Demolition derby custom 1:18 build [PICS]

Sorry for the delay of this promised post. Life got in the way.

I mentioned in my previous post about a 1:64 scale derby car that I had a much grander ambition rolling around in my mind for several years, ever since I started seeing Acme 1:18 scale ramp trucks being produced. I wondered if I could build a legit-looking demolition derby car to park on the back of one. That plan started coming together in the second half of 2025 when I actually bought a 1970 Dodge ramp truck and found the perfect project car: an unmarked 2001 Ford Crown Victoria custom builder kit from Motor Max. They both sat in my office for a few months as I planned it out. I had never done something like this before and had zero skills going in.

I studied many photos that I had taken of derby cars and others that I found online to get ideas for the interior and exterior designs, and then started sourcing all the extra parts and supplies I needed. I found 1:18 headers from an online R/C model shop. A selection of styrene I beams in different sizes from Burbank’s House of Hobbies. A Testors paint set and brushes from Amazon. Craft necklaces from Michaels. Wires and spray paint of different colors from my local Ace Hardware. Odds and ends from a toolbox that I thought may come in handy for something or other. And on and on. An old and clumsily broken Sun Star 1964 Ford became a parts donor and a canvas for experimentation. I taught myself how to use a Dremel tool, which I had never even heard of before this.

Finally, over the Christmas holidays, I had everything I needed and began the project in earnest. I completely disassembled the Crown Vic, and over the next few months as time permitted I cut, sawed, sanded, painted, drilled, melted, and built from scratch. The best and most freeing thing about this is that nothing had to be “perfect.” People build derby cars in their garages and driveways, and the goal is for them to be safe and functional in the moment, not pretty. Interiors are stripped down to almost nothing, and paint schemes may be decided by whatever’s on hand. The interior I built (and weathered) is a decent representation.

I wanted this to be a car that had been run hard. As many of you know, diecast metal is extremely hard and thick, yet breaks rather than bends when subjected to intense pressure or hammer strikes. That was a problem I had to figure out in order to get a realistic crumpling effect. The solution? Aluminum sheets cut to the general shapes of the rear panels of the car and then attached to the rest of the body once the original rear was cut away.

Once all the sub-builds were completed I put everything back together, but it was still far from done. I had to do all the detail painting (in this fantasy build, a couple of real-life Texas businesses are sponsors), Dremel-assisted scratching and denting, simulated paint transfers from other cars’ contacts, actual bashing into the handy Sun Star Ford, and mud-ifying. And, here is the result. I hope you all like it.