hehe, the topic title says it all, really. 
i had a go at 'repairing' some of the broken down vehicles from hl2. there's some pics below, and they can be downloaded from the, would you believe it, models download section.
(the 1st pick shows the original beat up van too)
If you want a bit of authenticity, move the fifth wheel back to the rear axle.
in its present position, any trailer would crash into the rear of the cab.
/me likes green one best
[edit]
a pretty good example of a fifth wheel
this truck is similar to yours. just tandem instead of a single axle.
Really well done and ultra useful
changes - if you were to do the full set I can imagine them getting a
huge amount of use.
Oh, well then. me being ignorant and all. still good stuff.
i figured, if he could inflate a tire, he could move the fifth wheel.
sorry, my bad 
aye, the fifth wheel thing. i didn't know that's what it was called, but i thought it looked a bit far forward. i take it the guy that made the original model was as much of a mechanic as me.
reno, about converting the entire set. the idea sounded good to me too, but when i looked closer at what i had to work with, i was quite surprised at how few different vehicles there were, and how a lot of them are damaged beyond repair. there another 2 or 3 that look promising, but i think if i want to expand the set, i'm gonna need to take the modeling head off, and put the texturing one on.
there's still another couple that i can work on, though. like the one in the pic. it was the first to go through the repair shop, but i didn't do the lod models for it, so it's sort of 'high poly all the way'. it was the one i liked the look of most, so after a wee break on another model, i'm getting back to doing it right 2nd time around.
anybody else think it would look much meaner with no doors on?
[addsig]
nah quaver, the skins stay as they are on those models. i was thinking of a way that i could upload the set of ref smd's and a qc file for the car, for anyone thhat wanted to have a go at editing the original texture and compiling it into their own models subfolder. if anyone fancies trying to paint their own skin, i could supply everything else you'd need. the original skin is car003a_01.vtf, in the models/prop_vehicles folder of your texture directory, btw.
Lep, i dont know how successful the sub-models idea would be, as there are already 4 submodels (LOD's) included. i think one of the stengths of submodels in hl1 was when they used the same textures, so the textures didn't need to be embedded in two sepetate models. with hl2 drawing all of the textures from a seperate folder, i don't see there being much, if any, benefit. maybe for something like a teaset, where you could keep smaller bits and pieces tidy.
oh, btw, the towtruck's just been added to the downloads page.
Ok, so how about a different idle animation where the doors are moved somewhere else, e.g. hidden away inside the body, or underneath the truck embedded in any road it's placed on?
here's a pic of another one that i had a go at skinning myself. as everything was set up for making one skin, it was just as easy to make three, and with three different skins, it would be a waste to use them on only one model.
you can see that the car and the van are the same but different, and i think they're different enough that it's not too noticable. maybe you disagree, but i don't care.
[addsig]
