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  #1  
Old 05-12-2017, 08:08 AM
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frizzen frizzen is offline
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Default 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Let's start off with a 'Funrise 1992' marked, Ford E-series high cube ambulance i've had since new. This body style is somewhere between 1983 to 1991 (3rd gen, with blue oval grill) Appears to be 1/14, but i havent bothered to measure.

It's got flashy lights, and an audio module. It got played with a lot, and was in great shape before being stored in a barn for 10+ years.

My dad was a paramedic, ran ambulances and care-vans for a lot of years while i was growing up. Something in me never got over how cool ambulances are.



From day 1, I always wished this were RC. Now i'm glad that it wasn't, but it still should be! I've been planning this conversion a while before committing to anything. On to the mock-ups!



Those tires look, off...



Rims? This isn't Mother, Juggs, and Speed!



Business end.



An old JRL dodge viper is our chassis donor, even though most of the chassis will still be Funrise. Rear end has been narrowed to tuck under body, front wheel offset needs brought down and a little fender trimming for wider sticky tires should get me there.

Steelies insert over rims like hubcaps. I could leave the beadlock ring chrome, or black it out to look more like sidewall.

Body is getting some mods and repaint. Changing between some / all of the decals. Going white, with orange stripes, and probably blue accent stripes. More than likely some scotch-lite for more flashy and impossible to take pictures of. Not going to be a livery clone.

All lights are going LED. More lights! Replacing the 'wrong' lenses, emergency lights will be all red and white, or i may leave a pair of ambers up top. More lights!

Hopefully i can tweak the stock light/sound board a bit to get it back to normal. Add a volume control pot. Then throw it a voltage stepdown from a stick pack, trigger to run remotely off a servo board and transistor. I'm hoping to keep Wailer siren and Airhorns.

I'm even hoping to keep everything in the cab or below the load deck, in case the crazy man eventually decides it needs remote back doors. Or worse...

----

If anyone wants to track down thin body, you want the one with 4 buttons on the cab door. If you get 2 buttons on the patient box it's the small one
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Last edited by frizzen; 10-20-2018 at 05:27 AM. Reason: Size vs buttons
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  #2  
Old 05-12-2017, 12:21 PM
fuzzy fuzzy is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econline Ambulance

could be model of life line ambulance built in sumner iowa.
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  #3  
Old 05-12-2017, 06:35 PM
Mustang46555 Mustang46555 is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econline Ambulance

Cool conversion project Frizzen.
I was an EMT for 9 years "back in the day" and spent a lot of hours in units just like this. Brings back lots of memories. Am hoping to see it running around at Lebanon in Sept!
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Old 05-22-2017, 03:06 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econline Ambulance

Thanks guys, i don't know much about the coach builders or how to spot them. Any help you've got on this build is appriceated.

Awesome, i didn't know you were an EMT. Thank you for doing it, i'm glad it's bringing back some memories.
I'm planning on having it up at lebanon even if it may not be really cool and flashy enough yet. I'm sure someone could come up with something for it to respond to...

The chrome looks a little shabby, let's do something about that.

Alright, nice.
Aluminum is way tougher than chrome.


Not sure how much of the black chassis will go into the grey chassis yet. Turns out my slow viper donor had a 2 speed gearbox.
--
Just noticed it, could my title be fixed to say "Econoline"?
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
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Last edited by frizzen; 05-22-2017 at 03:11 AM.
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  #5  
Old 05-30-2017, 08:25 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econline Ambulance

Chassis got tubbed for the big rear meats. The motor pod got melted into place.


The front axle is taking more time to play with wheel offset and swing arcs, and annoying me.

Made the plastic chassis diamond plate and edge banding aluminum. All the bright work other than steelie rims is aluminum speed tape. Not sure if the steelies want to stay chrome, or go white?

Also the original stickers have been removed. I've already got a 1/24 scale ambulance decal sheet i picked up across the street from the Lebanon show, so we'll see if any stickers are worthy to make it back on.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
It's still scale, and i play fairly well with others, most of the time...

Last edited by frizzen; 05-30-2017 at 08:32 PM. Reason: Edge and Econoline is hard.
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  #6  
Old 06-01-2017, 09:05 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Title change -I hope!! Looks good.
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  #7  
Old 06-06-2017, 08:35 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Thanks for fixing my title.

Got a little more bump, grind, melt accomplished...



Now i'm not happy about the stance. The front is tucked as much as i could without binding up the steering. Rear needs lifted some to level back out.

I'm thinking about punching the bumper a little further forward, or there was an offroad rescue i saw a pic of that had a winch bumper.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
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Old 11-06-2017, 09:12 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

I got another cheap chinese 20a esc with brake (like my VW T2 has) and i got it set up on the axle. Seems to have pretty good balance without being really fast, and i modded the axle to let me manually change the high/low shift fork from the bottom. 

Steering is just a horizon spms401 servo, like the vw. I'm going to have to think a while about mounts and linkages.

I modified the headlight lens to take a 5mm white led. The grill has been modified for 3mm red leds.

I dug into the rear box and found out that the lights are currently set up with 4 chrome buckets. so on each side the front 3 lights are one lamp, the back 3 are one lamp. I don't know if this will limit and simplify things, or make me work much harder to do what i wanted.

I moved the lenses around to something that seems more right. The blue lenses will be changed to white once i figure out some stuff.

I was thinking i would run the lightbar sides together, alternating on off with the forward on the cube. And the sides alternating with the lights next to each other. This kinda shoots that plan down.

Now i'm wondering if i should take the easy path and put the left grille, right lightbar, left forward cube, right aft cube together, alternating with the opposite. Or if i need to run several cirucits with different timing. Or if i need to throw a few more leds on the back.

Too many words





Flashy cars take lots of planning.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
It's still scale, and i play fairly well with others, most of the time...

Last edited by frizzen; 11-06-2017 at 10:03 PM. Reason: Pic
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  #9  
Old 11-07-2017, 07:45 PM
Mustang46555 Mustang46555 is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Frizzen,
The ambulance is looking good!
Got a lighting curve to throw at you. The two inner lights on each side of the box should actually be white as well as a pair (not on the model) with each centered over the rear doors. These were known as "ditch lights" and were used to light up the area around the unit at night. 10-50 P.I.'s (auto accident w/injuries) were the most common use although they were helpful in dark driveways and the rear facing pair made killer back up lights. The three sets were operated on their own switches separate from the emergency lights plus the rear ditch lights turned on when the doors opened (Indiana law at that time), day or night.
The front and rear corner reds flashed together and did not wig wag. I believe I remember the side reds alternating front to rear. The box lights were used by themselves on transfers when we had a patient aboard but it was a non-emergency call and did not warrant the light bar and siren. Of course on a full blown emergency run everything that could flash was going!
Just a bit of 80's ambulance trivia I thought you might enjoy.
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  #10  
Old 11-07-2017, 09:31 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Thank you! A lighting curve to help make it wore accurate, darn.
This is why i want to figure out lighting before it moved on to paint and i had to drill more holes and screw up paint and decals.


I can baffle the boxes to make the sides into ditch. I can probably tuck a set of 3or5mm leds over the doors easily, but might need to make a cover or something..


My lenses are faded and wrong.

It needs tail lights, i have to figure out where i'll have enough room with everything installed

Box roof Clearance lights would probably take surface mount leds drilled after paint, i'm not yet sure if i'll be feeling it that much.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
It's still scale, and i play fairly well with others, most of the time...
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Old 11-07-2017, 11:14 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Loved the Mother Juggs and Speed reference!
And is that copcar a Matador? What is it, who made it?
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  #12  
Old 11-08-2017, 12:09 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Loved that movie, and it was such a cool ambulance.
I shouldn't scare the nuns, he said i must not scare the nuns. Oh but i can't help myself!

Good eye, that's a 1972 Amc Matador made by Cox and used their little gas engine
http://www.rctruckandconstruction.co...ad.php?t=12889
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Old 11-08-2017, 12:48 AM
skeeter skeeter is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

WTF! How did I manage to completely miss this thread up to now? COOL build you have here. Me likes it a LOT!
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  #14  
Old 11-11-2017, 02:15 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Thanks skeeter! Maybe you were busy doing thread necromancy in the other sections for cool ideas and didn't look through the emergency section? Maybe nobody pays attention to emergency vehicles or moves over?

I figured out a steering solution that i'm happy enough with for now.



The jrl viper donor chassis had a cutout for steering centering that the lower servo mount ear drops into, the white brace holds the servo in place with a rubber servo mount crushed against the top of the servo. A 3mm screw connects the horn to the draglink. I'm going to do a brass bushing or something later so it won't chew up the linkage.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
It's still scale, and i play fairly well with others, most of the time...

Last edited by frizzen; 12-23-2017 at 04:28 AM.
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  #15  
Old 11-12-2017, 03:34 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Now that i know more, let's try that light lens layout again.





It'll need some translucent paint they're a bit pale.

Now back to thinging of rear light layout...

Does anyone know of any dome lenses that fit in a hole with an ID 0.480" or about 12mm. Preferably working with a hole depth around 0.100" or around 3mm.
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Old 11-12-2017, 07:37 AM
Mustang46555 Mustang46555 is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Now that's looking good. I don't have a source of lenses but you might try one of the larger electronics suppliers like Digikey and check out panel lights. Might find something there the right size. Lynn (TC1CAT) was pretty good with lenses, he might have a good source.

When you get ready for touch up/repainting here's a little detail trivia, the yellow stripe needs to be a fairly dark blue (same blue as the star of life emblem) to meet state regs at the time. Also on each front fender and on the right rear of the box, between the stripe and the orange should be a four digit number, the state certification number. As this was early in the EMS days most I saw started with a 0 our unit was 0671.
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Old 11-12-2017, 08:32 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Good idea. Worst case i'm going to have to make a vacuform and do it the hard way.

I knew when i do the repaint i needed that to be a blue stripe, but i didn't remember about the unit numbers.
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
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Old 11-12-2017, 10:05 PM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Quote:
Originally Posted by frizzen View Post
Does anyone know of any dome lenses that fit in a hole with an ID 0.480" or about 12mm. Preferably working with a hole depth around 0.100" or around 3mm.
Ill check the ones i bought for my k100 tonight after work or in the morning. They are from the tundra i think. Came with clear and yellow lens set.
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  #19  
Old 11-25-2017, 12:06 AM
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

It still needs more flashy.




---
Found out 'Wiggly Eyes' are the answer to my clear ditch light lenses!

Cut out the whites, scrap the pupil, get pupil out of bigger eye that fits on back of lens, center drill for 3mm led, apply aluminum speed tape for reflector, glue lens to backer pupil
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What do ya mean "Cars are neither Trucks or Construction"?
It's still scale, and i play fairly well with others, most of the time...

Last edited by frizzen; 10-06-2018 at 08:18 PM. Reason: I'm learning.
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  #20  
Old 11-25-2017, 12:13 AM
skeeter skeeter is offline
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Default Re: 1983-91 Econoline Ambulance

Looking good!
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