I took a break from my Bradley this weekend to work on something with less small parts. I thought it would be neat to have a bit of 1:1 scale armored fighting vehicle, but restoring a rusty Sherman or surplus Humvee is out of my budget. What I did find was a guy on eBay selling parted out components from military vehicles. I ordered a few inoperative lights and went to work:
First step was to remove all the “guts”. I wouldn’t be needing the 12 and 24 volt wiring and bulbs. After that I sanded and chipped a lot of the heavy sand-colored paint that was caked on them:
Next I masked the reflector surfaces and spray painted the housings with flat OD green Krylon:
Then I wired it all up. I put in some light bulb sockets from the hardware store and connected it all in the back with wire nuts. (NOTE: even at 25 watts output the fluorescent bulbs were too bright - I revised the plan with candle-base inserts and 7-watt nightlight bulbs - just right!)
I mounted it to a 1x6 wooden “bumper” of sorts, and spray painted some stars I made from a paper stencil. Here it is unlit and lit mounted above the window in my Man Cave:
That’s it! It was easy to make and adds a nice touch to the modeling room decor.
(And again, it was meant to be FUN and DECORATIVE, so no replies from rivet-counters pointing out that turn signals go on the front and brake lights to the rear and black-out lights go somewhere else, etc., nor any quotes from the National Electric Code about how all wiring connections must be made inside metal housings.[whstl])
Thanks for looking!
George