Pierre Rivard

Thanks Tim. I had failed to find this info in my research and took the guess... and I guessed wrong. Chassis is all done so I have to make a decision about it. Leave it as a short arm knowing it's wrong, rip off the back end or shelve the project. I'm a bit gutted but I'm glad you pointed out this major mistake of mine.

Thanks for the feedback guys. It's a bit more work than expected but a fun challenge nevertheless. Nice GTO Hobbyguy, how did you make that net. It's very nice!

Very very nice build sir! Kudos for spending time replicating the chassis as Junior built it. What materials do you use for door panels (I love the texture) and radiator hoses?

Beautiful craftsmanship as you always do!

Backward in time. 1967 is gone, welcome 1966. Beautiful fab work!

Fabrication around the MC rear axle. I fabricated spring mounts and the springs are from the spares. I added a styrene 0.5 x 1.5 mm for axle reinforcement and shock mounts brackets from the Salvino's kit. Shocks scratch built from 1mm and 2mm rods. Diff cooling pump from the Salvino's kit I chose not to do the 2 upper links for lateral control and chose to add a panhard rod.

Starting work on the rear end. The donor is the rear axle from the AMT Bobby Allison Monte Carlo. I will upgrade the components but for now it's all about setting the attachment points to get the proper location and mostly ride height, I have 6 mm front and 8mm rear measured from ground to rocker

Spending lots of time setting track and ride heights. Here the front is still a bit high, I'll just bend it a bit before I add the upper structure. The rear is not started yet, just the base kit metal axle. That'll get chopped up.

Chassis will be a bit of a dog's breakfast with parts coming from various sources and some scratch building as well. Starting at the front I grafted a Salvino's clip. Looks reasonably to a H&M setup except for the shocks which are more like what Nichels did on Dodges. I might keep it like that. It's a Nichels car after all...

Update on the chassis work. Here are 2 reference pictures from the build stage in Nichels' shop. My take away is a H&M Galaxie style fabricated front end. Floorpan could be fabricated but I'll assume reinforced stock. No information on the rear suspension. I'll go with assumption of a modified short arm. Also taking note that the rear upper spring and shock mounts are not exposed but boxed in.

Thanks Todd, I happen to have one of them in my spares and the fit is good.

Looking good. I have worked with .020 rod lately and it is small and very difficult to manipulate. Good stuff!

James, thank you for the nice feedback. This is the first time I try to flare fenders and I just guessed my way into it and it worked our reasonably well. The front sheetmetal is definitely dropped relative to a stock body but I did not feel capable of doing it properly, so I will give the car some lean on the chassis side instead. I got this pic from a fellow builder on Randy' site and it shows it clearly.

I think you'll make it look great. An alternative would be a styrene insert with a grille texture decal. Slixx has many options available. I can post pic or send you a pm if you think it might work.

I think they drew in the 66 chassis in the 72 kit. Mismatch in wheelbase, multiple body attachment pegs, none of which match. I think I'll just fab something with an axle from the spares box. Thanks.

The winner is behind door #1 What's the deal with the 429 c.i on the hood of #3? Weird...

I'm doing the purple one as it raced at Michigan Raceway. For the chassis I am set on doing a Galaxie front clip but still not sure about the back end. 1971 was sort of a transition year before fabricated chassis with truck arms became the norm for the GM and Ford teams. Thinking I might do some sort of beefed up short arm setup. I don't have pics of the car's rear chassis so it's a bit of a guess.

Thanks Larry. I did consider it but chose to go the route of a hybrid chassis consisting of a beefed up road chassis with a Galaxie front clip. Now that I'm in the thick of it I'm not yet sure how this will pan out. Time will tell...

So do I but I'm a long way off from the painting steps. Firs I need to fab some sort of chassis and test fit it to the body.

Awesome scratch-building I love the checker plate finish

Next the various small parts. Blanks over turn signal, front air dam bracket to body (the dam will added after paint), I fabricated a rear spoiler, again with guides. Front grille recess has been reduced by grinding the back side of the trim piece. Headlamps: drilled out outer lamps and added blanks. Inner molded lamps will be painted to mimic a mesh inlet cover.

Next I scratch built rear window straps. I hate trying to glue them on a painted body...shaky hand and all. I tape the strips in position and drill through strip and body, then insert a guiding rod. the rod is glued only to the strip for now. I then trim the top part of the rod. When all is painted I will insert to body and glue from underside and trim excess rod before glass install. I use Evergreen 0.02 x 0.06 (0,5 x 1.0 mm) strips and 0.02 (0.5 mm) rods Same idea for windshield clips

Next step were mods to the engine air intake plenum. I added the plenum box at the cowl and blocked off the hood ram intake which was not in use for racing the GTO

I then built up the back end components starting with the sheetmetal adds to smooth out airflow around the bumper sides. The bumper itself was very wide fo I removed about 3 mm (1/8") by making 2 cuts and removing material as required. Typical of what the teams did on the real cars,

Here is the result for the front opening. Some touch up may be required after primer but I think I'm close The rear wheel openings were moved back 3 mm to replicate a scale 115 in wheelbase typical of era cup cars. The GM A-bodies were 112 in and all had to be stretched to comply. I then had to flare up the rear part of the openings to counteract the body tapering off going back.