Dodge Crazy Van

I'm building one of my grails.  This one.

I've been working on it for a while but it's slow going for a number of reasons.
I've actually got 2 of these.  I'm building the cheaper on first which is complete but has a few parts from other kits replacing what should be there.  Both the interior tub and body are "wrong" for example but fit fine as they just kept modifying the moulds each year as the 1:1 got changed or they added or removed stuff from the kit.  The tub for example has no engraved texture on the sides and back but does have depressions below where the windows would be on one of the windowed versions.
The body is just a different year with slightly different badges but i'll be shaving them off anyway.  The most noticeable difference for the one that should be there is that the side doors are next to the rear wheel rather than the passenger door.  This has caused issues with the enlarged rear wheel openings as you'll see in the pic below.
Bigger problems were caused by the fact that the body was stripped in brake fluid before I got it.  I don;t know how long it was left in it but the plastic is very brittle and I keep breaking off the drip rails as I handle it.  This means I keep having to stop cleaning it up (whoever painted it in the past did so with all the mould separation lines intact) to repair them with thin styrene sheet.
The chrome in this one is very thin in places.  I've stripped some and will weather the rest to hid the fact.
The engines (i'm building the twin engined drag version) are very poor due to worn moulds and lack of detail.  There are no places to attach dizzies or mags onto the blower manifolds for example.
The scoops are just horrible and almost unusable.
And to cap it all the rear suspension design wouldn't actually work. The axle is sprung but it is linked directly to rigidly mounted engines.  I've modified it to rigidly mount the whole thing.
I'll detail more of the modifications i've made as I take more pics as I go.
But here's where she is ATM.

I've still got to get one if these yet.
Keen to watch this progress.

 ........ 

 That's gonna be cool!

Diggin' it so far. That stance is awesome.

Cool! Will we see a crazy painjob or tongue-in-cheek theme with this?

I'll probably try to use the decals and go for the black roof with white body as shown on the bpx art.
But then again...

OK, here's the engines.  This is the good side of the chrome.

Magnetos are scratch built.  Can't decide whether to use injection or a single huge 4bbl carbie on each blower.

Rear suspension modified to rigid mounted axle.  The wheely bars are missing from this one but i've got some resin TPB ones i'll use.  Having cut the body to clear the huge new AMT parts pack slicks i'm going to have to build some mini tubs to tidy up all that visible mess.


Front of the chassis.  I cut it off just in front of the crossmember and then used rectangular styrene rod to build a flat replacement.  Springs are from my parts box and will carry a straight axle with radius rods.

Very cool keen to see how this turns out

So where are you at with this build?

Aha!  I was just thinking today I should update you band of reprobates.

I've done more work on the engines, mini tubbed it, started to fill in the detail on the front suspension and attacked the body with sanding sticks.

Latest pic.

I've zeded the chassis to drop the front end as it was too high as it was.
You can see the big gouge in the side of the body where a big chunk of plastic peeled off while I was shaving the trim.  I blame that on the previous builder soaking it in brake fluid for far too long.
Engines are finished but the picture I took on my phone is crap.

Nice to see some progress.

Crazy  

Paul wrote:Crazy  

And the van is too.

Ho ho.

(shakes fist)

I'll get you Burns...

Good work Zen man!!