Project F150

[landon]

Last winter I picked up a little super 6 F150 for $30, thinking I would use it for parts. Well, my brother-in-law had twin grandkids since then, so I decided to pimp it out a bit for his new grandson... the girl will get her own, too! I'm not a total sexist, lol...

Here's what I started with:


I tore it down the day I brought it home, sold the bumper to MS1120, and it sat in pieces in the basement for months.


I had a good idea of what I wanted this to look like when finished, so I got to work. I was going for an anodized metal look under a deep red paint, with some badass wheels. Simple, but cool.

Primed:



Anodized base coat:


It's hard to tell in the pics, but this stuff sparkles like glitter... oh, and it's IMPOSSIBLE to work with. I will never, ever do another vehicle with this stuff... It took me 3 tries to get a decent finish, and I'm still not 100% happy with it. This paint might be good for very small jobs, but for a whole body, fuggetaboutit.

Color topcoat:


Almost completed assembly:




I've painted the steering wheel black since these pics, added acrylic mirrors to the side, and cleaned up the seat so it's mostly blemish-free. The wheels are from an earlier model Bigfoot truck, and took a little modding to get installed. Overall, I'm happy with the look. Next up is wiring. I'll run 12V, and keep it fairly simple. But, I'm planning a 3-stage throttle pedal to hopefully keep the GBs alive a bit longer. I'll post more once I get something built.
What do you think?

[bruces_eviltwin]

that thing looks awesome!

[SigEp]

WOW, that thing looks amazing! Keep it away from curbs though... ;)

[landon]

Thanks for the compliments!

Keep it away from curbs though... ;)

yeah! no doubt about the curbs...
and trees
and lawn furniture
and the house
and the garage
and parked cars
and dogs
and pretty much everything else that the kid is inevitably going to hit!
w/e... as soon as I pass it off to my bro-in-law, it's his problem! :lol:

[gwinnythepooh]

It looks great! Love the new tires!

[landon]

This one's pretty much done. I'm still waiting on my voltmeter for the dashboard, but this is painted, wired, and buttoned.

List of mods:
Custom anodized paint
BigFoot tires
12V 7ah batteries (2x) hidden in the seat-back
2-speed throttle pedal (single speed in reverse)
key switch
charge port
hidden on/off switch
dashboard voltmeter (to be added soon)

Had it out in the sunlight last weekend and took some pics before my daughter test-drove it.




During the test drive, I was hearing a little GB clicking during some of her harder starts. I was able to reproduce the sound on one of the boxes by turning the tire hard back and forth... gonna replace it before giving it to my brother-in-law. Hopefully it was worn a bit when I installed it, otherwise I'm going to have to either; invest in a lot of #3 GBs, upgrade to #7s, or bite the bullet and upgrade to an ESC. :roll:

EDIT (9/13/12):
Added side pipes last night!



Nice protective coating of dust, right?? :evil: my sister thought it would be a good idea to power sand her wooden toy chest project in the basement next to my work area... :roll: a good blast from the compressor should clear most of it off, hopefully!
oh, and I'm STILL waiting on my gd voltmeters from Hong Kong!! ugh, this ride is supposed to be ready by the end of the month...

EDIT (9/20/2012):
I finally added the voltmeter to the dashboard last night... and fried the supply line in the process. I didn't realize the key was in the on position while I was soldering the leads, and they touched. For a while. Smoked about 10" of thin wire. :o Checked the rest of the wiring and it seems ok, changed that length out and finished the install... :roll:
Oh, and in cutting the hole for the voltmeter, I realized how easy it is to chip this paint off the body... even though I sanded and did a Fusion basecoat...wtf? Anyway, there are now some nice chips around the voltmeter

[SAHDman]

What volt are you running that at? Curious about the double 12v in the back

[landon]

It's running at 12V, I doubled the batteries for the benefit of run time. I got a good deal on some 7ah batteries, so I wanted to use those, rather than buy a single, higher capacity battery for it. And putting them in the seat meant I didn't have to cut the body anywhere for this build.

[iDz Bowl]

I had the same gear clicking problem with my son's F-150. Figured out the problem after replacing the gear. There are two pins in the gear box holding the gears in place. One of them was really worn and eventually snapped. I had a spare gearbox that I used and just swapped out the gears, because they were fine. This time I opened up both gearboxs and put a bunch of synthetic grease in them, especially near those pins. It's been running fine (and hard) for 3 months now with no noises! You might just need the box minus the gears, I don't know if that would be any cheaper. It would also probably be more efficient to make some aluminum pins to replace those plastic ones, but that's not my area of expertise.

Here's a link to my old project. viewtopic.php?t=4600

[landon]

ya know, I seem to recall seeing a thread about this GB slip issue somewhere on here. Forgot about that...

Found it: http://www.modifiedpowerwheels.com/foru ... C_ID=19037

Looks like I have a fix to try tonight!

SAHDman: I'm still interested in your #3s, even if this fix works.

[iDz Bowl]

I'm in North East ohio also, south west of Cleveland, we should have the little ones show off their rides sometime together! Also, I work in a plant and I just found a bunch of pins, I'll have to see if they measure up to be the right size from that thread, if they do, you're more than welcome to grab a couple off of me (if we're close enough).

Jeremiah

[iDz Bowl]

I just found a bunch of shoulder bolts, nuts, and lock washers (unless you've got thread locker or lock nuts). Let me know if you need any. I'm gonna try this on the shot gearbox tonight.

[landon]

nice! Parma, wasn't it? I think I read that in one of your old posts... not creeping, really!
If Taz's measurements are correct (and why wouldn't they be?), the pins should be .25" x 1.5"
I'm wondering though, if there's some way to brace the GB from the outside to stop it from spreading, rather than trying to drill out a gear for the pin or shoulder bolt fix? meh, that's just me being lazy...
I've been seeing more and more users on here from the north coast, lately. Wonder if it's time we started ourselves a little club?
If you're cool with me grabbing some, I would definitely be interested in enough hardware to 'fix' two GBs!

[iDz Bowl]

I don't think that way would work, because eventually the pin would snap, like mine, and start making the gear float. I don't think it would be too tough to do the shoulder bolt fix, except for the fact that we have to take the steering wheel and the rear wheels off everytime we work on the gears, or at least I do, haha!

I started a group, for North East Ohioans and people close by, it's in my signature, check it out.

[hkayssi]

WOW! That thing looks great man, good work :D 8-)

[taz11]

For some reason, this just called out to me. Great job and not Overkill (not that there is anything wrong with overkill :lol: )


Moderator pick ;)

[landon]

For some reason, this just called out to me. Great job and not Overkill (not that there is anything wrong with overkill :lol: )


Moderator pick ;)

Wow, sweet! Thanks, Taz!! :D
Other than the paint being a p.i.t.a., this build was a lot of fun. I might detail how I made the multi-speed throttle pedal in a different thread. That's a pretty cool mod, imho...
Can't wait to get the voltmeter in the dash and call this one done!

[madmaxdecals]

What color red was used on this one?? Also, what anodized paint did you use? Sorry...I'm loving this color for a Lightning Mcqueen project...thank you....it is definitely the coolest F150 I think I've seen

[landon]

What color red was used on this one?? Also, what anodized paint did you use? Sorry...I'm loving this color for a Lightning Mcqueen project...thank you....it is definitely the coolest F150 I think I've seen

:D TY!
It's the MetalCast line from Duplicolor (I got it at AutoZone). It might look cool.... but seriously, it sucks. It's nearly impossible to get good uniform coverage from the glittery base-coat stuff, and the red is a translucent red that lays overtop that. I literally had to do the whole thing twice (minus the primer)... I don't even want to tell you what I spent in paint! :oops:
If you end up using it, I recommend practicing (several times) on a big something you don't care about. and beer. lots of beer... :lol:

[SAHDman]

Where did you get the headlight decals?

[landon]

Where did you get the headlight decals?

Bought a decal sheet for the Handy Manny F150 from HobbyMasters for $5, I think. Worth every penny!

[daveweber34]

If you end up using it, I recommend practicing (several times) on a big something you don't care about. and beer. lots of beer... :lol:

Yeah, that isthe way to fix the paint. After all, as any guy knows from going to bars, beer makes everything look better. :P