6x6 Peterbilt Semi Truck

[Tommy R]

I decided the front axle needs to move forward a bit to get better centered within the fender. So I drilled a couple new holes in the leaf springs.

However, this moved the axle too far forward. So then I moved the hanger back and up just a bit. This would bring the wheelbase back a smidge, but also give me a bit more caster. By the way, you can see how poorly my paint is adhering to the self-etching primer. I recently picked up some touch-up paint and I'll definitely be needing it when I go to reassemble.

And here's my plan to put a little space between the duallies. First, I thread in some longer 12mm screws through the hub. I also added a dab of grease on the hub to hopefully prevent the wheels from bonding to the paint that seems to want to come off far too easily sometimes!

Install the inner wheel and then add nuts to the wheel studs. In this case, the nuts are 1.5 or 2 mm in thickness.

Now with the outer wheel installed I have a reasonable amount of space between the tires. It's not excessive like a brodozer but it's just about what I was hoping for so I'm pleased.

 

[Highmark]

You're knocking this out of the park Tommy! I remember when you first started the thread, and it's cool to see you back at it. We'll have to do a 6x6 Semi run when you're done.

 

[Tommy R]

You're knocking this out of the park Tommy! I remember when you first started the thread, and it's cool to see you back at it. We'll have to do a 6x6 Semi run when you're done.

Thanks, man! Yes, we definitely need to do that! Are you on Facebook? There's a group called Texas Mini Truckers that hosts events. I'm looking forward to finally being able to attend one. :mrgreen:

 

[Tommy R]

Got a nice delivery of Lesu goodies today, but the only pic I have so far is the micro servo mount for the transmission. I drilled/tapped a bunch of holes on the chassis today for the other stuff that came in and all of it should get paint tomorrow.

Anyway, here's the servo installed. With the servo arm cut down just a bit it clears the bottom of the sleeper cab. I just had to clearance part of the crossmember for the shifter link.

 

[Tommy R]

A few progress pics after some paint work.

Lesu rear suspension and some other aluminum goodies. I also should've installed the rear center caps. D'oh!

Scale hardware for the win!

 

[Tommy R]

So we got a bit of snow on Sunday here in Austin, Texas. That's not a common occurrence for us so I figured I'd take the opportunity to take a few pics and see how it drives in some icy conditions. Well, it did great!

Then last night we got some real snow. Like....."are we even in Texas" kinda snow! Depending where you measured, we easily got 4-7 inches, which is crazy for us. Well, of course I had to test out the truck in deeper stuff today. Overall, it did really great and had plenty of traction. The limitation, as one would expect, is the low hanging front bumper and the overall low right height. Nonetheless, I was pleased!

I also got some Lesu steps for the frame, but only have one installed at the moment.

 

[durok]

Nice!

I just woke up, my power has been restored after 24hours...

I'd have gone out with one of my rigs if I had a warm apartment to come home to, unfortunately I was shivering inside cursing the electric company!

 

[W1ck3d0n3]

I feel your pain. Pg&e dose the same thing when it hot as hell and windy here in Northern Cali to "stop" the start of fires.

Sent from my SM-J700T1 using Tapatalk

 

[Tommy R]

I knew I'd want custom plates for this truck and rather than spend money on some custom ones, I decided to try my hand at making some. Being 1/14th scale, they're only about 1" long so it won't be obvious if they're not perfect. And it costs me nothing to try so why not? I went online and copied a few JPGs of license plates I'd want. I printed them and then trimmed them out. Here's a super close-up of what my mediocre printer could do:

Then I adhered them to some .015" styrene with some glue.

Then I trimmed them out with some clear tape applied over them to protect the ink.

The thin overall thickness feels pretty realistic and from a short distance I think they'll look just fine.

Another thing I've been thinking about lately is the front bumper. I haven't found an aluminum one that I like so for now I'm going to use the stocker. I cut off the two "buck teeth" from under it to help the approach angle.

I like weight in my scale RCs. They perform more realistically that way. In fact, I'm rather disappointed the Pete is only weighing in at about 9 lbs so far. So I decided to add some weight in the form of touring car weights glued into the front bumper. I Dremeled out some room inside the bumper, glued the weights in, and will paint them silver so they're less obvious. Those 80 grams really gave the bumper some heft!

 

[Tommy R]

I popped some holes in the dash today in preparation for backlighting the dash similar to how Bob at Hobby Concepts does it.

And with paint and my marker job it came out looking like wood grain. Perfect!!

Primed/painted some other bits today, too. Ignore Cletus. I think he sniffed too much spray paint today.

 

[Tommy R]

I picked up a pair of super single Michelins from RC4WD in hopes of maybe running them up front. Holy crapola, they're gigantic!

I mean....sure, technically they fit, but that wheel is way too narrow so these will be used another time. It's a bummer because they look amazing and are so much softer than the rock hard Lesus.

I also started working on painting the driver. Never painted a person before so it'll be interesting to see how this dude turns out! But how do I mount him into the seat?

Not gonna lie. This felt a bit awkward.

But I had my reasons to violate poor Cletus the way I did!

See? I told ya. This wasn't just for my own personal enjoyment!

Finally getting around to doing some detailing of the cab, too. Rolled the windows down to make it easier to see the interior.

Got the orange lenses fitted to the cab clearance lights and painted the visor.

I also painted the wipers and some window trim.

Lastly, I picked up a Gear Jammer fifth wheel slider and a Lesu fifth wheel and did some painting along the way.

 

[Phildirt]

Those super singles look like float tires you'd see on a dump truck.

I used to drive OTR and hated super singles. If you have a blowout there's a pretty good chance the wheel is contacting pavement, no tire next to it to hold up the axle until you can limp off the road. So it turns into a tow instead of a tire swap. And they are very expensive. Allegedly good for fuel economy though. I used to have a tractor and trailer with them and got ragged on by the super truckers that it was a 10 wheeler.

 

[Mike Flea]

Your rig is looking super cool Tommy, good to see you're working on it again"thumbsup""thumbsup"

 

[cutlaSS]

Awesome build! I wonder how those Super Singles would hold up if they were narrowed. Back in the day we would cut and shut/ narrow our comp tires all the time. maybe reinforce the joint with the section of tire you cut out.

 

[Tommy R]

Thanks for the kind words, y'all! I've got some wider wheels showing up today. We'll see how they fit and then I'll decide what to do with the super singles. Now on to another update!

Well, Cletus has gotten all gussied up so he can scour the truck stops for lot lizards!

I told him his toupe looks ridiculous.

Since I got rid of the raised transmission I decided to get a new floor section that wasn't cut up. I also painted and detailed the seats a bit.

Uh oh, the Lesu trans is also too tall.

A 2mm body lift under the cab and sleeper did the trick.

Barely noticeable.

Here you can also see the plates I put on the bumper and I also added some lenses to the Lesu headlights because they weren't included!

Speaking of the Lesu headlights, it's not going to be easy to wire these up cleanly!

Since I'm planning my trailer build, I also picked up some aluminum axles and some cheap wheels. For now I'll use the extra Lesu AT tires I had laying around, though I'm hoping to get some lower profile tires to fit underneath my trailer. Anyone wanna trade?

It's getting so close! Cletus had to jump in and make vroom vroom noises. By the way, it's not easy getting the body on with him in there! LOL

 

[Mike Flea]

Depending on the thickness of your headlight wires, get an appropriate size shrink tubing to use as wireloom

 

[LoneRanger]

fantastic thread! keep on truckin!

L.R.

 

[Tommy R]

Depending on the thickness of your headlight wires, get an appropriate size shrink tubing to use as wireloom

That's the plan. Picked up some 24 AWG solid core today for it.

fantastic thread! keep on truckin!

L.R.

Thanks!

 

[Tommy R]

Uh oh! Looks like I've got a defective super single. I hate it when that happens.

Yep, I'm resurrecting my cut-n-shut days from 10+ years ago. I decided to remove one sliver of tread blocks to get the width I wanted.

I've got some more work to do on them, but I'm liking what I'm seeing so far.

 

[Tommy R]

All done. Incidentally, the Michelin on the right from rcbrmin.com is SUPER hard. It made the Lesu feel like a crawler tire. The RCW4WD Michelin that I narrowed, however, is very soft, but with the stock foams it looks like it'll support the weight of the truck nicely.

I may experiment with taller foams to see if I can get the profile of the tread a bit more rounded, but nonetheless, I'm quite pleased!