¹⁄35

Werkstattkraftwagen!

Building the Rear Structure

The rear structure of this truck is from a magazine by Verlinden Showcase. The truck that was used in it, was an Opel Blitz. To not copy it completely, I gave it my personal touch, because this is my first scratchbuild and because I don’t have all the means and tools here yet.

The measurements in the aforementioned book are not entirely precise, which is mentioned, they are rough measurements. So I looked up a nice figure, standing up straight and took the measurements of that. I have to mention that the rear structure is simply mounted to part # 81A, which is the large bottom plate for the standard loading bed. This has a nice texture and is perfect for it. The large mudguards are placed later.

So I started modifying the rear bed and cutting out the window parts and assembling the roof. The measurements for the window parts can be roughly used from the example as is the curvature of the roof construction. The measurements for the window frames and door post can be used directly too. The handgrips on the outside were all made from solder because it is easy to work with and shape with needle-nose pliers.

All handgrips and door handles are attached with superglue. The hinge points are made of lead foil and the bolts are styrene. This is a small round rod that I cut into thin slices, because I am not the rich owner of the right tools for this job. For the interior of the rear structure, the cupboards and the bench, I drew from the Verlinden book. Since these are all mentioned with measurements in millimeters, marking and building this furniture is a breeze.

Now that the bare interior, the rear bed and the roof are done, it is time to start the railing on top of the roof. I wanted this railing as fine as possible so I went to a model shop for ships. But I could not succeed there at that time, because they simply didn’t have what I was looking for. The same applies for a model train store. Either they were short on railings or the ones they had were too high and I really didn’t want them higher than 7mm , so in the end you come to the conclusion that you have to make it yourself. So acquire some extra styrene. Round 1mm stock was the thinnest at that time. Oh well, it will have to do.

Back home I went straight to work and the end result was not all that disappointing. It was a tedious job though. Especially because I wanted the railing to follow the curvature of the roof. Attaching it gave some problems too, as it turned out that some of the struts were a little long, especially on the curved parts. The rest of the texture, I took directly from the book, as I kind of liked it. When this was all done I sprayed the rear structure in panzer grey too.

Copyright ©2002 - Text and Model Photos by Eric Sikkema. Line Drawings Copyright Verlinden Productions (used with permission). All Rights Reserved.