Hi there folks

My gas has run out on my heater in the shed so no new work on the current builds as it is b***** freezing here in Scotland.

Thought I would post this build I did early last year that was quite a fun wee build and paint job.

I had the Monogram Chevy Blazer in my stash for a long time but did not want to build as the Sheriff's 4x4 or in civvy colours.

I came accross a site
http://www.therangerstation.com/tech_library/camouflage.htm
and saw the chevy in the new SUV patterns which was the perfect subject for me.

I looked on the net for other pics of real Chevies in the US army




The kit was built very much OOB but with all crome on parts removed with Mr Muscle, then washed in soapy liquid before painting. Parts were primed with a basic halfords gray.

I sprayed the truck using tamiya rattle cans starting with the olive drab

I masked off the areas for the tan using bluetack and newspaper pressed down onto the bluetack following the camo plans

The matt black was supposed to be the last colour, but even taking care on directions of spraying and pealing off masks while paint still tacky I found areas that neaded touched up or red-done. I was left with minor areas of overlap, but I put that down to the impatience of the spray shop having to do so many trucks

The leather seats and door panels were painted to match the photo and all internal surfaces were painted olive drab overal

The engine bay was wired and a second battery installed to allow for the 24v system



A NATO standard towing pintle was added and indicators coloured with transparent coloured paints


Paperwork with a notepad and pen was added to the driver's seat and road cones and a sign were placed in the load area


The light bar was painted up and wired. Possibly for use in convoy duties or Engineer's runabout



Still got to add tie down shackles front and rear to make up.

Also to find suitable references for an Engineers unit for markings and registrations. Any US guys have any suggestions of markings for units in Europe?

Hope you like

Nige

Plans were scaled up to 1/24 then patterns cut to suit and overlaid on top of bluetack




There are a lot of other camo patterns from this site

Nige

Nige! Ola!

Nice topic....civvie to Military.

Couple of comments: All of the seats in the CUCV's that I had in my units or drove (Range Control), were IIRC, black or dark brown vinyl or, more commonly...canvas covered. The tires look like a "mud grabber" type...rather aggressive...those I remember were normal radial "truck" tires. The traffic cones look quite large (short and fat versus taller and skinny), and the rear window seems to stick out some. I could be very wrong on this, but the "convoy" type light bars had much smaller lights....and no siren.

Regarding units (States or Germany) that had the CUCV's, they were mostly assigned to Maintenance, Supply, or REMF units.....pick a Division and Battalion....can't recall the vehicle number for Maint, but Supply it was usually S-4/G-4 or HHB/HHC/HHQ-4 (for the S-4).

Hope this helps some.

Mike

Hi there

Where would markings have been placed and in what colour or size. Any ideas as to what would be on the markings?

Nige

Nige,
Brings back memmories! My first vehicle that was assigned to me when I first came into the Army was a CUCV Blazer back in Germany.
As for bumper numbers go, they where located in the same place as there are today, division/brigade onthe front passenger side and rear divers side and the company on the front divers and rear passengers side.

Here was the way my unit had it:
21 TAACOM 563 - 290

563 was our company and 290 was our vehicle number

Hi Pete and Mike

You wouldn't happen to have any pics of that type of vehicle from your days with them?
And what colours would they use?
What do the letters stand for in both cases?

Thank guys this is great help

Nige

Sorry, but i didn't take to many pictures back when I was in Germany.

TAACOM was Theater Area Command

The numbers/letters where black and they where placed on desert tan strips on both sides of the bumpers.

Nige,

Dang....been a LONG time. IIRC, all the markings in memory (with the non-sand color camo schemes such as your's) were done with a sand colored background. The lettering was done, more often than not on the smaller wheeled vehicles, in two-inch stencils in black. Generally, there was about 1/2-inch of sand showing above and below the stenciling...left and right of the stencils varied.....some units, regardless of "length" of the stenciling left about a 1/2 inch to 1 inch of sand showing....a lot of units, merely for looks, taped off an area for the sand that would allow BOTH sides of the bumper markings to fit in an equal sized sand background. Make sense?? In essence, if the Division/Battalion markings were 12" across, the sand area would be roughly 13".....the area of sand for the vehicle's number would also be 13"....with the HQ 4 or whatnot centered (left to right) in the sand background. IIRC, the vechicle number (HQ 4) was on the DRIVER'S side with the Division/Battalion markings on the "passenger" side (I may well be bass-akwards on this).

Our HMMWV's, M577's, M113's, Jeep's, CUCV's, et cetera had the numbers/letters in 2" black stenciling...our 2-1/2 and 5-tons were in 4" stencils (the bumpers were much "taller").

For the CUCV's, they were placed center-mass, top to bottom, and about 3 to 4 inches from the end's of the bumpers.

Anyhow....Sand background, Black lettering. Oh, additional kicker here....when we had to redo bumper numbers, if the paint was available THROUGH the unit, it was usually FLAT. If not, and we went to the PX to buy it, it was usually gloss SAND (or ALMOND [did that many a time]) and FLAT black....

HTH.

Mike

Heheheh, I think we were all typing/thinking at the same time!

Nige, one of my units was HHB, 3/41 FA, 24ID.....(hey hey Pete!!) And sorry, no pics of the CUCV....REMF car!! (Joking of course, but have none)

Anyhow....Division/Battalion side..... 24I 3 41FA other side would have been HQ 4 (for the S-4's vehicle). 24I = 24th Infantry Division 3 41FA = 3rd Battalion, 41st Field Artillery HQ 4 = Headquarters 4 (HHB = Headquarters and Headquarters Battery whereas HQ was for the Battalion pukes)

Lower level to higher level: SQD (Squad) - PLT (Platoon) - BTRY (Battery) or CO (Company) - BN (Battalion) - BDE (Brigade) - DIV (Division) - CORPS (CORPS?) - ARMY This is "ficticious, but...could be 1st SQD, 3rd PLT, A (Alpha) CO, 75th FA BN, 41st FA BDE, 3rd INF (Infantry) DIV, V (Fifth) CORPS, 7th ARMY...................

Mike

Hi Mike and Pete

That kinda makes a bit of sence, even though I would have maybe been better doing this in a sand colour.

Do you know if many of these went out during the Iraqi conflicts?

Thanks for your help, Greatly appreciated.

Nige

I take it that REMF stands for rear echelon mother flying of course?



I will get some paper and take notes tomorrow to work on it when I get a chance. On this tri colour scheme would it be common for the markings to be black letters on white panels?

Thanks

Nige

Our FA Battalion (During the First Gulf War) had both the CUCV Blazers and Pick-Ups.....they were, IIRC all in either Maintenance, Supply, or Commo. None that I recall in the "line" units...the "fighters." Either "numbered" as HQ (Headquarters [Commo or BN Maint [BMO] or S-4]) or SVC (Service Battery).

Mike

You are QUITE correct about REMF.....

Black lettering on sand......it was a RARITY that white was used.....and that was only because some Private didn't have the wherewithall to ASK a Corporal where to get the PROPER paint from! Or, some silly LT was asked if he'd be so kind as to go to the PX and get the paint for us and came back with "white" sand.

Mike

Much appreciated. In UK we call the regular soldiers ARAB's casting doubt on their parentage!!

As a former TA part timer we are called STAB - Stupid TA parentage unknowns!!!!

or members of the SAS - Saturdays and Sundays

Nige

Second what Mike said on the first Gulf War (Operation Desert Shield/Storm). My unit back then was a Theater Maintenence unit. I know some of the FSB (Forward Support Battalions) had the blazers too. Like mine, it was the shop officers vehicle, the blazer was used for the commander and 1st Sergeant.

Vefore we changed to 21st TAACOM, our mother unit was the 59th Ordenance Brigade. On the vehicle it would look like this: 59 ORD BD 563 - 290

That is useful

If I come across one of these again I think I will do it in sand colour just for the contrast. I take it that seeing these side by side before sand coloured one heads out to Iraq would be quite feasible too as paint shop job just prior to embarcation?

Great guys!



Nige

Nice build, Nige. The camo pattern looks good, and there are a lot of nice little details that you've added. Based on the pics, this is Monogram's "Sherrif's Blazer", which is a representation of a '76 Chevy.

I did a similar conversion a while back, around 1991 or so. Just a couple of points: GM changed the front sheetmetal design of their light truck line in 1981. Since most GM CUCVs were built in the mid 80's ('84 to '86) the front fenders, hood and grille on these models was different than what is on your build. I see that you added some square headlights to the kit piece to make it look like the correct grille, but the fenders, hood and grille center are incorrect. When I did this conversion, I started with an AMT '75 Blazer, and swapped everything in front of the firewall from AMT's '84 GMC pickup kit. I also stole both bumpers from the GMC, as they are slightly different than the older items. In all, it gave me the right look, but it was a chore to get everything lined up. Even worse was modifying the GMC grille, adding the NATO slave receptacle and blackout light, and scratchbuilding the distinctive CUCV grille guard. There are plenty of reference photos out there if you wanted to build your own, since AFAIK, all CUCVs were so equipped. I think I tried soldering brass strip to create the grille guard (!!), but in the end I just went with good old styrene sheet, spare parts and liquid cement.

The correct mirrors came from the '84 GMC kit, and I think I took some wheels and tires from the parts box. The engine compartment was pretty hacked up from the front fender surgery, so I think I just glued the hood shut and pretended there was a 6.2L Detroit diesel under there. Which was a blessing, really, because I didn't want to scratchbuild a dual alternator setup and wire in two batteries...

BTW, you can find both kits again - if you were dying to do the conversion and spend a good deal of time scratchbuilding - with both the Blazer and the GMC pickup being repopped as part of AMT's "Hot Trucks" line. Wouldn't it be great to see one of these done from one of the major manufacturers in 1:35?

Again, I do like your build, so I hope this info helps.

-YL

Hi Yoni

Thanks for that. Do you have any pics of your Chevy build to see the differences you talk about there. What colours did you do yours in? I liked the three colour, but now knowing they were in Iraq I would fancy doing it again in the sand.

That sounds like a lot of chopping you did. What did you do with the parts from the other kits. Were these new kits chopped or old ones recycled?

Thanks for the tips. Maybe Monogram could do a militerised version in 1/24. That would be good to include up to date radio, shackles and the like. I still have to source the shackles for mine.

Nige

Hi Nige.

My CUCV Blazer conversion met with a rather mysterious end. At the time of the build, I was freelancing for a model magazine, and the Blazer was going to be the subject of a brief, how-to feature. I had written the article, but didn't have a camera, so I packed up the model and mailed it off to a photographer (who also freelanced for the same magazine) for a nice set of Kodachromes. Weeks went by; no news, no pics, and more importantly, no model. A call to the photographer netted me a "this number has been disconnected and is no longer in service" recorded message. Long story short, the photographer disappeared into the mists of time, and took my CUCV with him. Really. The last time I saw the converted CUCV was the day I packed it into a box and sent it off into oblivion, courtesy of the USPS and one flaky shutterbug. Needless to say, I don't have any pictures.

Anyway, while I still had the Blazer, I painted it in the NATO 3-color camo, similar to yours.

I had both the AMT kits (Blazer and GMC pickup) in my model stash, so I just used them to build the conversion. I put most of the leftover parts in the parts box, although IIRC, the GMC bed and frame went to a buddy of mine for a project he was working on. Since discovering your build, I've had an itch to do the conversion again, especially since I already have an AMT '75 Blazer in the works, and it has already been converted to the post-'76 half-cab (versus the pre-'76 full removable top). Not that I need yet another uncompleted project, mind you.



You can see where the I filled in the sunroof on the AMT kit. The scribed lines for the hardtop are less distinct, but they're there. The Monogram kit that you used already has the proper hardtop, and as a bonus, it's removable!

The differences in the front sheetmetal between the '73-'80 bodystyle and the '81-'88 are subtle, but take a look at the following:



This is a '76, but it has all the major styling cues of the '73-'80 GM light trucks. The front fenders are square, the fender character line is square, the headlight bezels are square, the grille is square, the hood has a definite lip at the front edge, and things are quite boxy. (That's not a bad thing, since I have a '76 sitting in my driveway, and I quite like it.)



This is an '84. Again, it has most of the major styling cues of the '81-'88 trucks, but more importantly, the '84-'86 models are what the CUCVs were built on. Things are less boxy. The fenders are more streamlined, and they slope down towards the grille in the front. This leaves the hood with much less of a vertical lip. Also, the fender character line is pointed, lacking the "rectangle within a square" look of the earlier models. The placement of the front turn signal is different, too. You can also see the changes in the grille (which is still square, for the most part).

Here's a comparison view of both types from the front, to give you a better idea...





That's a lot of info, but again, I hope it helps.

-YL