Current status on this build - still need to finish up interior cab details:

VERY nice! Mine is a hard cab AFKWX and I've been trying to figure out how best to scratchbuild one in 35th. The museum's is in running condition, but needs windshields (on the way) and a new brush guard. Oh, and a brake job, since she doesn't want to stop at all!

The AFKWX was TO&E equipment for WWII AAA Searchlight battalions and when it goes back into the museum building next month, it will be pulling an M18 trailer with a 60" Sperry searchlight in the bed. The plan now is to put it in the markings of the 227th AAA Searchlight Battalion as it would have appeared in the Pacific.

I'm currently laying out the plan for us to move back into our buildings (just had a 6 month renovation that added HVAC) and I've got a 1:35 CCKW as a place holder for it for planning purposes!

v/r

Jon

Here is what that front end is supposed to look like.



Jon I would love to see a few snaps of your hard top version. Mike

Jon

As you said - a totally standard chassis and engine but the difference is the COE (Cab Over Engine) control set up. The COE design nets another 21 square feet of load space on this vehicle - the weight carrying capacity remains the same (2.5 ton) but the cubic volume of material that can be carried is increased.

This design was to become VERY popular in civilian life!

OK - I cut two Tamiya load boxes and glued them together. Tell me, Where's the seam in that load box floor?????

Here is the current status of my AFKWX. This is as far as I got. I can't help but feel that my freelanced cab design is just too ugly and stupidly "duck faced" to continue with. As I said at the beginning of this piece I am waiting for someone to do a correct conversion cab in resin. THAT, I will buy!

There's the seam!



I cut the two load floors and took my time sguaring up the end cuts so you could not see any daylight showing through the new seam. I then applied glue to both sides and gave the glue time to soften the plastic.

Finally on a piece of glass I pushed the two pieces together and physically held them together under pressure for a time. The chemically softened plastic, under the pressure, actually becomes one piece. After hardening overnight, I was able to lightly begin to sand the load floor to smooth the joint without loosing the floor's surface detail. Finally I took a hobby knife and added wood grain to the floor to further hide the seam.

Ba-Zinga!

The front fenders came from a junked Tamiya, Chevy Long Range Desert Truck. (Hey, it's still a GM product with the correct fender profile) The very top portion of the hood is also from the Desert Truck. The rest is cobbled together scrap plastic knitted to a more or less standard Tamiya open top cab.


Did you know - The open top cab was actually designed by Studebaker for their Deuce being exported to Russia. This was done at the request of the US Army however due to the Russian's bitter cold winters they wanted nothing to do with the open top cabs.

However, the US Army then insisted that GM incorporate the Studebaker design (bolt for bolt) into their CCKW's to reduce shipping volume and make for a more flexible use truck.

Hi, Mike! It's "Who's on First..." But in all seriousness, you must be the "US SOFTSKINS KING"... I love the CCKW-series, but I don't think I'll spend as much time building, kit-bashing, and scratch-building every different variant as you do- This is meant as a COMPLIMENT to you. I just have so many other projects that I want to get done. You should get a book published: " Modelling US Army Softskins of World War II" by Mike Koenig... With your knowledge and expertise, it would make a very handy "BEST-SELLER!!!

On a side note, a derivative (I think...) of the AFKWX had been ordered by the French Army in 1940 but only 116 had been delivered before the Armistice. It was the AFWX 354 which was used to carry a Sperry 60" searchlight. Here's one in US service :


...and a Beute one :



and some information about these trucks in French service :




H.P.

Frenchy,

The AFKWX-353 and 354s were standard equipment in the AAA Searchlight battalions. The 354 was the "king cab" while the 353 only had the forward bench seat. I'm about to go take pics of ours and will post shortly!

Jon

I am nearly as crazy about the Opel Blitz line of trucks, with almost as many variants built there. AND I have now started a firetruck variant of the Scud missile carrier and another of the MAZ-357 8x8! I have way too many projects "in process".

Dennis

I have been a kit-basher since I was 12, always looking for new ways to mesh multiple models together.

Here's my AFKWX. New windshield frames are on the way for it too!

Hi, Mike! I HEAR THAT- I haven't built ANYTHING "straight out of the box" since I was 10, when I was in fifth grade! My first kit-bash/scratch-build effort was supposed to be an M3 Light Tank that I cobbled up out of the old classic 1/40 REVELL M4 Artillery Tractor/155mm "Long Tom" Combo kit. Needless to say, it was nowhere near accurate, because I only had the old DC Comics "GI COMBAT" comic books to use for "reference"- IS THAT A HOOT, OR WHAT?!?

No sheet plastic back then, so I had to use "built-up" Index Cards to make the upper Hull Superstructure and the "early-style" welded "segmented" Turret. I made the Main Gun and the .30cal MG barrels out of different sizes of plastic runners. That ALLIS-CHALMERS Suspension was hardly close to the M3-series VVSS, but for a crazy 10-year-old, it was good enough... It looked awful, but what the hey, I had fun with it...

I brush-painted the whole mess in my own mix of the old TESTORS Gloss Enamel Paints- you must remember those old icky-gicky paints that almost never dried properly..? I can still remember when PACTRA came out with the first "PACTRA FLATS"- it was a new revolution at the time. Shortly thereafter, I bought my first-ever airbrush, and that opened a whole new world for me...

Thanks for the pics Jon !

H.P.

U-Models has released a resin 1/35th scale AFKX 4x4 truck fitted with a LeRoy compressor. Could be another option to get the AFKWX cab ( maybe cheaper than Masters Production)... :



Blast Models sells U-Models stuff, but this kit is currently out of stock...

H.P.

Well I COULD use the cab and then put the compressor on a regular CCKW.

Still more $$$ than I wanted to spend!

Yes, I'm cheap - another reason I'm a kit basher!

Man, it figures when it rains, it pours. A friend of mine (also a forum member)called me up yesterday afternoon and let me know that there are two AFKX 1 1/2 ton hard cabs for sale near him. No beds, but they look otherwise complete.

*sigh...

Friggin furlough...

Oh well. Back to modeling.

Had an almost complete COE dump truck (civilian) here in central Kentucky but it sold. Did not realise you were looking for more!

We have spoken in this thread about "Super Single" tires being used on some CCKW's. Clearly these are NOT DUKW tires (I don't think) which would be a much larger diameter.

Does anyone have any idea what diameter the Super Single tires used on CCKW's might be?

I wanted to use the already too small super singles off the Italeri DUKW but others are cautioning me not to.

Any thoughts????

11.00 X 18 tires... Just like the DUKW. But Kurt should know better Here you can see the two wheels options side by side :


H.P.

Anyone wanting a CCKW 352 model should first look at the manual on the web - it's there at archive.org.
For a conversion, one might consider the "GMC CCKW 352 & Wrecker Set 7" resin kit 35096 by Real Model of Czech Republic Realmodel (realmodel.cz). It is rather comprehensive for €39.95.
Excellent value, I thought - until I started building the fuel tank. It is depicted on p.409 of the manual. As can be seen there, the sheet metal "wrapper" around the tank proper has round stepping (?) holes on its load tray-facing side. In the kit, these are on the front side, right next to the fillers.
The outside clamps for the wheels are castoffs from Italeri's water tanker and show the same rectangular cross-section where they should be rounded. And the inside clamps have the same wrong shape, with their protrusions facing away from the wheels. To add insult to injury, the u-channel to which the wheels are bolted is affixed to the inner clamps' rear, not the front.
In a nutshell, it seems that the master for the tank had its fillers mounted to the wrong side, so you might relocate these, but you'd still have four incorrect clamps requiring a difficult correction.
The rest of the conversion kit looks ok, pending its build.
PzAufkl

It reminds me of the 1941 GMC K-18 (a.k.a. CF-351) radio truck front end :





H.P.