1960 Ford Starliner Fastback

[Peter Lombardo]

I wrote a lot here….so read it at your own risk.

Introduction

I am sure that most of you have experienced builds like this. This car fought me at every turn. I have said this many times before, that I try and challenge myself with most new builds to try something new and different….like they say no pain, no gain. I feel that this is the best way we learn new techniques and improve our skills. This car provided me with all of the hurtles and challenges that I could possibly want.

As I look back on the construction I see that the main reason that this was a very difficult build came from my original intention of installing a remote control operating driver door into the build. I went through 3 sets of motors and electronics only to finally surrender to the frustrations of none working to my satisfaction.

So the motorized door feature will have to wait for another build once I can work out the electronic and mechanical glitches. The other problems I encountered came from the paint as it is a multilayer paint scheme with problems at every level. This was a classic example of a build that just kept presenting a new problem to be overcome at every juncture and the only reason it was finished was that I refused to accept total defeat and I wanted it done for the NNL East that is coming up in two weeks. So even though this build fell short of my expectations, it served as a real learning experience and has convinced me that I will overcome the logistics of installing a remote control door, of my own design in a future build….OK, enough, on to the specifics of this difficult build.

The Build

Maybe you recall that I posted the original pictures a few months ago when I first stumbled on the idea of this build. I was in the hobby shop looking at a few kits when I saw the AMT 1969 Ford Torino kit on the shelf. This is a kit that never ever appealed to me in the 10 or so years that it has sat on the shelf in Fred’s store. But for some reason, this time the roofline caught my eye.

The day before, I was looking at an older kit in my collection (not the new reissue) of the 1960 Ford and wondering what I could do to that kit to make it different. I like the lines of the car but I was concentrating on the roof and what I could do to improve it. When I saw the roof on the Torino a light bulb went off over my head and the idea was hatched.

I am picking up here where the first post left off…..once the roof was grafted on and the doors opened I began thinking about what to do next. I was not sure what “flavor†I wanted for this build…..I mean, old school, pro street, modern updated custom, or race I just was not sure. I liked the idea of the hood scope and thought that a front air dam would look good, but what to do about the bumpers? I was not sure which way to go with it except that I knew this car would have a different and unusual door opening system. About 4 months ago a friend of mine sent me an e mail with a short video attached of a very different door opening system. It was the Lincoln Mark VIII (I think it was a VIII) anyway, most of you saw this as it was posted here on the forum a few days ago. I saw this and thought it might be perfect for this build…..but upon examination, I saw that it would never work on this build for two main reasons…..1, the door, with the curved shape and interior panel was too thick to fit under the door on this, a car with a proper frame, unlike the unibody modern Lincoln and 2, this build was going to be on the “low†side so there was no way the door would clear the ground….I want to use that opening technique on a future build but it will have to wait until the subject car is right for it.

Anyway, the seed was planted and I wanted a unique opening door for this car. I thought long and hard about a different way to hinge it. I have done the regular, suicide, and Lambo styles but needed to come up with something different. Then it hit me; why not “swing†the door out and up? I have never seen this before (if it has been done before, I have not seen it) so I thought it was certainly unique and always being up for the self-induced challenge, the game was on. The first part was easy, I fabricated two “Z†swing arms for each door, one front and one back and attached them to the bottom of the door and to the top of the inner fenders. These arms fit into aluminum tubes glued in place so that they were free to swivel and allow the door to swing out and up to a position above the door opening. The tricky part was attaching a second swing arm to both so as to stabilize the door to keep it in a vertical position and add some friction to keep the door under control. Because the swing arc of the second arm was different the real challenge was in keeping them on a different plane so that they did not interfere with each other and allowing the base fix point to “slide†so that the swing arms did not bind up and inhibit smooth operation. In the end, the final design was a fairly simple one with the second swing arm attached to an arm with a track within it to allow the swing arm to slide a little in and out as the door arc changes. I think the picture is easier to understand then my explanation but I wanted to attempt an explanation anyway.

I added a hood scope that was lifted from the AMT 1958 Chevy Impala kit. I shaved the emblems with the exception of the Ford crest on the hood front that I just like…don’t know why…just do. As for the bumpers, I was not sure at first but as I progressed it became clear to me that they needed to be molding onto the car and painted the body color. With putty and epoxy I filled in the contours and molded the rear lower rocker trim into the line of the bumper. I covered over the real lower rocker panels “finned†trim so that they flowed into the bumper better.

On the front bumper, I added an air dam with a built in opening to help cool the radiator and added two small ducts with cooling hoses that run to the front brakes. Road lights ala Mustang Shelby GT500 were centered in the lower opening over a mesh grill. The wheels are #1277 Chrome Hela’s from Pegasus with tires lifted from a Radio Shack hop up kit for one of their remote control cars.

Under the hood, I built up the engine pretty much stock with the usual plumbing and wiring to complete the look. I fabricated two tiny struts on either side to hold the hood up like the real car would have. The Interior was built close to stock with the big ‘old bench seats done in off white and a deep blue violet inert on the seats and door panels. The only variations here are the larger rear package shelf for the bigger rear window (in hind sight, I should have added some big ’old speakers on the shelf…oh well, lost opportunity) but with the tinted rear window, you can’t see much back there anyway and I installed a floor shifter to replace the column shifter that came with the kit.

I thought the exhaust outlet would look great right in front of the rear wheel opening kind of like the Shelby Eleanor Mustang. I went with an egg shaped opening to follow along with the shape of the wheel wells and the look of the roof line. I added a bulge along the lower rocker panel leading up to the outlet to simulate the look of a modern “lake pipe†exhaust and to give some definition to

the lower body….kind of an aero skirt flair.

The rear of the car, I think, came out looking great. The shape of the rear of the roofline fits perfectly with the rear slope of the 60 Ford trunk areas. The little side fins extend the long line of the side of the car and flow right into the rear of the car. I then thought that since this car has a street racer flair to it, I liked the idea of the flat black finned air defuser to the lower rear. With the exhaust outlet in front of the rear wheels, I was free to design the rear end treatment without having to allow for the exhaust so the air defuser, ala sport prototype racers seemed a perfect solution. I intentionally omitted trunk lines or an opening because I liked the simple smooth look the rear end and did not want to mare the clean lines.

I thought about putting a chrome gasoline filler cap in the center of the trunk, as the fuel tank was moved from the bottom of the chassis to a position above the rear chassis and under rear trunk area, but it looked so clean without anything I just left it alone. I never really cared much for the tail lights of the original design as the little half moons did nothing for me. And the original design has small inverted half moon designs sculpted in the chrome bumper which I have removed so the whole design needed rethinking for my revision. I thought that I could carry over the big clean smooth design of the rear into a full width fender to fender tail light that would keep the theme of big smooth expansive sheet metal throughout the design. I removed the entire center of the chrome tail trim, secured it in place and filled the entire cavity with Tamiya clear red mixed with clear quick dry epoxy.

I almost embedded the letters F O R D in the center area of the tail light but I thought it might look too gimmicky so I resisted….sometimes less is more and I think this is an example of that.

The paint…..what a royal pain in the butt I had with the paint. First, I could not decide on the color or scheme. I drew the car out on paper, made copies of the simple pen drawing and then colored in the schemes I was thinking about. I had narrowed it down to three designs. One was a Shelby GT500 scheme in pearl white with royal blue wide double stripes…very nice. Two was a CanAm Boss 302 inspired yellow orange scheme with black Boss 302 style stripes also very nice and three was what I ended up with, a multi-layer flamed scheme with a flip-flop violet pearl top coat. (in hindsight, the Boss 302 scheme may have been the real winner here since the car has a real road racer look to it…oh well, I just may have to build another one) Anyway, once the car was primed and block sanded, it was painted a base solid white. For some reason the lacquer paint reacted with, I don’t know, the air or something, but it was not happy and I had to sand off much of it when it dried. Then thinner mist coats of white went on and was sanded without any real problem. Then I laid down a cream solid over the nose and front fenders followed by a medium red violet further back and then a darker blue violet to the rear of that. Once dry, this was clear coated. I then laid down computer designed and cut paint masks of the flame pattern that I wanted over the cream and violet areas on the hood and front fenders. Then the entire car was painted a medium blue very similar to Ford’s Guardsmen Blue. Again, for some reason this paint fought me all the way. I got more fish eyes and strange looking pocks and indentations then I have ever experienced. Just goes to show you that it is sometimes out of your control no matter what you do. I did the best I could to save the blue layer with clear over the top. Then I covered that layer with a mix of Violet flip-flop paint powder pigment mixed with clear lacquer thinned down to blow through my air brush. I then had a brutal time removing the paint mask for the stripes. I will be the first to admit that this is not the best paint job I have ever done, but I do like the color combination very much and like they say “What is done is doneâ€â€¦.the paint is done.

I know, I wrote†War and Peace†here…sorry, but you did not have to read it all so you have no one to blame but yourself. Anyway, I love the look of this car, I just wish the paint was a little better, but I ran out of time because the NNL East is coming and I need to have this and one more car completed in time. I next have to complete my custom 1960 Pontiac Bonneville for the show.

As always, thanks for looking and any and all comments are always welcome.

[09WNS/14BRK]

wow mate looks great

like how the light shines on it too

door are cool too

[Harry P.]

Nice work overall... I especially like the rear 3/4 view. The shape of the side window openings and the roofline remind me of a mid '60s Fury or 300 (that's a good thing! ). I like how the rear edge of the side windows lines up with the top of the rear window and forms a continuous line across the car from side to side. That's a nice styling touch... good attention to detail there.

I like your idea of embedding a "FORD" script across the rear light panel. Maybe a thin chrome trim strip centered in the red area, to break up that large expanse of red, with "FORD" in the cehter. I also might have tried a thin horizontal strip of "backup light" running across the middle of the taillight panel, side to side, and centered top to bottom within the red area.

But even without either of those touches, the back looks good. Nice job!

[Peter Lombardo]

Harry...that looks GREAT!!!!! I wish I thought of that...it is such a big improvement in that it adds the function of a back up light and the sophistication of the trim. It is just enough to break up the large expansion of tail light on my design without over doing it.....yeah, yours looks better. It reminds me of the thunderbird rear treatments in the early seventys. Aces Harry...Aces!!

[evilone]

That is sweet bro great idea and those doors a wicked .

[Jantrix]

Amazing work. That's more than I would want to attempt. Great photo's too.

[RodBurNeR]

This is a pretty crazy custom! I like the way you have the doors open! Did you place a "pull handle" under them for when you want to shut them and drive away? Sorry im too lazy tonight to read all that

[Foxer]

The doors are very interesting. I really like the rear and the paint ... in the end it came out adding much to the build.

[crazyjim]

Your Starliner looks fantastic!

I posted the question some time back about rolling the front & rear pans on this model but never got a reply. I have something pretty decent going with Evergreen. The rear end was easier than the front. I like how you opened another grille in the front pan.

Thanks for the inspiration.

[cruz]

Very cool!!!!

[James Flowers]

I like those doors. How did you get them to work with out binding ? The over all look is great. I like the roof looks good on it. Just one thing how come no trunk? Seems to me there would be a lot of wasted space under there for a street racer.

Edited April 3, 2009 by mustanglover1951

[Peter Lombardo]

In response to the questions:

First, I am sorry that I missed that question about the rolled front and rear bumper pans.

What I do, most of the time, is secure the chrome bumper to the car (in cases where the bumper is an adequate beginning) with super glue and / or epoxy. The bond must be secure. Then I use my Dremel tool with a sand drum to grind down any area that is too high for my design. I then fill any low spots with putty…..usually Bondo type auto filler. Be very careful to remove any chrome in that area so as to provide a strong and rough base for the Bondo to adhere to. The rest is just shaping and filing and cutting to make the roll pan look as I want it to look. In the case of the front of the 60 Ford, once the front bumper was in place, I super glue a sheet of styrene that I “bent†with pliers to the contours of the side to the front to the other side….kind of a large “C†shape. Then I added a thin piece of plastic to the bottom, glued it on, filled in the joint with a little putty and sanded that smooth to represent a lower lip at the bottom of the spoiler, like a real one would have. Then I cut out the opening for the grill. Once open, I added aluminum tubes to the corners secured with super glue. Once dry, I filled in with putty and when dry, sanded them smooth.

As for the “swing arm†hinges for the doors. There are 3 “Z†shape swing arms per door. One in the front and two in the back. I attempted a drawing diagram to help explain the design. It is actually a simple design, but I was trying to motorize the drivers door and that was giving me problems so I postponed that feature until I can work out the logistics of that installation. I will do it on another build. Anyway, I am posting a few more pictures and this diagram and hopefully you can see what I did. The only tricky part is the 3rd swing arm fix point on the body. It attaches to the inside of the door panel on the door so that is easy, but on the body it must go through a “slide†holder to compensate for the different swing arc then the other two swing arms. It is really simpler then it sounds.

[Harry P.]

That's some big-time engineering on those doors!

Seeing that got me thinking... wouldn't it be nice if car doors opened like minivan doors...sliding straight back instead of swinging out. Of course, on a 4-door you'd have to have some sort of system where the rear doors couldn't be opened while the fronts are open, but that would be easy enough to engineer. Just think... no more parking lot door dings!