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Classic Alfa


Harry P.

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Here's one I finished a while ago, but I don't think I've ever posted it here on this forum. It's the Pocher 1932 Alfa Touring coupe. Pocher actually did three versions of this car, the coupe, the fenderless race version and the hardtop "Dinner Jacket" formal coupe. The engine/chassis are identical on all three, only the bodywork differs.

Here's where I started–the engine. In this partially built-up engine assembly you can see the pistons in their individual metal cylinder sleeves. The crank is built up piece by piece, and the connecting rods, pistons, wrist pins and even piston rings are separate pieces, in typical Pocher detail-overkill fashion. Yes, the crankshaft rotates and the pistons move up and down when you turn the starting crank. The problem is, you never see that once the model is built! B) Paint is a mix of Testors Metalizers, Duplicolor and "Odds'n'Ends" brand pewter for the block. Everything you see here is included in the kit except the hose clamps, which I scratchbuilt.

alfaprogress1.jpg

Here is the top end. Camshafts are actually present under those cam covers, but again, once the model is built you'd never know that. In this photo, what you see is comprised of over 60 separate pieces!

alfaprogres2.jpg

Here is the front axle assembly. The brakes actually work from the pedal through all the levers right down to the operational brake shoes. I should say the brakes theoretically work. From past experience I found that the "operational" brakes on a Pocher kit will never work, no matter how carefully you build the model, because there's way too much slack in the system. You can push the pedal to the floor and still not get enough movement through the system to actually move the shoes, so I just left the shoes off. Once the wheels are installed nobody would ever know the difference anyway! ;) I did, however, include all the visible brake parts on the inboard side of the wheels.

alfaprogres3.jpg

Next up: chassis and cockpit details...

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That stuff looks gorgeous, but all that detail INSIDE the engine .. insane! This I find silly and it hurts me building with hidden detail like this. Even the crude Competition Pack engines compared to a Pocher kit are heartbreaking to hide those cranks and cams.

Fantastic job on the look of this so far, Harry ... 30 odd shades of metallics ... yes! .. )) .. you're teasing us.. MORE, MORE, MORE!!!! :P

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First off, this is breathtaking. How much is Pocher and how much is the builder without seeing the raw kit is impossible to convey, especially with such superb photography. I've seen a raw Pocher kit, and despite the hyper-detailing and astronomical parts count, believe me when I say it's the builder! I hope you can carry us through to the finish, Harry. The subject matter is gorgeous, Pocher's modeling of it second to none, but it's a rare occasion when someone shares a build of this quality and complexity. Besides, it's your chance to permanently retire the belt for maximum number of views on a single thread on the MCM forum! <_< How about posting builds #1 through #4, perhaps in the Under Glass section so those folks who might ignore the Big Boyz section won't miss them?

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The wheels are built up like the real thing... spoke by individual spoke. Each wheel is comprised of 3 different spokes. The spokes are built in 3 separate layers, with a tiny nipple on each end of each spoke. Here are the spokes for one wheel:

alfaprogress13-1.jpg

Here is an example of the size of one of the spoke nipples:

alfaprogress14.jpg

You build each wheel by first assembling a 7-piece hub, then lacing a layer of spokes (each spoke getting 2 nipples slipped on, 1 on each end) onto the hub and an outer ring. You have to make sure the spokes are arranged correctly and cross over each other correctly. Once you lace the first spoke layer, another outer spacer ring is added, then the second layer of spokes (laced in a different pattern than the first layer), then another outer spacer ring, then the third layer of spokes (yet another different pattern!) with a third spacer ring, and this "sandwich" of spokes and spacer rings is screwed together, and finally the outer two metal rims are screwed on. Each wheel has approx. 200 individual parts... and this car has 6 wheels, 4 road wheels and 2 spares. Building all six wheels is a major project all by itself! Luckily, Pocher supplies plenty of extra spokes and nipples, because these parts are very small and easy to drop and lose... especially the tiny spoke nipples.

alfaprogress12.jpg

You can't ask for more realism, because each wire wheel is an actual wire wheel... only 8 times smaller than the original.

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How the doors were built...

Here's an exploded view of the door components. You can see the outer handle, shaft and screw "A", and the latch and associated bits and pieces marked "B." You can also see how the latch mechanism fits into the door (the ghosted latch assembly in place). The 3 screw bosses for attaching the inner door panel (in the red circles) were too long, and besides, the screws themselves were not countersunk, so if I had used the kit supplied screws to attach the inner door panel, the screws would have stuck out and created 3 bumps under the leather upholstery. So I just cut off the 3 mounting bosses and glued the panel in place instead.

alfaprogress20.jpg

Here's how the latch mechanism works:

alfaprogress28.jpg

And here is how the doors look after the leather upholstery is applied. Now you can see how the 3 protruding screwheads would have caused a bump behind the leather.

alfaprogress34.jpg

I attached the map pockets by first gluing the front edge to the door panel, letting the glue dry and then gluing the back edge in place, but pushing the back edge slightly forward so that the "pocket" stuck out a bit and wasn't just flat against the door upholstery.

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That's quite an extension on the door for the hinge.

It has to be that way. The upper and lower hinge points have to be vertical for the door to swing open "level." If the upper hinge was located right at the front edge of the door, the upper hinge would be somewhat further to the rear of the car than the lower hinge... and the doors wouldn't open level, but they would swing out... and up.

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  • 1 month later...

A little more...

The model comes with leather upholstery for the seat and interior. Unfortunately, the seat is molded as one piece with the body, which means you would have to paint the body, and polish it, then upholster the seat without messing up the finished paint. Impossible.

The first step was to use the back side of a #11 X-acto blade to carefully scribe the seat away from the body. It took some time, but if you're careful and patient, it'll work... eventually! (the dark spots you see on the body is epoxy filler, used to correct flaws–mostly sink marks–in the body).

alfaprogress16.jpg

Now that the seat was separated from the body I could upholster it much more easily, without worrying about ruining the paint on the body. Pocher supplies a sheet of leather with all the individual pieces for the interior die-cut. I used contact cement to attach the upholstery pieces to the seat. As you know, with contact cement you get one chance... kind of nerve-wracking when you're working on a $500 kit. I did several "dry runs" to get a feel for how the leather would fit and how best to apply it. Then the contact cement and the moment of truth. It turned out pretty well...

alfaprogress27.jpg

After I painted the body and foiled the side spear trim, I reattached the upholstered seat by using strips if sheet styrene as "bridges" between the body and the seat. Here's a shot of an early test fit of the body with upholstered interior sitting on the chassis. Note how the leather upholstery wraps around the tops of the doors and across the body above the dash, forming a leather "bolster" around the cockpit. Getting the leather to stretch and follow these contours was a bit of a challenge, but it worked out well in the end.

alfaprogress35.jpg

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Harry, I picked up a Monza kit off ego-bay. It's partially assemble so I have to take it apart first. My question is about the chassis color. I like the semi-gloss black, but every photo I've seen has the chassis the same color as the body. Is this a Gran Sport thing or would black be correct for the Monza also? Thanks in advance!

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All the Monza photos I've seen have the chassis matching the body color, so I'd guess that would be the way to go. I haven't seen a photo of a Monza that had the chassis painted different than the body. I did a "custom" color scheme, it's not necessarily accurate, but I like it!

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.....Here is the top end. Camshafts are actually present under those cam covers, but again, once the model is built you'd never know that. In this photo, what you see is comprised of over 60 separate pieces!

alfaprogres2.jpg

Here is the front axle assembly. The brakes actually work from the pedal through all the levers right down to the operational brake shoes. I should say the brakes theoretically work. From past experience I found that the "operational" brakes on a Pocher kit will never work, no matter how carefully you build the model, because there's way too much slack in the system. You can push the pedal to the floor and still not get enough movement through the system to actually move the shoes, so I just left the shoes off. Once the wheels are installed nobody would ever know the difference anyway! :P I did, however, include all the visible brake parts on the inboard side of the wheels.

alfaprogres3.jpg

First off-- beautiful work Harry, on a beauty of a model. Yeah, it is a shame about all those 'hidden once assembled details', but what a thrill for the builder, and what better for a model car forum, than the WIP pics showing all those wonderful li'l details before they get hidden away! ;)

Am I correct in assuming that the 1:1 Alpha had mechanical brakes? If so, the problem you speak of being inherent to the Pocher kits brakes would be very prototypical from what I understand. Used to work with a fellow whose Dad was a volunteer fireman who drove a firetruck with mechanical brakes, and he said that they needed adjusted constantly if you wanted them to actually work!

Thanks again for sharing all the WIP pics-- priceless! :lol:

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First off-- beautiful work Harry, on a beauty of a model. Yeah, it is a shame about all those 'hidden once assembled details', but what a thrill for the builder, and what better for a model car forum, than the WIP pics showing all those wonderful li'l details before they get hidden away! ;)

Am I correct in assuming that the 1:1 Alpha had mechanical brakes? If so, the problem you speak of being inherent to the Pocher kits brakes would be very prototypical from what I understand. Used to work with a fellow whose Dad was a volunteer fireman who drove a firetruck with mechanical brakes, and he said that they needed adjusted constantly if you wanted them to actually work!

Thanks again for sharing all the WIP pics-- priceless! :lol:

Yup, the real deal had mechanical brakes. I'm sure those brakes kept a lot of mechanics real busy! There are a lot of connections along the way from brake pedal to brake shoes. The kit brake system has all the individual linkages, rods, levers, etc. that the real system had, but of course the tolerances of the kit parts are nowhere near tight enough for the brakes to work... there's way too much play in the system. I read once where the only way to make a Pocher kit's brake system really work is to scratchbuild all the various linkages to much tighter tolerances... and I'm not about to spend the time needed to do that! :P

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More...

Pocher kits are known for their "issues" regarding the fit of various parts. Now, given the fact that the average Pocher kit has between 2,000 and 3,000 parts, a few fit issues are to be expected... but the problem is, in most cases you don't realize the problem until it's too late. In other words, there's no way for the builder to anticipate certain problems until they make themselves obvious, and by that time it's often too late (or a major PITA) to disassemble things and go back to correct the problem.

Here's a perfect example. The car has a centrally mounted oil tank that sits between the frame rails under the floorboard. The filler for the tank is located on the right side of the car... the filler neck and cap protrude through a hole in the right side running board. (Yeah, the fenders are molded in that bright electric blue!)

Unfortunately, the filler neck of the tank and the hole in the running board don't line up. And there's no way to know this until you've assembled the frame. Here's the problem, discovered too late:

alfaprogress24.jpg

The hole on the running board doesn't line up with the neck of the tank. At this point I had two choices: Either disassemble the frame so that I could remove the tank and mount it further forward in the frame, or modify the running board. Moving the tank forward would also affect the location of too many other chassis components, so that was not an option. I could have disassembled the frame, removed the tank, cut off the filler neck, reattach it to the tank and then rebuild the chassis, but at this point I figured it would be easier to modify the as-yet unmounted fender/running board. Here's a photo that shows how far the hole had to be moved (distance "A"):

alfaprogress25.jpg

So I measured, then carefully cut the running board apart, using a razor saw to make the perpendicular cuts and scribing the longitudinal cuts with the back side of my X-acto blade until the pieces came free, and reassembled the cut pieces as shown here:

alfaprogress26.jpg

I reinforced the joints with sheet styrene from below, filled the gaps with Bondo and sanded everything smooth... all the time being careful to keep the running board ridges untouched. It was a pretty delicate operation, and the results were not perfect... but pretty close!

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Ok, now that the running board has been modified, back to some more chassis assembly. Here's a shot of the radiator housing...

alfaprogress31.jpg

The shell is a one-piece plated metal stamping. I masked off the outer portion and sprayed the grille with Krylon semi-gloss black. Once the paint was dry I took some very fine sandpaper and removed the paint from the "Alfa Romeo" script to reveal the original plated surface. Since the grille shell is a plated metal piece, a little light sanding with very fine sandpaper didn't hurt the finish (a plated plastic piece would have gotten scratched). The gold medallion at the top is a separate kit piece, and the filler neck is brass. Those two weird things on each side of the grille shell are the headlight brackets, and the loose wires you see are the wires for the headlights, which at this point still had to be routed neatly along the chassis.

Here's a shot from the same angle but a little further along in the process:

alfaprogress40.jpg

You can see the headlights are mounted and wired, all I needed to do now was add the reflector buckets, bulbs, lenses and outer trim rings. The parts in this photo that look like real plated metal, like the crank, the horns, etc. really are plated metal. I left a lot of the metal chassis components unpainted (not prototypically correct)... but I liked the look of the plated components against the black of the chassis.

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The hood doesn't fit very well. It's a bit too short.

alfaprogress33.jpg

I could have added length to either the front or the back... but I decided to add length to both front and back, thereby keeping the hood hinge centered front to back. I used sheet styrene the same thickness as the hood and added a bit to both the front and the back, then smoothed everything out with Bondo:

alfaprogress38.jpg

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