with the build slowly (just the way I am), but consequently. I hope for an update on tuesday. 'Till then, thanks for your comments and have a nice day

Pawel

17

Of course, when I state a date, that means another deadline to be missed!

But anyhow, I made a little progress, and here are the pictures:

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

I painted and installed the seats.

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

I also finished the inside of the cab sides and back. I’m going to put them together soon!

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

I also started the stressful job of narrowing the windshield. After narrowing the cab the winshield is 4mm to wide. First the frame, the glass will be next!

1:24 Mack Superliner by Pawel Mroczkowski

Thanks for reading, have a nice day

Pawel

18

Man, that looks great so far. I don’t know why, but I can see the Snow Man from Smokey and the Bandit in the driver’s seat. right now…

19

Nice to see old models rebuilt rather than tossed out. looks like you’re going all out to up the standard of this model, which is good also.

20

Railfan 233, thanks for your comment! Boy, was that a cool movie or what! Although, just checked it, Snow Man had a Ken W-900. But dang, from what I read, the Macks are just legendary, aren’t they? Such a pity Italeri treated them this way…

OctaneOrange, thanks a lot - I thought it would be a pity to toss it, the model has a sentimental value for me, like I wrote before. And, I told myself, I’m gonna do it right this time. But the cleaning of the old paint definitly IS a PAIN… If I could only get a new sleeperbox for it, that would make it so much easier…

Well awright, please stay tuned, thanks for looking and have a nice day

Pawel