1/25th Car Hauler

AMT's was a generic 60s style hauler. Revell made a much better one. Both show up on eBay fairly regularly.

Gene, If you are up to some scratch building, I have a set of plans on AutoCad for a ramp bed that will look pretty good on a 1-ton dually pickup chassis. I drew this up for a project for a friend of mine, we were going to use a

And last night I read on Hobby Heaven's board that the Revell kit is being re-released later this year.

Bill Banaszak, MFE

It all depends on what sort of haulaway (car hauler) you are looking for.

AMT's kit, stemming from 1971-72, is a 4-car truss-built unit, likely a Fruehauf trailer, that very clearly represents the type of 4-5 car haulaway used from the late 1930's until the early 1970's. I would rather call it simplified, rather than crude, given that it is accurately done, although it lacks the added details of hydraulic elevating cylinders for the upper rear ramps. This kind of haulaway was universal in its era, due to the nature of highways back then--the Interstate system was still pretty much a patchwork, and most delivery runs were undertaken on 2-lane federal and state highways, which in those days could not handle longer trailers, hence the 40' length of the model kit.

Revell's kit, while it certainly does have the more open framework and extensive hydraulic elevating cylinder details, is a model of the direct follow-on to what AMT's trailer represents. However, by 1981, when Revell first issued their trailer, it was already quite obsolete. This is, I suspect, because of the available tractor kits in Revell's line, which were then top-of-the-line Kenworth and Peterbilt conventional tractors, which were hardly the type of tractors used by haulaway companies or independent haulaway contractors.

Modern haulaways are similar in design to the Revell kit, in their general construction, however, they use smaller trailer wheels and tires, and the trailer is connected to the tractor by means of a low-mounted drawbar style hitch, rather than a conventional semi-trailer 5th wheel mounted on top of the frame. This is to make room for more cars, yet maintain an acceptable overall height. Also, given that Revell did their trailer to accommodate their semi-tractor kits, with no modifications to those, they did not make any provision for over-the-cab ramps, nor the fixed ramps on top of the rear of the chassis of the tractor, which is part of the load capacity of modern haulaways. Also, I believe that Revell's trailer is also a 45' unit, while modern units are 53' in length, the maximum allowable in almost all states.

AA

"Gene Lander" wrote in news:capmr5$3vs$ snipped-for-privacy@nntp-stjh-01-01.rogers.nf.net:

Revell has a new auto transporter coming out.

Imex released on years ago and I'm not sure if it was a rerelease of the old Revell or Revell's new one is a rerelease of the Imex one.

The Imex box can be seen here.

That's exactly what I'm looking for. Does anyone have any idea when it's to be released? It says on the web-page 05/2004 but that's now passed. Or is that the Revell Germany release date and not yet released in North America?

It may not get released in the US at all. You might want to email Hobby Heaven to find out if they'll be importing any of them.

snipped-for-privacy@modelcarkits.com