1950's automobile repair shop with flat-bed tow truck - 75972 / 75953 MODs

[Murdoch17]

I was inspired by set's 75972 (Dorado Showdown) and 75953 (Hogwarts Whomping Willow) to create this small town auto repair shop with flat-bed tow truck called Smokey's Garage.

The building features a raised platform for cars (such as the Anglia) to roll onto and be worked on, with folding ramps to keep the broken-down vehicle in place. NOTE: The front of the building is missing sixteen of this part in dark bluish gray above the second floor windows and the side door on the first floor.  Also, two of these printed 2 x 4 tiles go on the hanging sign out front of the garage.

The front of the building, with the ramps lowered for receiving a broken-down car.

The rear of the building folds open to allow access to the inside. The upper floor is the break room, with a rock-n-roll album on the table, and hi-fi stereo system in place to rock around the clock.....  at least during business hours! Here is the album piece.

The rear of the building.

This truck is basically a stretched version of the hover-vehicle in the Dorado Showdown set. It is missing two light-bluish gray ones of these (used as the back of the headlights in the set) as they don't fit where they are supposed to go in the model due to a LDD glitch.

I added regular-size wheels, and safety stripes to the deck, which sadly does not lower into a ramp like a real truck would... but it does just barely fit the Anglia IRL!

Here is the flatbed tow truck and the '67 Anglia in real bricks, plus the two workers Charlie "Smokey" Jones (on left) and Caroline "Carol" Jones (on right). Smokey owns the garage when this picture is taken (It's 1969 in-universe) and does the heavy diesel work and home cooking, while his wife Caroline does the gasoline engines and book keeping. They have a daughter, named Josephine Jones (nicknamed "Jo" and isn't present here) who is in training at trade-school to become a mechanic. She will shortly join the family business in 1970, and takeover from diesels when Smokey dies in 1976. Carol stays on until 1983, when she retires to work on restoring a Ford Model A as a pet project. Jo renames the business "Jo's Garage" in 1985 after moving to a new location (seen in set 10264, Corner Garage) in the downtown area when the older building became too outdated and small. She continues to run the garage today, even bringing her son Franklin into the family trade as of 1997..

NOTES:

I just bought the Dorado Showdown when it was $18 (US) from Amazon and then I went and subtracted all the parts I could find for this project in my own parts bins from the BrickLink file. The truck and Anglia themselves are finished already without ordering anything, and the building is down 200+ bricks from when I started looking for parts... still need to order around 520 more.

Keep your eyes peeled for real-world pictures of the vehicles, coming soon!

Edited July 13, 2019 by Murdoch17

[Daanski]

Cool! I've played with this idea as well, I think you worked it out spot on! Any plans to tile the floors?

Daan

[Murdoch17]

On 7/10/2019 at 8:22 AM, Daanski said:

Cool! I've played with this idea as well, I think you worked it out spot on! Any plans to tile the floors?

Daan

Thanks @Daanski for you comment! However, I don't have any plans to tile the floors... it's just not my style. Here is my newest picture, plus a bit of unofficial backstory about the mini-figures:

Here is the flatbed tow truck and the '67 Anglia in real bricks, plus the two workers Charlie "Smokey" Jones (on left) and Caroline "Carol" Jones (on right). Smokey owns the garage when this picture is taken (It's 1969 in-universe) and does the heavy diesel work and home cooking, while his wife Caroline does the gasoline engines and book keeping. They have a daughter, named Josephine Jones (nicknamed "Jo" and isn't present here) who is in training at trade-school to become a mechanic. She will shortly join the family business in 1970, and takeover from diesels when Smokey dies in 1976. Carol stays on until 1983, when she retires to work on restoring a Ford Model A as a pet project. Jo renames the business "Jo's Garage" in 1985 after moving to a new location (seen in set 10264, Corner Garage) in the downtown area when the older building became too outdated and small. She continues to run the garage today, even bringing her son Franklin into the family trade as of 1997.

Edited July 13, 2019 by Murdoch17

[fordtruckin]

Really great builds and excellent back story as well. Hope to see the garage building built with real bricks some day as well.