'57 Ford Custom Police Car.

[1 bad55 stan]

Nice work,Are you going to detail the engine?

[slusher]

Engine is looing great...

[W-409]

Thanks Guys for the nice comments, they mean a lot!

Stan: Yes, I'll detail the engine as nicely as I can. I'm not the best builder in the world, but I like to try detailing these things as nicely as possible.

[charlie8575]

You did a very nice job on that engine. Indicator of what's to come.

Niko, don't short-sell yourself too much. You do some really good work.

Charlie Larkin

[dragzz]

u have done vary nice and clean work there keep it up

[W-409]

Thanks, Charlie and Thomas! I'm pretty happy with the work I can do, but there is a lot to improve, too.

I got a little work done with the engine. I painted all parts and glued some of them together, but the main thing was that I put the spark plug wires on. I also added that coil wire and the next thing will be fuel lines. I've been looking for lots of reference pics, as I don't know much about these Ford engines. I think I got the fuel lines figured out, though. That should be tomorrow's thing, if I have time.

I also cut the kit's plastic fuel line away from Fuel Filter and painted it with silver. I made the connectors for fuel lines on that part and glued them on. I still have to paint them.

[1 bad55 stan]

that engine is looken real good,nice pluming..

[W-409]

Thanks Stan, I appreciate the kind words! Especially when coming from such a talented builder like you.

I got the fuel line done today. I used metal wire for that and it was really easy to get there. I also added the other line, but I don't actually know what is it. There's missing a line between that black junction block and firewall, but that can't be installed before I got the engine and firewall on place. My next steps will be adding the generator and the belt. Also carburetor linkage needs to be done.

[Lovefordgalaxie]

That other line is a vacuum line.

The fuel pump was also a vacuum pump, and the intake manifold was also a vacuum source. This way the windshield wipers would work ok under acceleration and at idle.

[W-409]

Time flies, they say... It has been six years since I have worked on this project. And actually I haven't been building pretty much anything scale model related for a year as I've been busy with 1:1 scale cars and other life...

But last weekend I took this '57 Ford back on the bench. I'm not sure if it will get finished this time, but I'm going to try anyway.

I prepped the chassis ready for paint and shot a coat of primer on it. That looked good so then I sprayed flat black from a spray can. Gas tank, spare tire cover and frame were brush painted with Revell Enamel colors.

Rear axle was painted gloss black. Brake line was molded to the axle so I painted that silver. The case and springs are gun metal with some black washing done with The Detailer and bolt ends were painted silver.

'

Engine is pretty close of being done. It is missing some small detailing and a few little parts... Hope to have the engine installed soon.

 

[W-409]

More progress, front axle parts painted with several different colors. It was nice to see that ball joints and everything were molded really nicely to the A-Arms as many kits are lacking those details.

Driveshaft painted...

And here is the engine ready to be installed on place. I built a generator bracket from sheet styrene. Some small details like a carburetor linkage and generator wiring will be added later on when firewall and everything is installed.

Then I glued the frame and chassis floor together. Exhaust pipes were not the easiest ones to install, but after some fiddling they fit fine. Front and rear suspension were installed too. Everything fit really nicely, except that I had to trim the rear shocks a little to fit properly. Not a big deal though.

Wheels were painted gloss black. The white ring with silver Ford-lettering on the hubcaps was offered as decals, but while the letters on hubcaps were raised, there would be no way to get the decals applied cleanly. So I painted the white area and dry-brushed silver to the tiny Ford letters. Not perfect, but came out decent I guess.

 

 

[espo]

Glad to see you are back working on this Ford. I like the way you detailed the hub caps as it looks better than the decals. The engine and chassis painting looks very realistic. 

[Bills72sj]

I agree. Very nice detail work.

[Vietnam Vet67]

Saw this restored one at Selfridge Air show from the Michigan State Police.

[Sledsel]

I love all the detail paint work and you are doing a great job on this kit, but it is far from correct.The body has a ton of flaws that make the built kit look wonky.

[David G.]

It's great that you're back to building. The detail work you've done is excellent, I can't wait to see more.

David G.

[W-409]

Thanks guys, it's  good to be back on the bench.

I haven't noticed any major flaws on the body, but to be honest I've always had a bad eye for that kind of things. Even though it might not be exactly correct, it builds up really nice and looks good when it's put together, so that's what matters to me the most.

 

Speaking of the body... I sprayed the first coat of primer on it today. The body had lots of mold lines and mold flash to be cleaned, and it looks like I still need to fix a couple of spots before I can move on to the actual painting. Meanwhile, I hope I can do some progress with the interior.

[TransAmMike]

Great work on the '57.  I looked in on your  Lindstrom website.  Cool looking Chevy's. At first I was thinking  I had never heard of the FHRA then realized its in Finland.

[W-409]

Thanks Mike! The race car is currently going through a big update but we are on home stretch now (new roll cage, rust repairs, new paint job, hopping up the engine and some chassis work as well).

 

Today I got the Ford on four wheels. Had to try how it looks with the body on. As you can see I had to do some fixing after the first primer coat so had to add some putty to the body...

 

Then I sanded the body and now it's ready for the second primer coat. Hopefully then I can start moving on to paint.

 

Front seat had an ugly seam where the front and rear halves meet. That had to be smoothed out with putty as well. Now the seat is ready for paint.

[W-409]

After that the seats and door panels were shot with a grey primer, which will also be their final color. But to be able to install decals on them without the annoying silvering effect, after the primer coat I sprayed a bit of gloss clear and then I put the decals on place. Fitment of the decals was really good. The door panels still need a bit of painting before they can be installed.

Then I sprayed a coat of flat clear to the seats and now they are ready to be installed.

[afx]

Looking good Niko.

[David G.]

Excellent progress on this, the interior looks great!

David G.

[W-409]

Thanks JC and David, I appreciate the kind words!

I finished up the door panels after painting the bottom parts of the upholstery with black and doing the panel lines with Tamiya's Panel Line Accent Color. Window cranks and door handles were of course painted silver.

And I glued the seats on place. Once couple of smaller parts are dry, I can assemble the rest of the interior.

The body looked finally like it is ready for paint. With this being two tone, and I decided to paint the white areas first, I had to do some masking. I used mostly two different Tamiya Masking Tapes and then some generic cheap "painter's tape". I shot some white primer to these areas and tomorrow I guess it's time to paint the roof and doors gloss white.

[Dennis Lacy]

Looking really good! I love all the thoughtful chassis and engine painting. That brings all the details to life. Looks like this kit has a good realistic stance to it, not sitting too high as a lot of factory-stock models tend to. 

[W-409]

Thanks Dennis! It's surprising how much difference a simple detail painting can make. And I agree on the stance, some kits sit pretty high if they're built out of the box, this one looks pretty good as is.

 

Today I sprayed some gloss white on the body. Once that was touch-dry, I removed the masking tapes and it looks pretty good. The Tamiya tape seemed to work really well. Now I'll let it dry over the weekend and next week I can shoot some black to the rest of the body...