Ferrari 250 GTO, Chevy Z28 powered: July 26

[Ace-Garageguy]

I got a deal a while back on the curbside version of the Gunze 250 GTO. Though this particular model may have some slight accuracy shortcomings, I really like its rendition of the Ferrari lines. This is one of those cars I'd build in full-scale if I had Bill Gates' money, just to be cheeky (without permanently altering the irreplaceable original, and engineering it to be easily returned to stock).  

                                                                                                       

Since the kit here has no engine, it's a natural for a transplant. A smallblock Chebby fits in just about everything, and it's entirely possible one of these could have been engine-swapped way back when, after it's expensive and temperamental engine developed large vent holes in the block. Before these things got to be stupid money, people actually did things like that. I put a small Mopar Hemi in a Lusso for a customer round about '72 or so.

First order of business is to look at what parts of the Ferrari "engine" are present, and what needs to be removed.

The engine of choice for me is going to be the two-four barrel crossram version (optional over-the-counter for the early Z-28 engine) found in the Monogram 1/24 '57 Chebby. This one is slated to become a big-block, straight axle gasser, so it generously donated its prime mover. With stock internals, tuned right, the engine should make well over 400HP, and its somewhat high-revving and peaky nature suits the Ferrari well...not to mention that's 100 bulletproof HP more than the engine that's native to the car.

                                                                                                               

Getting a first impression of where things will go. A Ford 9" is on the list of mods too. Always nice to be able to dump the clutch and smoke the tires...more than once before replacing it.

 

 

Edited September 21, 2022 by Ace-Garageguy

[cobraman]

Another way cool project.

[Crazy Ed]

   This ought to be interesting. I've got a Testors Ferrari 250GT Calif. Spyder that has had a S/B Chev. in it for a similar project.

[Snake45]

Ferrari looks, Chevy power--what's not to like?

[Ace-Garageguy]

Started prepping the body, scrubbed with hot water, toothbrush, and old-school abrasive cleanser. Body is uniformly scuffed, even in the hard-to-reach places you miss with sandpaper or Scotch-Brite pads.

Prepped the hood the same way, and because this kit is molded from a relatively hard styrene (compared to several recent acquisitions on my shelves), I thought I'd see if I could get away with using the hot SEM self-etching green primer. As this is an alloy bodied car in reality, I kinda wanted to have it sitting on the bench during construction in a primer looking like zinc-chromate. These hot primers have no adverse effect on many vintage kits, including some Johan and older AMT models I've used it on...all made back in the day when using the cheapest bottom-of-the-barrel styrene concoction to squeeze every last nickel of profit out of the kit wasn't thought to be a great idea.

Anyway, the hot SEM primer attacked and crazed the Gunze plastic immediately. Pretty deep crazing. I can fix it, and the danger of this happening is why I chose to experiment on a relatively small body part, rather than just shooting the whole thing. A very good illustration of why TEST FIRST is good advice.

[Pim]

cool idea for a build mate will look awesome when done a bit like an italian cobra 

[Dann Tier]

Never saw this kit before, it may not be 100% right, but it looks like a great kit.

[superbike-shaun]

hey Ace. cool project! ive got 3 of these Gunze Sanyo kits but they arent the curbside kits.

[Ace-Garageguy]

Thanks for the interest. 

I stopped after the pretty awful crazing problem on the hood, but several careful coats of PlastiKote scratch-filler primer have got it saved. I need to do some tests with the stuff on the undersides of some of the kit parts, scuffed like I did the body, to make sire it's not too hot for this particular bare plastic.

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

It's been a while on this one, but I've been doing some testing, learning how to deal with some problems, etc.

I tried a couple of different methods of shooting the body with HOT self-etching primer, in part because I'd wanted to leave her in chromate green through the build process. And she crazed like crazy no matter what I did.

Even though this particular kit misses the accuracy mark in a few places, overall I just prefer this rendition of the 250 GTO to even the real one...except that odd rear wheel arch. Adding material in the form of .030" strips...

While that was setting up, I started addressing the wheels I want to use. They're 1/25, and fall through the 1/24 tires I want. Solution: a strip of .020 styrene around the rim. And it's OK. Some of the earlier Americans had really thick looking rims.

After painting, they'll look close enough to possible period-correct for this build. Raised lettering is being removed from the tire as well. Took some more experimenting to get that working 100%, too.

Sculpting and rounding the first wheel arch...and the primer crazing is really apparent here. This is a fairly expensive kit, and giving up on it wasn't an option I liked.

About done with the first phase of the wheel arch mod...

 

 

Edited June 17, 2020 by Ace-Garageguy

[Ace-Garageguy]

Now for the really cool part (I think so, anyway).

She'd crazed down in the panel lines, and it also looked like by the time I had everything blocked, some of tthe lines would be getting pretty shallow.

So I bought a set of the Tamiya panel-line engraving tools. Expensive, and they took over 60 days to get here due to the Covid mess...but boy damm howdy, are they great.

Made a transfer template of the new wheel opening to insure the other side will match, with some reference marks.

Getting the wheel arches round is simply a matter of finding something with the right diameter and sticking some sandpaper to it...

Body with wheel arches done, puttied, and all the crazing sanded out, panel lines deepened...Even though the surface is level and smooth at this point, the effects of the crazing are still evident here. But I didn't want to get too aggressive and start losing body contours. In the event, the green was a good guide-coat for showing some mold lines and other imperfections. That apparent crack on the decklid was why I got a pretty good deal on this thing, too. Now fixed, permanently. There's a learning curve with the scribing tools, and you can see where my hand slipped a couple of times, but nothing terminal, and easily corrected.

Two coats of Tamiya fine white surfacing primer. Another first for me...and damm is that stuff great too. If you want good work without having everything go wrong, spend a few bucks for top-line materials. There are a few tiny flaws to address, another coat of primer, and she's ready for paint. I'm really happy I was able to save this one relatively easily...especially since I knew better but buggered her in the beginning anyway.

 

[afx]

I like this kit too despite it's flaws.  Gunze did a high-tech version both with and without full engine detail.  The kit was also issued under the Airfix banner.

Edited June 17, 2020 by afx

[89AKurt]

I missed this before, cool to see one of these getting built.  I have the engine-less version.  I'm glad to have discovered Tamiya primer.

[Spottedlaurel]

This is great to see, your reasoning is exactly why I'm building this thing:

1:24 Monogram Maserati 3500 GT kit by Spottedlaurel, on Flickr

I'm even using some bits from the same '57 Chevy donor (although I can't remember where the basic V8 engine and 'box came from in mine).

Rear arch aside the basic Ferrari bodyshell does look like a good rendition of the real thing. Are you going to be equally heretical on the colour and paint it something other than red?

Good work on the wheels.

[Ace-Garageguy]

On 6/16/2020 at 9:33 PM, afx said:

I like this kit too despite it's flaws.  Gunze did a high-tech version both with and without full engine detail.  The kit was also issued under the Airfix banner.

Thanks for the heads-up on the Airfix version. I'm looking for another engineless one to do something else a little different, and boy, have the prices climbed since last time I looked.

[Ace-Garageguy]

On 6/17/2020 at 1:05 AM, 89AKurt said:

I missed this before, cool to see one of these getting built.  I have the engine-less version.  I'm glad to have discovered Tamiya primer.

Thanks for your interest. I'm kicking myself for holding off so long to try the Tamiya stuff, but Duplicolor and PlastiKoke used to work so nicely...

[Ace-Garageguy]

On 6/17/2020 at 1:51 AM, Spottedlaurel said:

This is great to see, your reasoning is exactly why I'm building this thing...

...Are you going to be equally heretical on the colour and paint it something other than red?

Thanks for your interest too.

I like that hot-rod Maserati.

And yes, it's not going to be red.   

 

[Deuces ll]

13 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Thanks for your interest. I'm kicking myself for holding off so long to try the Tamiya stuff, but Duplicolor and PlastiKoke used to work so nicely...

Ever try to use a Tamia spray nozzle on a duplicolor or plasticote can????? You could even try swapping out the spray tips.... It's worth a try!!!..... 

[dave branson]

On 6/17/2020 at 12:51 AM, Spottedlaurel said:

This is great to see, your reasoning is exactly why I'm building this thing:

1:24 Monogram Maserati 3500 GT kit by Spottedlaurel, on Flickr

I'm even using some bits from the same '57 Chevy donor (although I can't remember where the basic V8 engine and 'box came from in mine).

Rear arch aside the basic Ferrari bodyshell does look like a good rendition of the real thing. Are you going to be equally heretical on the colour and paint it something other than red?

Good work on the wheels.

Always thought the Maserati would make a beautiful Convertible