Question of the day: "So why did they do it that way?"

[Greg Myers]

Looking at the Old Pro Nova kit got me to thinking,

why did they do the fenders the way they did? Having them separate from the body seems to serve absolutely no purpose. I was thinking maybe a flip nose gasser, but that wouldn't be quite right on this car.

I think there are quit a few other kits out there with this type situation. The Revell 1940 Ford Coupe kits have a strange set up with their front fenders attached to the body, just the opposite from the Nova kit, the rears being separate. I was expecting something more like the old AMT 1940 kits with the fenders all together.

I wonder what other kits have any strange set ups with major parts assembly's ?

[John Goschke]

Maybe they did it that way so they could more easily produce a kit of Pontiac's glorified Nova, the Ventura? Can't remember if they ever did though...

[mrknowetall]

They did produce the Ventura kit for a fairly short time.

[Rob Hall]

I've always assumed it was done that way so the Nova and Ventura II kits could share the body.

[Mark]

There was also the "Novacaine" funny car, which used the stock Nova body but with different front fenders. On those, the wheel openings are so far forward the front edges are off the fender...

[Greg Myers]

Would you look at that.

Edited August 6, 2013 by Greg Myers

[slusher]

l bought the AMT Nova about 10 years ago and thought l got a bargin until l opened the box and saw the front fenders and molded in black. l gave it to a friend...

[Harry P.]

Hmmm... a funny car with doors...

[Tom Geiger]

Hmmm... a funny car with doors...

That was the 70s! And ya know, nobody complained! As a kid one of my favorite kits was the Scat City Funny Car. 1970 Dodge Super Bee. The very same stock body AMT put on the stock / drag kit that's still being released today.

[Art Anderson]

As pointed out, the front fenders were done as separate parts in order for a Ventura to be produced at minimal tooling cost, It was a novel way ot attacking that concept, even if it didn't work out to 21st Century standards.

Art

[Greg Myers]

So I guess it was for different versions ?

What about the Revell '40 Ford Convertible / Coupe ? It had some goofy fender treatment also.

[Tom Geiger]

As pointed out, the front fenders were done as separate parts in order for a Ventura to be produced at minimal tooling cost, It was a novel way ot attacking that concept, even if it didn't work out to 21st Century standards.

It was AMTs solution on how to get three kits out of one tool. Seems they got the stock Nova, the Ventura and the Nova funny car. Great solution for the times when most of their clientele were kids. Note that MPC did the same thing with the Multi Maverick to give the two different wheelbases.

Criticizing it is like putting a 1970 Nova next to a 2013 Impala. The new car is so much more sophisticated there's no comparison. Likewise, our hobby, tooling technology and the detail level and accuracy of kits has grown. We should be happy with that!

Edited August 7, 2013 by Tom Geiger

[Art Anderson]

It was AMTs solution on how to get three kits out of one tool. Seems they got the stock Nova, the Ventura and the Nova funny car. Great solution for the times when most of their clientele were kids. Note that MPC did the same thing with the Multi Maverick to give the two different wheelbases.

Criticizing it is like putting a 1970 Nova next to a 2013 Impala. The new car is so much more sophisticated there's no comparison. Likewise, our hobby, tooling technology and the detail level and accuracy of kits has grown. We should be happy with that!

Tom has it quite correct IMO. If anyone were to stop and think for a moment--the basic idea was a good one, but with the somewhat "primitive-by-21st-Century-standards" technology of 1969 (when this kit was concieved and worked up) the execution leaves a good bit to be desired by today's model car builders. It's the very same reason that AMT laid out their 1965 Pontiac GTO as they did--give the model builder the option of building either a hardtop or a convertible in the same kit (let's not forget that Monogram did very much the same thing with their mid-1960's release of their now-legendary 1955 Chevrolet Bel Air hardop/convertible kit, their 1930 Model A Ford coupe/cabriolet, 1934 Ford coupe/cabriolet, and their 1936 Ford coupe/roadster--AS DID AMT with the '36 Ford coupe/roadster. Monogram carried the idea even further with a 1/48 scale Lockheed P-38 Lightning (a kit that still surfaces periodically in their lineup in single version only) which originally had 6 different variations possible all in one model kit (P-38J fighter, P-38L bomber pathfinder, P-38 night fighter, plus all the possible armament variations they could pack into a box and sell for $2!).

In short, the 1960's was the era when model kits of many subjects were being introduced with multiple variations, not necessarily limited to the common AMT-inspired "stock, custom and racing" 3in1 type kits.

From a cost standpoint, the '70 Nova/Ventura kit made a lot of sense: It was less expensive to create and tool a body shell sans front fenders, which could then be tooled separately in order to produce two different variations of the same car without having to mock up and tool the entire body shell (body shells are arguably the most expensive and difficult part of any model car kit to tool up). Couple those optional (at the production stage) front fenders with being able to change out the essential chrome trim items such as grilles, taillight bezels and hubcaps or wheel covers, and the relatively simple interior parts) and the concept became a very practical one. Only one problem though: IIRC, those front fenders didn't mate up to the body shell very well without a good bit of fiddling and finessing--but that was an issue of the available technology of the day, and quite likely cost concerns--plus considering that model car kits were considered by an entire hobby industry from top-to-bottom, side-to-side, and front-to-back to be a kid thing (face it, back 40-plus years ago, not many adults were building model cars--mostly kids).

In the bottom line, doesn't it make a bit of sense for us grownups to realize that, particularly when one encounters wire axles being used in a model kit, that the kit in question didn't originate last week--but is molded from tooling cut decades ago?

Art

[Tom Geiger]

--plus considering that model car kits were considered by an entire hobby industry from top-to-bottom, side-to-side, and front-to-back to be a kid thing (face it, back 40-plus years ago, not many adults were building model cars--mostly kids).

In conversation with the legendary Bob Paeth of Revell fame, Bob was absolutely humbled that people today remember and collect his work. He said back then, they were just making toys, and dealing with the present. They had no idea what the hobby would become!

[Greg Myers]

OK, ok, ok, I get it. What about the other kits? You know, the other ones with wonky stuff in them. Like the Revell '40 Ford Coupe / Convertible ?

[Art Anderson]

So I guess it was for different versions ?

What about the Revell '40 Ford Convertible / Coupe ? It had some goofy fender treatment also.

Greg,

I'm not sure just what you mean by "It had some goofy fender treatment also"? Unless I'm missing something, I don't really see anything odd about the body shell or the fenders, or the way the rear fenders mount--unless you are questioning the raised "molding" around the circumference of the rear fender opening on the body shell? If so, while that molding is a bit heavy-handed, there should be one there, as well as between the front quarter panel of the body, and the rearmost portion of the front fenders: On the real '40 Ford (as produced, and as should be on any model of virtually every "fat fendered" car) the manufacturer used a "welting" between fender and body for two purposes: One was to seal the joint between fender and body shell against dust and in wet weather, serving to keep water out of the joint as well. That welting had a rounded "bead" along the edge showing at the surface of the body/fender joint. Revell executed it for the rear fenders, but forgot to tool in the one on the front fender trailing edge.

Does this answer your question?

Art

[Greg Myers]

I guess I was expecting something like the old AMT '40 coupe/sedan/ sedan delivery where the fenders were one unit and the body another, kind of like the real car, instead of the Revell two connected , two not.

The whole thread was supposed to be about how model company's come up with "creative" ideas to put parts together ( i.e. the Nova fenders), thus the title, "So why did they do it that way?"

Edited August 9, 2013 by Greg Myers

[Art Anderson]

If I am not mistaken, Greg's beef with the Revell 40 Ford is the seperate rear fenders, versus a one piece body.

Hmmm.

Considering that on a real 1940 Ford all 4 fenders are separate from the body shell, I'm not entirely sure why the parts layout of the Revell kit would be somehow "wonky". Of course, the front fenders, given their relatively short area of attachment to the body shell itself (on the real car, the front fenders are primarily bolted to the top of the frame rails by way of the inner fender splash aprons, and only the trailing edge is secured to the body shell itself) which would make assembling them to the model rather problematic. After all, one only needs to experience building the 1959-introduced (yeah, it's been THAT long ago) AMT 1940 Ford coupe to see the problems not only with front fender alignment, not to mention the poor fit of the hood on the AMT kit (up front, all those parts do relate directly to each other, certainly in fitting properly, on the real '40 Ford as well as any model kit of one).

On many model car kit body shells, the styling of the actual car can cause real engineering headaches when it comes to creating model kit tooling, if the people developing the model kit are going to achieve the correct shapes and contours while making the kit assemble in at least some semblance of a logical manner. Perhaps nowhere is this more a problem than when designing a model kit of the so-called "fat fendered" cars of the era 1935-48, given their overall shapes and combinations of shapes. Where does the designer go, when faced with either making the body shell, including fenders and exposed running boards as a one-piece unit which likely would mean altering body and fender shapes to make the one-piece unit come out of the steel molds, or making the body shell with those added sheet metal parts separate from each other, just as the automaker did? When one really thinks about this--aren't we expecting model companies to take a body shell, which in real life in the case of the '40 Ford coupe, was built from at least 17 sheet metal panels (all painted body color BTW), and reduce those to just one molded part? What about the somewhat slightly inward-curving sides of the body shell which are a key part of the styling of that car? (On the '40 Ford, the bodies are several inches wider at the belt line than they are at the bottom (rocker panel area), which would make the tooling AND the engineering of plastic flow in the tooling even more complicated than it is as the body stands as produced in the kit. Doing a body shell like this completely in one piece including all 4 fenders and the running boards could well mean more separate mold cores (which of course would mean more mold parting lines to clean up!) and add significantly to the cost of the tooling--not to mention the painting and polishing problems that would be the end result. With the complete restyling of Ford cars that happened for model year 1941, and carried over through the 1948 model year, most of that goes away, given that for '41, while Fords (as with most all other new cars) still had running boards, they were hidden inside the bottom of the doors, becoming little more than a narrow step-plate rather than a wide, traditional platform on which driver and passengers planted their feet firmly in order to climb up and into the car body).

Another problem that would have arisen had Revell engineered this kit with the rear fenders molded as a part of the body shell would have been the very tight and deep area at the lower leading edge of the rear fenders! I can't imagine trying to polish out paint in that area at all!.

All in all, while I see some minor inaccuracies in Revell's rendition; the overly heavy drain moldings along the edges of the roof, and the rather heavy, rounded chrome spears down the body and hood sides (on the real car, those spears are flat in cross section, not rounded as on the Revell kit, with a finely ribbed, not smooth, facing to them--AMT did get that right on their kit). And, I'll put up with assembling the rear fenders and running boards to the body as separate parts, rather than having to live with the ill-fitting fenders/running board unit of the now 54-year old AMT tooling.

Art

[Greg Myers]

My head hurts.

[midwest 1953]

It comes down to.. the front fenders are attached to the body to make it easier to align the hood with both the body and fenders.

The rear fenders are separate, because it is easier to make the tool that way, and there is no alignment problem there..