kensar

Hello Pierre and Mike. The bellows on the shafts were made from 3/32" styrene tubing. The 'grooves' were cut into the tubing using a 60 degree thread cutting tool on the lathe. Thanks for looking and the encouraging posts.

Fantastic work, Charlie. Where do you get the small bolts, screws and fasteners?

If I remember correctly, Profil24 did one of these in resin in 1/24 scale some time ago.

Thank you very much, Mark. The finished pedal assembly. Test fit. Next, I need to straighten out the slightly warped cockpit tub before installing these parts.

After a few days away for Memorial Day, I finished the seats. They came out as good as I had hoped - a massive improvement from the kit version. Finished with the belts. I've turned my attention to the pedal assembly, reworking them yet again. This time I am confident they are more correct. Still a work in progress. Due to the dimensions of the foot box in the model, I'll only be creating the front side that is viewable. Thanks again to Randy for the reference pic and diagram.

Nice work continuing here. Your focus on accuracy is quite admirable. I see you opted to make springs from styrene instead of wire. I don't think I've seen that before. ?

I'll be following this one. Really interested in seeing what you do with it. Many interesting possibilities.

Thanks Randy! This was exactly what I was looking for.

Worked on the seats. Drilled 300 holes, taking about 5 hours. Gluing in the crimp tubes is next, of course. I think I will use aliphatic glue instead of CA. It also dries clear and since I can control its viscosity by diluting with water, it would be more controllable to apply. I had separated the pedals, but pictures showed they are mounted on a common pivot rod, so I reworked them. I'll be putting together some master cylinders and reservoirs. I couldn't find any pictures of the actual setup used in #1046, so I will wing it.

The gold color on the pumps is Alclad gold paint. The bottom is the natural aluminum. Thanks for stopping by.

After getting some paint on the interior parts above, I turned to the seats, which along with the tires, are in my opinion the worst parts of the kit. I carved in some seams and wrinkles using hobby knives. Some time ago, I saw these bead crimps in the local craft store and thought they would be good eyelets for GT40 seats if they are the right size, so I bought a bunch of them for a dirt cheap price. They are silver plated, so no painted needed, which is what I wanted to avoid in the first place. Yea, these will work great, after I get some paint on the seats. They will be CAed from the back after being placed in position.

I've been following this project for a while now and must say it's quite ambitious. Great work!

Well, you are working on a smaller scale and that makes a big difference.

Small update, moving into the interior. I'm basing most details off of the 1046 chassis. First, a look at the back of the interior wall where the fuel pumps and filter are mounted. I'm just hoping I don't run into some fit interferences when I put everything together. Here, I've separated the pedals and need to fab some master cylinders. I'm guessing the reservoirs were mounted on top of the master cylinders on the 1046 chassis and were accessed through a removable panel in front of the windshield. At least that's my plan for this build. Chassis 1046 had a shifter made from flat bar stock, so I've gone that direction. Mock up of the shifter parts. Thanks for looking in. Comments welcome.

Wow, you're having to put a lot of work into this. The results will certainly show it. It will look fantastic.

Nice progress on this. Looking forward to seeing some wheels under it.

Spent a lot of time in the machine shop this past week, making fuel pumps, ignition coil and fuel filter housing and then figuring out how to mount them all. I ended up cutting off all the molded mounting points and remaking provisions for mounting it all. I decided to only use 3 fuel pumps, 2 on the left side and one on the right instead of 3 on each side that the kit has. I have serious doubts that any GT40 had 6 fuel pumps anyway. Got some painting and detailing done as well, so this is moving along again. Fuel pump parts Detailing done. The fittings and lines will be added later. Again some of the kit plumbing is wrong. Fuel filter housing The shelf behind the rear window was shortened to make room for the fuel filter and narrowed up for a better fit. Pictures later. Also worked on the wheels - painting them and preparing the tires, which were painted a dark gray on the tread after sanding for a used look. Also took off the squared edges that were on the tires.

Nice model of an interesting car. Very good paint and decaling. Too bad there aren't better kits of this type of racer.

rear suspension - completed The rear suspension took a while due to many heim joints and bolts replacing kit moldings and I also worked with the tires for test fitting. I found the Icon Automotive tires were just too wide and would not fit. I addition to interfering with the hub carriers, they would have stuck out of the body work too far. It took a while to come to this conclusion. If building this kit, check the fit of the brake calipers and brake discs with the wheels. The calipers are placed pretty far inboard and could cause problems fitting the wheels. Nearing completion and before weathering Completed and with weathering and brake dust I will likely go back to the wheels before moving on to the interior.

The heim joints are made on the lathe from 1/8" round bar stock. I made a special lathe cutting tool to get the round shape and the rod extending from it. Being able to make special tools is certainly an advantage. The cutting tool is High Speed Steel (HSS) which can be cut with grinding wheels and Dremel cutting wheels. HSS is hard enough to cut soft metals and plastics. After the round end is cut, the lathe is stopped and I hand file two flats on it at 180 degrees apart. I have milled these flats in the past, but hand filing saved a lot of time. Then I finish cutting the rod extending from the end, making a provision to insert it into a 1/16" aluminum rod. Next, remove it from the lathe and drill a hole through the flats on the milling machine. The hex jam bolts are Meng 2.6mm hex bolt heads drilled for a 1/16" rod to pass through. Everything is then CAed into place.

I got the front torsion bar done today. Spent yesterday making the heim joints. I hand filed the flats on them as opposed to milling them as I have in the past. I don't think I lost much accuracy and saved a lot of time. Kit part at the top. I'll likely hit this area with more flat black to simulate brake dust.

Great to see this build here. Do post any issues your guys come across as it will be helpful. I see the build will be of the 1046 chassis. BTW is the tan underside just a primer? It will be interesting to see how this group project turns out.

You've done a lot of work here. Interesting choice of material with the Renshape. I'm interested to see how you finish it.

Thanks for commenting everyone. I'm pleased others are getting build tips from my posts as that is the point in it. Loosely following the kit instructions, I started working on the front end. I reduced the diameter of the suspension mounting points and shortened the camber adjustment in order to place a nut and shaft there. The as-molded kit parts are on the left and my mods on the right. I lathed off the grooved lines of the brake disc and made some disc faces on the lathe from aluminum, which I glued on the plastic backing. I found the brake discs were not concentric with the hub - how do you screw that up? The right-most part is how the disc was molded. I have completed most of the left front suspension by assembling the kit parts with some modifications for adding details. I added brake lines and crossover tubes. I didn't cut out the back of the calipers because it appears that will not be visible. I painted in a significant amount of flat black around the calipers and nearby parts, but absolutely none of it shows in the photos. I have read in other builds of this kit that the front ride height is about 2mm too high. I am using Icon Automotive tires (I waited about 2 years to get them) which are about 2mm larger diameter than the kit tires. The front ride height is determined by the length of the front shocks, so I shortened them about 1.3mm to be on the safe side (I would rather err on the low side of the ride height). After finishing the right side suspension, I will move on to the torsion bar setup. Thanks for looking in.

A short update here - the coolant and oil plumbing bits and , first paint on the chassis pan. These coolant lines will run to the tunnel going through the cockpit. PE hose clamps and heat shrink tubing. There are take-offs for the lines running to the water reservoir tank. These are fittings and lines for the oil circuits - to and from filter and oil cooler and the large ones to and from the oil tank in the front. The chassis pan was primed in gray first, then painted in dark aluminum and then blue. The side pods remain in primer for now.