Are there any 1/48 ground equipment models out there? Couldn’t find any at the common sites…
You looking for WWII or modern day? And then for what country, espceially if you’re looking for WWII equipment. I have seen both WWII and modern day. ProModeller has a set of WWII ground equipment that has two items each from USA, UK and Germany. Hasegawa has both WWII Luftwaffe and modern day equipment. Haswgawa also as a set of modern carrier equipment. I’ve found the Hasegawa kits at my LHS, but I also seen them on ebay.
Was looking for modern, USAF,…ladders, maintenance stands…maybe loaders…
50/60’s is the era…but i do not believe the equipment was much different…
I could be wrong
NICE LOX AND AIR CART…
REALLY WANTED THE STANDS TOO…ANYBODY SEEN THOSE?
NEED TO RESEARCH HASEGAWA…
There are few maintenance stands as they are hard to mold in plastic as they have expanded metal decking on them. These are more conducive to being made using Photo Etched parts. These stands are easily scratchbuilt using some rod and tube styrene and some screening or tight woven netting from the fabric store. Wheels can be source from either disc punched from styrene sheet or the spares box. Casters can be made from again punched discs and some heavy foil cut and folded to make the wheel frames.
I’ve never seen anything but scratch-built maintenence stands… I make 'em myself as well, like Hawkeye said, from Plastruct channel & angle, and Evergreen rod, with basswood planking, or for more modern stuff, I use foil burnished over fine screen for treadplate and glue that down over sheet styrene… Same with ladders… A reasonable facsimile of expanded steel can be made from screen cut at a 45-degree angle to the grid.
Huffers are a fairly easy scratch-build from styrene sheet, wheels from toy cars & trucks, and wire hoses & ducts… Promodeler’s set has a towing tug that would work from late WW2-era all the way into the 60’s…
Prieser , teknics , matador , flightpath , dartmoor propaganda , accurate armor , all have kits in this genre good luck finding some of them .The teknics 1/48 B-17 crew just went for $85 us on ebay.Of course scratch built will give the best unique look ,I mean how hard is it to make a ladder?
Nuttin’ to it…
Workstand built from Evergreen strip & rod with the engine stand from Monogram F-80 kit providing the castors:
Excellent do you have the dimensions for the engine removal stand? The big inverted ‘v’ with the chain hoist you know the one -I would like to scratch one for my dio .I have pix but none of the complete item. All the airfield dio stuff available and no one ever did this item Also Esci has a good plastic modern ground support kit ,I just saw one on ebay for $5 .I have boxes full of this stuff from LHS and ebay
Since the '60s U.S. Air Force maintenance stands have remained fairly standardized, with several different types in use, many of which can be used together to form a taller stand. The C-1 stand is a simple stand consisting of a rolling platform with steps on one side that is easily manuvered into position by one person. It has a standing surface about four feet off the ground and has an expanded metal surface. It has been reproduced in both 1/72nd and 1/48th scales in the Hasegawa ground equipment sets. One detail often missed on these stands-every piece of USAF ground equipment has an inspection & maintenance documentation form holder on it somewhere. On a maintenance stand it is usually a clear vinyl or plastic (sometimes O.D. green) document holder, often held on with straps. If the holder is transparent, the white forms inside are clearly visable & stand out. Some maintenance stands are hydraulic & can be raised or lowered to a specific height, and will have a hydraulic reservoir, hoses, actuator, & hand pump & lever.
Yeah but who makes a modern Tug tractor for moving aircraft around in 1/48 scale? The Escii set has the tractor for hauling the munitions. And what would be nice is a 1/48 scale Chevy crew truck commonly called a “Bread Truck”.
Just a shot in the dark here, but you migt be able to find a suitable truck in the Walther’s catalogue or othe such model railroad catalogues. O Scale model railroad stuff is1/48th and they have quite a selection of commercial vehicles for rail-heads… Most are rather toy-like, but there are some real keepers out there too, and with a little work and a well-stocked parts bin, can be turned diorama-worthy accessories…
Did some digging around and found this site with pictures of maintenance stands:
http://www.aerospecialties.com/catalog/maintenance-stands_category_main.php
The B-4 & B-6 look pretty doable…
I built mine (several times), but never had any dimensions… I just used the pictures in Shep Paine’s Black WIdow diorama and a figure for a “yardstick” to measure it out… I used Plastruct stryrene-coated wire for it (plastic rod is too flimsy), the return rollers from an M-48 for the castors and mounted them with sheet plastic and the nuts shaved off a Sherman drive-wheel. I used the top half of a 100-rd magazine from a quad-fifty (same as Shep’s) for the chain-hoist housing…
Hard to find that dio pic…Ill need it next year so ill find it somewhere Thanks…
Ain’t hard at all…
Hans is this the diecast step van you were talking about?
http://www.scaleuniversity.com/images/PICS/diecast/fedexstep.jpg
It definitely looks like a Flightline crew vehicle just needs a repaint. Though it has been 17 years since I was on a airforce base so I don’t know what color they are using now last I remembered it was Dark Blue with yellow stenciling on the driver compartment doors.
Yeah, that’s the one, Mike… Don’t know exactly what’s available in O-Scale anymore, but it doesn’t really matter what civilian paint’s on it… Been a long time since I lived on an AFB too (1968 or so, IIRC-I’m an Air Force Brat), but the dark blue & yellow is what I recall as well…I remember them picking Dad up when we were stationed at Bergstrom…
Those bread vans are so 60’s-70’s. The AF converted to GSA vehicles so you see Suburbans, 6-pac pickups, and van based (like a small motorhome but with a regular van front) cube vans on the flightline, and they are in many different basic colors, not the old AF blue color.
Well, Thunder was wanting some stuff in that era, and Mike said he was interested in them, so that’s why they came up… JMHO, but if I were a jet guy, 50’s & 60’s is THE ultimate era for jet dioramas… The USAF had so many different types in service that it was definately the “Golden Age”… Or should I say, “The Silver Age”?