Anyone have suggestions for material that would best simulate tow cables? Kinda' want to make these myself and have come up blank as to materials and/or methods to create them in 1/16 scale. I know there are commercial products out there, but would rather make them myself just for the satisfaction.

For the cable itself,try going to Lowes or Home Depot and find the section that has hardware for hanging pictures and mirrors.
"Braided Wire,Mirror Cord made by Hillman"
For the loops? Good question,havent figured out how to homemake nice ones myself.....need very small swage kit.
I tried using heat shrink tubing,but it doesnt look right.

How about regular electric wire. You could strip the insulation off (or get non-insulated copper wire). It is braided fairly tight and being copper could be bent and flex easily. You would have to paint it, but that shouldn't be much of a problem. You could probably find it ina small gauge with a high strand count as well, which would probably look more like real cable rather than the 2-3 strands that are in the picture hanging cables.

2-3 strands?.....here is a Pic,looks good to me!

I just found the perfect size wire to replace the smaller dia. side-mounted cable. And yes, it is picture hanging wire. As far as the strand count goes at that small scale, a few twists locked in a cordless drill will fix that up. The thimbles and swages can be made from thin pieces of epoxy putty.

I've been looking around on the net for articles. One person used what Stang suggested and seperated the strands. They then wound them back together with a Dremmel type tool. Sounds like it would look better, although I'm leaning towards Jstrat's find. From the pics it looks close to the King Tigers tow cable size, and it's already wound together. I'll give both a try and see which one stands up to repeated bending and such.

As for those tow cable eyes, that could get complicated.... might be better off getting the kits for the tow cables, after all.

EDIT: Good idea for the eyes, Brimauster.

Thanks for the replies people!

jstrat121 - that stuff does look pretty good. Haven't seen that (of course haven't looked for it either). The stuff I was referrinf to and used before is more like what I described 2-3 strands, a little thicker than that and not very flexible. I may have to look for that next time I go to the hardware store.

For the eye crimps we may be able to use the small metal crimps (like electrical solderless connections) that are used for fishing line.

Thats it!!! I just rembered that down here we have riggings for fishing that are made of stainless wire strands with eyes on both ends with a swivel in the eye. Something like this [link=http://www.basspro.com/servlet/catalog.TextId?hvarTextId=22784&hvarDept=151&hvarE vent=&hvarClassCode=5&hvarSubCode=4&hvarTarget=bro wse]Rigging[/link] I know I can get them at varying lengths locally and the slide a sleeve over them, like this [link=http://www.basspro.com/servlet/catalog.TextId?hvarTextId=72006&hvarDept=151&hvarE vent=&hvarClassCode=5&hvarSubCode=4&hvarTarget=bro wse]sleeve[/link]. If you want to get super strong and good coloring you could go with leader like this and then just add the sleeves yourself: [link=http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/product/standard-item.jsp?_DARGS=/cabelas/en/common/catalog/item-link.jsp_A&_DAV=MainCatcat390001&id=0017977316703a &navCount=4&podId=0017977&parentId=cat20407&navAct ion=push&catalogCode=IG&rid=&parentType=index&inde xId=cat20407&hasJS=true]Titanium leader[/link]. A local company makes them to the various sizes. If I get a chance to go and get some I'll post pics and where to get them....

K-Mart has lots of fishing tackle.....I will check them out and post any good finds!

No progress on this end. Spent from Friday night until this morning dealing with the flu. [:'(]

I'm going to try and get to the hardware store after work Mon. to find stuff for this. Find anything Jstrat?

One of the locals did the same thing to keep from loosing the body clips on an RC Truck--the first thing I thought of was how much the looked like the cables on the back of the Leopard VsTank. He simply used some type of copper coupling. Another alternative may be to try and plastic dip (Rubberize-It!) the braided wire back onto itself. Although some of the people around here don't know what "plastic dip" or "Rubberize-It!" is in some of the hardware stores, the automotive parts stores usually sell it since some people dip their tools in it.

What part of the tank are you guys talking about putting this wire. Dose anyone have a pic to show us bone heads?

K-Mart came up empty. They have a similar type of cable(tow cable) they are "wire Leaders" used for fishing.
But, they are way too small/thin and do not bend and hold any kind of shape...the above wire is still much better(mirro hanging)
Just need to figure out a way to do the swage at the end.

Here are a few photos of my stock Leopard.

Thanks T AND B .......... hey did you add your cables to your tank TNB? or are those stock cables?

Stock Leopard, stock cables. Just an extra touch added by the manufacturer to the Leopard, as well as the light kit.

I ended up going to Ace Hardware and found a Hillman product that very closely represents the Tiger/King Tiger cables! It's called Multi-Purpose Wire 20/6 Steel 100ft Wrap-Pack, Item # 122070. The size is very close to the overall diameter of the wraped tow-cable wire. It's kinda' stiff, but bends and holds shape pretty well.

As for the ends, I found some oversized pieces, which are called "thimbles". These are the cup shaped end pieces over which the wire wraps around on the ends. I couldn't come up with the proper term(even though Brim mentioned thimble) and after finding these, I now know what a "thimble" is. Anyway, like I stated they are a bit oversized, and I have instead cut the ends off the plastic cables and attached them to the steel cable ends. This will do for now, until I find the right sized "thimbles". [8D]

For what it worth buy 1/16 steel cable from home depot, it's like $0.27 a foot i use it on my t34/85 tank it looks great.[sm=biggrin.gif]

I added new photos to the gallery with the "new" cables. Something else has changed on my KT, but I can't figure out what. [>:]

This is what I have come up with(so far)
Hillman wire and cable crimps from the nuts and bolts section(both from Ace Hardware),not exact,but close!
They will also hold a shape pretty good!

Has anyone made a tow hook on there tank that you tow any thing with? what are you towing like a cannon or cargo some thing like that.....Dose anyone have pics pulling some thing with your tanks?????

Well, after trying to drill two of the stock plastic tow shackles with too large a drill bit(not drilling pilot holes) and shattering them, they are just for show at the moment. I had to glue them back together, so they won't take to much force!

Jstrat,
Did you see any of the Hillman thimbles while at Ace? I picked a few up even though they were a bit large. They should work good with your setup! I might just make a few like yours, since I now have about 90ft of cable to play with. They look a lot sturdier than my faked plastic ones. [8D]

The above cables are very strong for their size.When you crimp using a "Klein Tool"(used to crimp electronic splices),the aluminum colars embed into the mesh of the cable.I could not pull them apart by hand.
What do these "thimbles" look like?

The curved metal piece in the loop:


Picture From OSHA

Cap those look really good. What did you use for the crimp?

Sorry, Stang. Those aren't mine. They are OSHA's. The only pic I could find. []

I edited it so nobody would think it was my two thumbs that made it.