Locating 1/48 Scale Vehicles

Hallmark(as in greeting cards) offered a GMC/Chevy pickup truck about 8 years ago in 1:48. It had a Christmas tree in the bed and an eye hook in the roof, both were easy to remove.   Athearn offered Ford C model flat bed with removable side straight trucks and semi tractors in 1:50.

Ertl and Ertl(1:43) and Tootsie(1:48)

Tootsie and Tootsie (1:48), Athearn(1:50) and Ertl(1:43)

Tootsie (1:48)

Tootsie tractors with scale (96" wide, 13' 6" tall) scratch built trailers.  Trailer tires are dowel rods with starting holes drilled with a metal bit and painted to resemble wheels. Trailer bodies are from a ripped 4x4. All Tootsie semi tractors were stripped, primed and painted. Stripes on trailers are hobby or auto parts tape. Signs are cut from hobby or trade magazines and glued to the painted wood with a second coat of diluted glue over them after the undercoat dries.

K-Mart scale width and height trailer

Scale kit trailer atop K-Line flat car

Weaver 35' trailer atop Weaver piggyback flat car.

REA truck (1 of five options) from a Scale Art kit.  Kind of rare.

Ertl repaint.

Athearn Ford C (1:50) flat bed truck with sides repainted.

Internet photo of a completed Tamiya kit.  Tamiya offers scale size military trucks and automobiles.  Some Revell 1:48 kits are available

John in Lansing, ILL

Hi John,

Thanks for the great pictures and options for 1/48th.  I appreciate also letting me know the manufacturers so I can locate some of them perhaps.

Lansing reminds me of a story from my youth.  I went to Spain right after high school for 6 weeks of summer study and I met a girl there.  I lived in West Chester, PA at the time but I promised to visit her at Michigan State on my way out to school in Nebraska in 1967.  I had saved money all through high school teaching guitar and bought  1959 Mercedes 190SL that I had put a roof rack on to haul my steamer trunk to school.   It blocked my rear view considerably.  It was really embarrassing when I backed into a gas pump and dented the heck out of the gas pump.   I should get a model of that in scale and put it on my layout.

Cheers,

Mike

Model cars on a layout can be a demonstration of the cars acquired in real life - as a personal or family history of acquired automobiles -- or of one's wishful thinking. Nearly all of the 1:43 cars on my layout are from the late 1940s and '50s, when I was a teenager fascinated by Detroit Iron. Most of the cars (and a few pickup trucks) were purchased from Die-Cast Direct, a vendor in Kentucky. My layout includes 18 cars, among them:

From real life ...
1949 Cadillac 4-door sedan -- my dad's car
1949 Packard 4-door sedan -- my mom's car
1956 Continental Mk II  -- my classic car, now being restored.

From fantasy ...
1953 Studebaker hardtop -- my "dream car"
1957 Edsel Convertible -- another "dream car"
1957 Mercury Turnpike Cruiser -- another "dream car."

There may be a sub-category of psychiatry that specializes in analysis of one's personality based on the cars one acquires (or favors). Let the good times roll and re-live the memories!

Mike Mottler
mottlerm@gmail.com

Hi Mike,

Thanks for sharing the cars you love.  I was excited to hear about your 1956 Continental Mk II , so I looked it up and watched a video on it.  What a history of famous people that owned that car.  Really neat features like the side scoops on some of the models and the roof vents for the air conditioning.

I also trace my life via the cars my family and I have owned over the 70 year length of the road of my life so far.

My uncle had a bullet nosed Studebaker, and I was always enthralled by the Golden Hawk and other later ones as well.

I have had some real nice cars but I am selling my 1970 MGB this summer to one of my train customers.  It hurts my knees to use it and it is time for someone else to get the pleasure that I have had owning it all these years since 1990.

I am in pursuit of 1/48th scale cars, so if you hear of any current ones for sale, please let me know.

Cheers,

Mike

I too look for nice 1:48 vehicles. So far my attempts are:

The tractor trailer in the H&H Feed Mill bay is is a Lionel that is claimed to be O-scale. Also pictured are two Menard panel vans, also claimed as O-scale (or 1:48). The tractor seems a little small in comparison to the panel vans.

For comparison effect, I positioned a 1:43 Ford truck (I don't know the year) between two O-scale pickup trucks. The black one is a 1953 Ford F100 and the red one is a 1948 Ford F1. Both I ordered from Diecast Direct from their 2018 Christmas Catalog. The two and a half pages of trucks was called "Railroad Truck Series Maintenance Trucks". Nearly every railroad was represented. All trucks claimed to be O-scale. They were mostly Ford, but there were a few Chevy and GMC trucks.

Diecast Direct (another form sponsor) is where I get mine. 

Tucker sold 200-something full scale cars-  How many of US have Tuckers in 1:43??

I have three!

I thought Tucker sold less than 50 cars! I have none, as l model 1940, and have to use pre-1941 1/43 vehicles.

I suppose my greatest concern, besides the small amount of available 1:48 vehicles, is how precise is their acclaimed scale?

From my above post pic of a Lionel tractor trailer and two Menard panel vans (all three are acclaimed 1:48 scale), my eyes tell me the tractor looked about the same size as the panel vans, yet it should have looked obviously more massive, shouldn’t it?

I also use 1:50th scale vehicles since they're so close and more common. 

TM Terry posted:

I suppose my greatest concern, besides the small amount of available 1:48 vehicles, is how precise is their acclaimed scale?

From my above post pic of a Lionel tractor trailer and two Menard panel vans (all three are acclaimed 1:48 scale), my eyes tell me the tractor looked about the same size as the panel vans, yet it should have looked obviously more massive, shouldn’t it?

Some early tractors were smaller; the trailers were around 25' to 30' long/8' wide as opposed to some of today's 50'+/102" wide trailers.

BEKINS is a wood moving van body atop a BB157 chassis with cab. HO decals, couldn't find O scale.

DRY ICE is a wood reefer body atop an ERTL COE Chevy. Decals from a Walthers Cornerstone kit.   Athearn Roadway Express local truck is on the road.

Wood box body atop an ERTL COE Chevy

Clockwise starting at the left: Athearn Ford C tractor, ERTL Chevy COE, Athearn Ford C Branch city delivery truck. unknown Campbell's Soup semi, Athearn Ford C Roadway city delivery truck and the ERTL Chevy COE with reefer body.

Furthest two semi-trailers at the dock are wood.

John in Lansing, ILL

Mike H Mottler posted:

Model cars on a layout can be a demonstration of the cars acquired in real life - as a personal or family history of acquired automobiles -- or of one's wishful thinking. Nearly all of the 1:43 cars on my layout are from the late 1940s and '50s, when I was a teenager fascinated by Detroit Iron. Most of the cars (and a few pickup trucks) were purchased from Die-Cast Direct, a vendor in Kentucky. My layout includes 18 cars, among them:

From real life ...
1949 Cadillac 4-door sedan -- my dad's car
1949 Packard 4-door sedan -- my mom's car
1956 Continental Mk II  -- my classic car, now being restored.

From fantasy ...
1953 Studebaker hardtop -- my "dream car"
1957 Edsel Convertible -- another "dream car"
1957 Mercury Turnpike Cruiser -- another "dream car."

There may be a sub-category of psychiatry that specializes in analysis of one's personality based on the cars one acquires (or favors). Let the good times roll and re-live the memories!

Mike Mottler
mottlerm@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

         

Well, Mike, your 1957 Edsel is INDEED a fantasy  car, since the model years were 1958 and 1959!  There WAS a 1960 Edsel, but alas, they looked like rebadged 1960 Fords, and there were very few of them produced, as Edsel faded away into automotive history.  -Salty Rails-