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Is there a way that somebody could tell me how to take the body model off one chassis and put a different body on it, or is there a tutorial that I can read. I've read a number of different tutorials but they are all about building trucks from scratch, and all I want to do is a body swap from one chassis to another.

Delete all the faces of the frame or body whichever you don't need or one then the other to save both as separate models. Don't forget to delete unused verts and save under a new name.

Press the space bar to highlight the first face then click the 'Follow Current Face' icon . Hold down the space bar to cycle through all the faces quickly. The faces will be ordered in two sequential groups, first the body then the frame or vise versa. By cycling through the faces determine which is the first of the portion you want to delete, lets say it's the frame. Once on the first frame face hold down the Ctrl key then the Delete key until all the frame faces are gone... be careful to stop before you get to any body faces... if you do delete some body faces by accident just close the model without saving and open and try again. Once you've succesfully deleted all the frame faces go to the Vertex menu and click the Delete All Unused option and save the model under a new name.
Now select all the vertices by holding down the Alt key and pressing A. With all the verts selected go to the Groups menu and click on Vertex Groups, give the group a name then click Save Current then close the box and save the model again. You will open that saved group to center/translate the body model onto it's new frame when the time comes.

Repeat the above to save a desired frame.

To ressemble, open up the body model then go to the Insert menu, click on the Model option and select your new frame. Save the new assembly with a New name.

Tip, do your face mapping before assembly to make life easier. Save often, there is no undo option.

That's a quick and dirty 'how to'. I'll elaborate if you need more help, just ask.

http://binedit.com/help/

Ok, so far so good, I got the body on the new chassis, but could you help me with the mapping part of it, because I tried to put the new body and chassis on wheels but the model base name came up in red and it wouldn't load. Could that be a result of not mapping it?

I don't think that mapping's your problem. Mapping just rearranges where the paint goes and would not cause an error in the truck maker unless the textures were missing.

The red text indicates either a missing bin file from the models folder or misnamed bin file. If the red text is adjacent to the body model name then you should double check the file name and be sure it's in the model folder.

I have a hunch that the problem has something to do with the tire models because they require 3 sets of tire models and their names need to be specific to one another.... a little tricky but easily fixed
Check this page for more details... Custom Wheels

And there's this for more info... BEtruckedit.htm

okay. I was doing the steps as well. I've gotton up to here:



now I'm kind of lost. how do I move the frame downwards so that is doesn't go throug the body?

That's where saving Vertex Groups comes in handy.

You need to select all vertices in the frame and/or in the body via the Alt+A key combo then 'save' the selected vertice group under binedits Groups menu. Once that's done and saved you will be able to Load that vertex group after you import the other half of the truck (frame, body, engine, or whatever model you insert).

To move the selected vertex group you open the Model/Translate menu ... see the 'Translate' description here ... http://binedit.com/help/ .... for more info. [note to myself; that page does not include key functions]

Key combo functions for translating selected vertice groups

Alt+Z = moves selected vert group along the positive Z (BLUE) axis
Alt+X = moves selected vert group along the positive X (RED) axis
Alt+Y = moves selected vert group along the positive Y (GREEN) axis

and.... Holding down the Shift key along with Alt and Z, X, or Y reverses the respective direction

under binedits Help/Keyboard Map menu you'll find more keyboard shortcut details.

Mine worked like a charm! You were right, it was the tires. I just opened all six of the tires that i wanted to use and saved them as a name that corresponded with the name that I gave the new body and chassis assembly. Thanks a million for all your help Mal, I really appreciate it.

cool. thanks for the advice Malibu350.