International Lonestar Wrecker

Here is another one. This is what I'm currently working on, a Lonestar Tri axle Wrecker. I know a lot of people do not like these trucks, but I do, and more importantly, my missus loves them. So, as long as I'm building a Lonestar at the moment, she is encouraging me to get in and build them. She dictates the paint scheme as well as the colours. The green Lonestar had her input with the paint job and that worked out well lol. With this one, I've started with an ex donor kit, which was missing chassis, suspension, axles, brakes, engine, exhaust and possibly more pieces that I haven't discovered yet. I'm also using an old Can Do wrecker body, that was a mega glue bomb, and the remains of it's chassis that was snapped into a few pieces by a disgruntled ex. Not mine, that's how I bought it.



I then scratch built a new chassis and cross members, then cut the Can Do suspension from the old chassis, and then mounted them in place. The first pic shows the old Can Do chassis, a scratch built stock Lonestar chassis rails and the long scratch built chassis rails for this build.

Next thing to scratch build was the front axle and steering.







Front brakes were done when I made the front axle. Made rear brakes and other chassis brackets, so I could put it all into mock up stage, and double check my axle positions.

Next on my list was the engine/gearbox. I was going to scratch build a Max Force to look like the one from the kit, but when I was researching it, I found that this truck was also offered with a Cummins ISX 15, so that's what I decided to scratch build. I started with an old RoG Cummins from the parts bin. I cut the gearbox/ bellhousing of the engine block, then separated the block in half. I swapped the block side around from left to right and visa versa, then started reskinning it with block moulding detail.






Its rough, but I don't show my models in any comp, and I'm not a rivet counter, and certainly not out to impress those that love picking faults. I may however knock up a decent one and cast it, as I now have 6 of these ex donor Lonestars with no engines. Time to build the Valve cover. I just broke it down to layers, put detail into each layer, then stuck it all together. I hand cut the Cummins letter from 10 thou card, and got it good enough the third time around.




Carving and shaping an inlet manifold.


Sump, and all the other bits and bobs. All scratch built.

Some great work going on here, well done.

Ya some great work going on this one

Thanks guys.

Looking good mate, I did one of these but went with the day cab and made all the necessary Harley Davidson (special edition) components.

Hi mate. I have seen pics of your build before, and I love it. I do know that there is a resin day cab available from the States or did you make this one yourself. I wouldn't mind having a crack at making a day cab myself once day, but for now I'm more interested in modifying this old Can Do body so that it doesn't look like that I've mated two kits together. Definitely would have been easier to scratch build a whole new body. Might just happen yet.

Mate this is amazing work. The engine looks great.

ProBee wrote:Hi mate. I have seen pics of your build before, and I love it. I do know that there is a resin day cab available from the States or did you make this one yourself. I wouldn't mind having a crack at making a day cab myself once day,  but for now I'm more interested in modifying this old Can Do body so that it doesn't look like that I've mated two kits together.  Definitely would have been easier to scratch build a whole new body.  Might just happen yet.

I purchased the resin daycab and HD grill, but was far from happy with the daycab so built this one from the kit cab. The front wheel arches with recesses for headlights, front bumper, sunvisor and various others were all me (the bullet headlights are a resin item from P&P). The wheels are kit wheels modified to 5 slotters, front tyres are modified Italeri super singles (I say modified because their inner diameter is larger than that of the kit wheels). The decals and Harley Davidson photo etch were custom made for me.

Can do body has been modified, single piece brass rod for the hand rails along both sides, tail light recesses have been filled in and "LED" lights added, a grill has been added over the winches and the winch ropes are actually real wire. All kit chrome was stripped and re-done with Alclad, tool bin handles are PE items, single fuel tank modified and the other side is a tool bin, both have PE steps from Auslowe. Fronts of the tool bins have storage rails, one side has a broom and the other has a shovel, both have fire extinguishers. Exhaust has been extensively modified (stacks are the lonestar kit items, filled in to be round rather than contoured to body shape) and support brace made for them.


The lonestar is a great kit, even better if you get the Revell instructions for it rather than the Moebius ones. It's nice to see a decent late model truck represented rather than the re-hash of old school trucks (or worse, the constant flow of European trucks). Keep up the good work mate, your build is looking brilliant and the attention to detail and scratchbuilding is fantastic.

Thanks LordZycon. Rwaldram, that is some serious work you have done to that wrecker. I will be studying your pic much further now lol. I agree that it is nice to see a late model truck on offer instead of the constant re-releases. I don't mind some euro trucks, but if you noticed in the for sale section, I have quite a few for sale. I have seven of these Lonestar's, and all but one are ex donor kits that I will scratch build the missing bits and pieces. I'm very happy to buy these from the guys that only use the the bits they need for their aussie auslowe models, then are stuck with what to do with the the rest of the kit. My wife says she doesn't mind me having a cabinet full of Lonestar's. I agree with you re the Revell versus Moebius instructions. I downloaded the Revell instructions direct from the Revell web site. Big difference, not that I really need it seeing most of my Lonestar's will be scratch built. Thanks for the kind words mate.

Got a bit more done. Engine is almost finished and scratch built rear stabilizers are made.






Rear stabilizers

Cool

Brilliant work Mick.

Thanks fellas.

Nice work, should look sharp.

Looking good love the engine keep it going Cheer's

A lot of nice work going into this , great scratch building work , look forward to seeing more .

Thanks guys. I have another update on this. I have assembled most of the chassis and installed the engine and radiator. Also made a few other bits and bobs such as the tail shaft and centre bearing plus an engine fan. I have started work on the wrecker body as well. I have had to make all new panels to replace the ones that were missing from this junker, plus I made some custom LED tail lights.



Found some intercooler pipes in the parts bin, so I cut them up to make them fit.



Custom tail lights were made from 4mm Evergreen, then the panel was reskinned with 20 thou Evergreen.



All the top cover plates were made from 40 thou Evergreen. Hopefully I will get to finish this tomorrow. Needs trimming, putty and sanding. Getting there slowly.

Great job on it

Update. All the paint is on, plus the foil work and pin striping. Paint is ColorFX purple pearl. I have scratch built much more stuff for this truck such as rear out riggers and bits and bobs. should be in clear coat tomorrow.

Sorry about the lack of progress shots for this, but have had mega issues with Photobucket, and when I got it sorted, I had forgotten that I had posted this truck on this site. So now I'm going to jump a little and show the completed truck. Recap scratch built items are chassis and cross members, Cummins ISX15, front suspension, front axle and steering, radiator shroud, all hoses and pipe work and exhaust system etc etc, and lots of stuff on the wrecker body as you can see. I got 6 more of these unwanted, unloved ex donor Lonestars, and I look forward to building something out of all of them. Hope you like it.

Got Photobucket working again. More pics.

Great job on the wrecker, Cool colours on it too. Green one looks great too.