My grandfather worked many hard years eking out a living as a cement contractor, pouring concrete and laying cinder block. I wanted to call upon my weathering skills, honed by years of reading Fine Scale Modeler, and build a model of my grandfather's dilapidated old work truck. Unfortunately, only 1950's Ford pick up trucks populated hobby store shelves. Finally, the release of AMT's nicely detailed 1950 Chevy pick up truck provided me with the foundation I needed.

The kit went together quickly and easily. Using bits of styrene sheet and strips, I added the frame work and school lockers my grandfather had welded to his faithful old truck. With construction on the truck finished, I began grinding rust holes through from underneath, along the rear fenders, running boards, and above the headlights. I carved out some dents, bent the running boards into their rust weakened bow, and added the battered Maxwell House coffee cans my grandfather had riveted above the headlights, when rust threatened their mounts.

The truck was painted and weathered with generous helpings of pastels, dirt, Rustall and dead flat. Using a toothbrush, I spattered it with paint "mud", and dirtied the windshield for the wipers to smudge clean. I hand painted the signs on the doors, just as my tiny hands had done with a brush thirty years ago. For the cab, I built a lunch box, complete with thermos and a Miracle Whip sandwich, his lunch of choice. Ohio used to include key chains that matched your tags when you received your license plates. Using one of these as reference, I replicated his license plates in scale on our Mac.

The ladders were taken from a fire truck, then tied down with string. The shovels, picks, and hoes came from an old farm play set. A scale garage detail set provided smaller wrenches and sockets to fill the lockers. Stair forms and a mortar box were built, then the bed piled with tools, sand and dirt.

The cement mixer proved to be the greatest challenge, not in building, but in finding reference. My wife called equipment rental companies, driving all over town to no avail, trying to find one from the right era. Finally we discovered Arnold Schwartzenegger ducking behind one, dodging bullets in True Lies. The mixer was built in just a few hours with styrene, spare parts, and a mixing drum cut down from a toy truck. The mixer was hooked to the pick up with a trailer hitch made from a straight pin, and a safety chain of old necklace.