The team of Denny May on the left and Bob Anderson on the right are shown with one of their 1/4 scale scratch-built 1955 Ford trucks.  It was finished as a general purpose truck for Elmer’s Orchard.  The bed has a high-detailed wood floor.  ​

This AAA-approved 1/4 scale scratch-built 1955 Ford wrecker has many unique features.  The boom supports a brake-locking winch used when towing disabled vehicles.  Note: the pedal car being towed is a Ford Woody built by Bob Anderson. ​

Dennis May is one who loves to dream, design, restore and build unique things; from Cretors horse-drawn popcorn wagons to scale model trucks.  When asked how all this unfolded, Denny responded, “My grandfather’s lifelong avocation was farming.  He was also an inventor of sorts.  I always enjoyed his work.  My father followed along and could fix about anything on the farm.  Apparently I had a latent ability inherited from them as I restored a 1949 Ford F1 panel truck that turned out quite nice.  
“I got acquainted with my neighbor, Bob Anderson, who can build most anything.  Doug Erickson, a machinist friend of Bob’s provides input with many of Bob’s undertakings.  Together, they are a masterful pair.  I shared my interest in tinkering with Bob one day.  Bob needed assistance with a project and asked if I could provide a helping hand.  I wasn’t sure of my capabilities, but I was a willing participant.  Bob liked the way that project turned out so he asked if I could provide still more help.  I was excited for the opportunity and accepted.  After several years working with Bob and Doug, I’ve learned a great deal and have become a complement in their varied endeavors.  Scratch building scale model trucks is only one of many things we build.”


Truck-Related Background
Denny grew up on the family’s Angus farm in Mineral Point, Wis.  He was active in rural youth organizations, including 4-H and FFA.  Through these activities, his projects were beef related where he became an accomplished showman.  He also had early experience driving and operating farm tractors and trucks.  “I drove the farm tractor for the first time at age 10.  We had trucks on the farm that I drove at the ripe old age of 15.  As soon as I got my driver’s license at 16, I was running errands with the farm truck.  My dad sold silo unloaders and related equipment.  My first assignment was picking up a shipment of this equipment in town.   The family showed cattle around the Midwest and still does today.   I drove my father’s two-ton truck with show cattle to the International Stock Show in Chicago when I was 16 years old.  Hauling those cattle at that young age was quite an experience,” Denny remarked.
Denny does not recall many toys as a youngster.  “I remember playing in the sandbox, but we didn’t have many toys.  At an early age I was busy using the real stuff so toys didn’t mean a lot.  During my youth, I was just being a worker on the farm.  Every one of my family had work tasks.  We just didn’t have much time to play with toys,” he commented.

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His fascination began at birth in 1948, just as he was drawing his first breath in a New York hospital located on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
 “As I was being born, Rescue Company 3 of the FDNY (Fire Department of the City of New York) went screaming by and the die was cast,” relates Larry Phillips, a longtime columnist for Toy Trucker & Contractor magazine and an influential collector. 
Living in Brooklyn, N.Y., the first five years of his life, he remembers regularly exploring an engine house, enthralled by the gleaming 1938 Ahrens-Fox HT pumper and befriended by the affable firefighters.
“We lived just a few blocks from Engine Company 241 in the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn and as we walked to church on Sunday morning, we walked right past the firehouse,” he tells. “My dad was the visionary and he put me on the pumper when I was probably close to 3 years old and he said, ‘Larry, this is going to be you for the rest of your life.’”
The prediction came true. Larry’s career has been in close proximity to fire departments across the country. Today, Larry’s home in Jamestown, N.D., is a treasure trove of fire department memorabilia and a museum of model fire trucks, reflecting both Larry’s career and his passion for the model hobby.


Finding a second home
Larry’s father hailed from the Harlem section of New York City, while his mother was a North Dakota native. While Larry’s father was teaching at an Officer Candidate School in Fargo, N.D., the couple met at a USO (United Service Organizations) for wartime soldiers. His mother’s church group was serving food at the weekly USO functions, while his father was playing the piano.
Larry’s family lived in Brooklyn, N.Y., then moved to the suburb of Bethpage, Long Island, where a cousin was a dispatcher at the Bethpage Fire Department and invited the family to visit.
“I walked into that firehouse and it just clicked,” Larry says. “That became my second home.” He spent every waking moment that he could at what would eventually become the headquarters firehouse. He was soon adopted as the “buff,” running errands for the firefighters.
Within a year, the department bought him the traditional bright red Bethpage Fire Department jacket emblazoned with his name and fire department Maltese cross; the jacket is now in his collection.
“From then on, I was hooked and laddered for the rest of my life. The die was very, very well-cast,” he says.

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Gene Gregory is shown with his superbly built remote-controlled 1/4 scale scratch-built CAT Model D5N bulldozer.   ​

G​ene Gregory is a craftsman extraordinaire. And while he has crafted numerous replicas, each new enterprise is more intricate than the previous one.
Asked how he settled on building a scale model CAT with an invisible leash, Gene recounted, “I had built two other remote-controlled 1/4 scale units: a John Deere Model 8020 diesel field tractor and a John Deere Model 5010 diesel construction tractor with a John Deere Model 400 scraper pan. I wanted to build a tractor that was more challenging.”
To Gene’s credit, he fulfilled that inspiration by scratch building a CAT Model D5N bulldozer. An exact replica, and to the nth degree!


CAT Construction
Following are details that comprise Gene’s masterpiece. “I took countless measurements, along with pictures from a neighbor’s CAT D5N. I returned for follow-up measurements a dozen or more times. Getting precise dimensions was necessary for accuracy. The CAT was built using 3/4-inch aluminum plate for the base. This thickness allowed taps to be drilled into the edges to support 3/4-inch power supports,” Gene commented.  
Building the track housing was rather intricate. Gene carved the housing from a block of wood. This created the form for the eventual cast-aluminum housing that was poured into a mold. The housing was round on top with a flat hollow bottom.
The radiator housing was developed in a similar fashion. Gene made a wood carving from which a mold was formed. Molten cast aluminum was poured in the mold to form the housing. Although not operational, the radiator core is made from copper for authenticity. Side housings behind the radiator are made from aluminum sheet metal.
In the bottom of the base are two 12-volt batteries. Two motors are located behind the batteries, one for each drive wheel. 
There is also a jackshaft to regulate the speed for each motor. Gene engineered the desired ground speed at 80 feet per minute when traveling at full speed.        
Gene gained valuable knowledge with the electronics from his previous two tractors. This aided his electronic engineering for the CAT. Sophisticated electronics for the D5N are located above the batteries and under the hood. A saber-tooth speed controller associated with the electronics is located in the same area. Speed controls for each motor facilitates turning using a joystick. These are also located among the electronics.
There is a 24-volt hydraulic pump and reserve tank to operate the four-way power blade. The power blade movement is activated with four modified BIMBA air cylinders. The blade can be moved up and down. It can also be angled right or left.
The dash is loaded with switches and gauges that resemble the original CAT Model D5N. They include a switch for power, along with light switches. There are 12-volt LED lights both fore and aft.

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Chad Zachmeier is not your average teenage model collector. In many ways, he is the type of collector that one might have expected from Thomas Edison if Edison had collected or scratch built models.
Zachmeier is a dreamer, an inventor and a builder. He said, “I do not collect any store-bought models. I have built all of my models by hand, everything in my collection.”
Like many young collectors, Zachmeier played with models as a little boy, but even at a very young age he wanted to scratch an itch that production models simply could not scratch.
“I started out playing and building with Legos when I was just a little boy,” he said. “At that time my dad, Chuck, worked for Bobcat Company [he worked as a machinist in the engineering department at Bobcat for 18 years, which may explain some of Chad’s machinist ability]. So he was always bringing home little 1/25 scale model Bobcat toys. My only problem was I had no attachments for the Bobcat and I wanted the realism that only attachments could give. I tried to make attachments out of Legos but they didn’t turn out so well, so I started making my little attachments out of Popsicle sticks and toothpicks.”
From this small beginning, Zachmeier decided to build more advanced attachments for his models. He began with what he later called his first major project. “I started making the basic pallet forks and snow bucket for the small model toys, but even these weren’t enough to satisfy me. I decided to make my entire scratch-built attachments collection clip onto the machine just like real attachments do. And while that might have satisfied most collectors, I decided to take it a step further and make every piece move just like the real full-size attachments move. I kept building one attachment at a time, usually looking at a picture from a Work Saver magazine. As time progressed, all of my attachments became more and more complex. By the time I finished building them, I had completed 33 attachments including pallet forks, dirt bucket, snow bucket, rock bucket, large dump bucket, grapple fork bucket, brush mower, lawn mower, road grader, vibratory roller, snowblower, trencher, wheel packer, cement breaker, dozer blade, brush saw, street sweeper, post-hole auger, tree spade, high dump bucket, excavator attachment, rototiller, box scraper, forestry cutter, landscape rake, scarifier and an ice scraper.”

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