Bernard Kron

I'm always looking for an attainable variant. In my Unimat-less and vacu-form-free universe the key here is to make a rigid, accurate positive form and then wrap & dip, as it were. Thanx for that...

Thanks for the info, Bill. Real looking interior bits a a critical elements. I'll mess with card stock, plastic sheet and tempering it and see where Iand up. On thing that occurs to me is that if you have a kit part that is the correct shape and dimensionally where you want to land up, it could be used as a form to make a thinner, more accurate copy using it as your form.

Porsche 356A Speedster CalClub Style Race Car Wandering the Internet one day I came upon a great blog post called “Speedster Wars” about the early days of road racing, specifically the late 50’s and early 60’s California Sports Car Club production Porsche racing. You can find it on the RoadScholars.com website here: https://roadscholars.com/speedster-wars/ .If you ever were curious about the roots of the Outlaw Porsche movement, this is it. Inspired by the maximum coolness of it all I looked into what 1/24th styrene kits were out there of the iconic Porsche 356A Speedster. It turns out there have been two. In the early days of styrene, in 1960, Revell issued two versions, a street version and a true Speedster Wars race car, complete with tonneau cover and roll over bar. Oddly the street version appears never to have been reissued, but the race car version has been reissued at least 3 times, the last in 1996. Perhaps it’s because the first re-issue, sometime in the 1960’s, which featured new box art, had been heavily revised, with the wheel openings enlarged and rounded, thus losing the Porsche 356’s signature “bathtub” look wheel wells. The tires, too were wider two piece affairs, definitely not correct for the 1960 look of the original issue. Apparently the re-issue was targeted to the red-hot slot car market of the time, the enlarged wheel openings allowing easy conversion. The other 356a speedster kit was released by Fujimi in 1988, again in two versions, street and competition. They are both, like the Revell kit, Carrera versions with the 4-cam motor. The street variant lacks the rollover bar and race car decals of the Competition version, but is otherwise identical. Both versions are considered rare, having only been issued in 1989, the race version especially so, trading currently for over $100.00 when you can find one. For my first bite at this particular apple I opted for the Revell kit, not realizing the body had been butchered, since the box art of the most common version is a re-issue of the original box art and shows the stock side trim and correct wheel well arches. Price, or course, was the motivation for choosing the Revell kit. The three-piece body, typical of a ca. 1960 Revell products, was expected, but the funky wheel well openings and wide tires and wheels were not. When the slot car version was created they also shortened the side trim. Between that and having to fill the seam for the body sides, I decided to remove the side trim entirely. Something I’m starting to do when venturing into a new kit I’m unfamiliar with, is to search on the web for photos of well-built but otherwise box-stock versions. That’s what tipped me off to the wheel opening and wide tire issues (the eBay purchased kit was already on its way to me). I also saw that it had an overly high stance and that the tires didn’t fill the wheel wells properly. So I spent some time modifying the kit wheels to accept narrower, period correct race car tires I had in my stash included with some Halibrand mags I had from Historic Racing Miniatures. The body got a small but critical channel job by shaving about 3/32 of an inch off the tops of the inner body panels. The result is a much improved stance and properly proportioned wheels and tires. Other than that the build is pretty box stock. The motor is kind of a lump but is largely invisible under the engine cover. Oddly, the kit comes with only one inner door panel and one seat, obviously on the driver’s side, the assumption being that the tonneau cover hides everything else, which, fortunately, is true. I added some leather tie-down straps made from tiny photo-etch 1/16”x1/8” buckles and plastic strip. The buckles were found on the web from a supplier of miniature hardware for horse modelers, of all things. They use these bits to make miniature harnesses and tack. Who woulda thought? I also scratched a little Porsche Spyder style rear view mirror and added an aluminum quick-release gas cap from Replicas & Miniatures Co.of Md. The paint is Duplicolor Bright Red with white lacquer stripes. The roundels and numbers are custom printed decals from my own designs. Thanx for lookin’, B.

Thank you all! Having gone to the trouble of correcting the Revell kit’s wheel/tire/wheel-openings problems I decided to add a little more detail to the kit to more closely resemble 1:1 cars of the period, in particular the Bruce Jennings #77 car pictured above. The most elaborate details were the leather tie down straps securing the front compartment cover. I searched the web and found some miniature buckles made for horse modeling hobbyists who make miniature horse tackle and harnesses. These are the smallest ones they make and are .0625”x.125” which scales out to 1.5”x3”. The leather straps were made from .010 thickness strip styrene. I sculpted a facsimile of a Porsche Spyder fender mirror like the one on the Jennings car. And lastly, again like the Jennings car, I added an aluminum quick release fuel filler cap protruding through the front bonnet panel. The filler cap is a resin piece from Replicas & Miniatures of Md. I had in my stash. Below is a summary picture of these final details. I’ll post the final “beauty shots” of the completed model Under Glass tomorrow. Thanx to all for following along, B.

This project was only going to work if I could solve the twin, and related, problems of the original kit’s crummy stance and funky rolling stock. Adapting the kit wheels to proper period road racing tires, as shown in my last post, was part of the solution. The other part, the stance, couldn’t really be known until I had finished the chassis and interior panels and installed the suspension and wheels and tires. As it turned out most things fit quite well but when it came down to dialing in a well-balanced race car stance the kit sat a little tall at the rear and, overall, the car required a very subtle bit of channeling all around, on the order of maybe 1/32” of an inch in the front and 3/64” at the rear. Small stuff, but critical to getting a decent looking model. To do this I landed up shaving a small amount of material from the tops of the front fender well panels and the rear bulkhead. The model would never have the signature stock 356 wheel well shapes, but with the taller tires on the kit rims and the slight channel now the car sits solidly on all its corners and looks like it’s ready for the Speedster Wars. Below is a composite photo of the model mocked up with the body in position and the final stance. Now it’s time to glue everything together and attend to the final details. I hope to get this done in the next couple of days so I can get back to my Porsche 904 project. Thanx for lookin’, B.

Based on the style and parts used I'm guessing it was built somewhere between '62-'65. Totally, absolutely cool. What a find!

Thank you everyone! Overall, I’ve been making good progress on this project. This is an odd kit in that it is crude in some respects and yet quite detailed and true to the spirit of its subject in others. As discussed earlier the body is a three piece assembly with separate lower body sides which necessitates extensive body prep to build the kit to modern standards. Also, it appears, the kit body was modified around the wheel wells subsequent to its first release, apparently to allow for slot car wheels and tires. The result is the loss of the Porsche 356 series’ signature slightly enclosed wheels. As the stock build-up picture I showed earlier demonstrates, this gives the model an awkwardly high stance with too much air around the rolling stock. In addition some details, like the engine and parts of the interior, while they look convincing once assembled into the completed model, lack the accuracy and detail of a modern kit. For these reasons I’ve decided not to overdo things with this build, and mainly stick with what’s in the box and focus on paint detailing as the main way to get a decent contemporary result from this old chestnut. The one exception is the rolling stock. The kit tires are undersized in diameter and yet hugely wide for the period the model is supposed to represent. In addition the kit wheels, left unmodified, make the wide tires protrude slightly beyond the wheel well openings. This really needed to be changed. I was lucky enough to find some period correct racing tires in my stash. I suspect they came from a set of early Halibrand mags by Historic Racing Miniatures that I got for a recent hot rod project. They are slightly larger in diameter than the kit tires, properly narrow for a late 50’s SCCA racer, and with the right modifications, the kit wheels, which look quite acceptable, can be made to fit inside the bodywork in proper manner for the type of car I’m representing. I got4 rid of the kit wheel backs which caused the protruding wheel problem and substituted some inner rims from an old AMT ’36 Ford kit. The composite photo below shows the kit tire compared to the narrower HRM tire and also compares how the old kit wheel looks in the front wheel well vs. the modified version. I has originally planned to detail the motor somewhat. But the way the motor is constructed in this kit, it’s an integral part of the engine compartment sheet metal and it’s hard to add additional parts to it. The kit motor lacks any ignition system at all, not even a distributor, for example. And I can’t even remember how long ago it’s been since I didn’t wire and plumb a motor. But as it turns out, the motor builds up with an acceptable overall appearance, especially once it’s buried deep in the recesses of the engine compartment. So, other than the usual paint detailing, it’s straight out of the box. The interior is another example of this semi-detailed approach. The kit comes with only one seat and with only a driver’s side door panel. The idea is that you can’t see under the tonneau cover, so why include these unseen details. Once again I decided to roll with it rather than worry about these “missing” parts. The composite photo below shows the boot and engine compartment as I have completed them, as well as the dashboard and driver’s seat. As you can see the detail included is really quite adequate, although hardly up to contemporary kit standards. A lastly, here is the body with the front grills and headlights installed. The headlights are covered in masking tape painted Tamiya Bright Orange. The rear view shows the engine cover grill. The taillights have yet to be installed. As you can see, I’m not far from final assembly. The stance is the remaining major issue. Hopefully getting the wheels inside the wheel wells and adding the slightly larger tires will help in this regard. Thanx for lookin’, B.

They look great! Did you pull a second body from the fiberglass plug?

Thanks Kris. Looking forward to it so that the wheels of industry can start turning again!

I recently placed an order with M.A.D. I'm a longtime customer. I have often used Kris Morgan's fine parts. But this time for some reason the order hasn't arrived yet and it's starting to get very late. I sent them an inquiry about my order's status, using the web form on the M.A.D. website, and then a follow up. I haven't received an answer and want to contact them via regular e-mail. Can someone PM me an e-mail address to contact them? They have bo phone r e-mail address info on the website. Thanx! Bernard Kron

Thanks everyone! I’ve gotten the main paint and graphics done. The basic color is Duplicolor Bright Red with a white racing stripe. The stripe was done by spraying a base coat of white lacquer and then masking out the stripe and applying the top coat of red. The white number roundels with the fine red stripe around the outer edge are leftovers from my ’57 Corvette project from last year, as are the red numbers which I had printed as extras at the time. The bodywork is essentially done, waiting only for a clear coat and final polish. Now on to the chassis, motor and rolling stock! I’m going to try to adapt the kit wheels to larger, more period correct tires, in the hopes of filling the enlarged wheel wells in a better proportioned, more pleasing way. We’ll see… Incidentally, a member on the SA board reports that the first release of this kit had the correct wheel well openings but on the next re-issue they were enlarged to clear slot car tires. There was even and article in Scale Auto Enthusiast at the time which had templates to restore the correct openings. I’m committed to making this version look as good as I can without the additional bodywork changes, but I look forward to a later, more correct project using the Fujimi 356A Speedster as the base. Thanx for lookin’, B.

Dreamtime from the 50's sportscar scene: First off, a full detail kit of the Scarab Mk. 1, the chassis and motor on this one were created by a greatest hits of West Coast sports car and hot rod legends, and of course the body is drop dead gorgeous: Then a basic tool for any sportscar special, the Devin SS fiberglass body. I would settle for an aftermarket 1/24th body, but a factory chassis would nice... I understand this has been produced at various times, but an affordable full detail styrene 1/24 version would be a dream of mine, the Costin Maserati 450S coupe. I'd take either the competition version, or the street rdo, although the purposeful look of the racing car is probably my fave (bow about a 2 in 1?).

I’ve started a second Porsche race car project while I wait to receive some small parts for my Porsche 904 build. This one is based on the venerable Revell Competition Porsche kit, which represents a classic SCCA style Porsche 356A Speedster as raced in the late 50’s and early 60’s. The cover art on the box promises much and captures the flavor of the era, but unfortunately this is an ancient kit with the old Revell multi part body, consisting of the top of the tub-shaped body, and the two side panels in the area between the wheel wells. The kit also has some pretty glaring inaccuracies, the most important of which is that the wheels openings are radiused into a round shape and are somewhat larger than the real car’s characteristic shape. Below is a composite picture showing the cover art, a picture I found on the net of a straight out-of-box build of the Revell kit, and a side view of the real 356A speedster. The oversized, rounded wheel wells should be obvious. The build-up picture also shows the rather horrible stance of the kit build and the fact that the wheels appear to protrude somewhat. I’m not too thrilled about the wheels and tires either. The 4th panel shows the bodywork I’ve done. Most of the Speedsters of the era tended to be street cars which were quite often driven to the races. Many of them kept the stock side trim. But just as many can be seen to have undergone some mild clean up include removing the trim and filling the seams around the front and rear pans. After reinforcing the body structure where the side panels joined the top of the body with styrene strip I looked at the result, and while it was quite clean, the side strip was all wrong (see the build up picture again). The side trim is too short on the Revell kit, and, with the oversized wheel wells, stops short of the wheel openings. It looks awkward so I decided to fill and smooth the body. Correcting the stance and doing something about the wheels and tires will be a challenge, If anyone knows a good source for period Porsche wheels in the right scale (1/24th), I’m open to suggestions. In the meantime I’ll keep plugging away. The paint scheme will be bright red with white stripes and roundels. Below is a composite picture of two period cars which are examples of the style I’m after. The upper car is an east coast as campaigned by Bruce Jennings, the legendary King Carrera. The lower two pictures are of the Ray Kimble “Kimble Special” which is a west coast car known mainly for all the movie work it got. Thanx for lookin’, B.

As I add sports cars and road racing subjects to my modeling mix (having been almost exclusively an old skool hot rod modeler up to now) I’m going through my mental list of favorites and the Porsche 904 rises to the top of the list. Not only is it a beautiful car and a classic example of the early 60’s “streamline” style, but the model is available in a good quality kit for a relatively affordable price in the form of the classic Monogram kit, the basis for this project. In researching this project there were two versions which served as inspiration The red Scuderia Filipinetti car, in its restored form, is striking in its pure simplicity with its oversized white roundels contrasting against the striking paint. A modern competitor in the European vintage road racing and rally scene is Jean-Marc Bussolini, CEO of French agricultural coop and hypermarchè chain E.LeClerc who is somewhat of a Porsche specialist. His 904 is the centerpiece of his collection with its striking Bleu de France and silver livery. I’m going with the Bussolini color scheme combined with the pure simplicity of the Filipinetti car. Because the interior is finished in flat black in the 1:1 I shot the interior surfaces in black primer before going to the outer body surfaces in blue and masked the interior off. Unfortunately, until the exterior paint is finished including clear coats any body mockups will necessarily be a bit dodgy as the photo below will attest. The basic exterior scheme is finished in Tamiya TS-10 French Blue. The racing stripe is the classic French bleu, blanc, rouge in the form of a homemade decal printed to white decal paper. I’m congenitally unable to build a true replica model so I have invented a fictional 60’s privateer (in a tip of the hat to the Swiss Filipinetti outfit), the ostensibly Paris-based Equipe Lutèce (Lutèce is the ancient French version of the Roman name for Paris, Lutetia). The team badge is based on the Paris coat of arms and adorns the fenders and rear Kamm tail. I still have trade decals and roundels to apply and then it will all get clear coated and polished. Then on to chassis, interior and motor. Thanx for lookin’ B.

I need to correct this. The '36 Ford Roadster has a longer door length which it shares with the 3-window coupe. When ERTL/AMT introduced the 5-window they moved the door line to represent the short door length of this model, which was used on the Club Cabriolet Convertible version (roll up windows and A-pillars extending from the doors) of the open air '36 Ford. So, if you want to build a Roadster version (snap in side curtains and separate windscreen) you need to either re-draw the 5-window door lines, or , more easily, start with the 3-window coupe version.

I'm beginning a series of 50's and 60's sports car projects, cars like the various pre-911 air-cooled Porsches (356 A,B, &C; 904; 906;), E-type Jags, Ferraris, Maseratis, front-engine Lotii, etc. I have been slowly building up a stash of kits but one thing I'm ignorant about is sources of detail aftermarket parts like wire mesh headlight stone protectors, leather hold down straps, Lucas and Cibie fog lamps, Raydyot rear view mirrors, vintage correct seats, steering wheels and instruments, Boranni and Dunlop Wheels, correct period tires (i.e. Dunlop, Englebert, Firestone, Goodyear, etc.) I'm a long time hot rod and drag car kit basher and know my way around that world of aftermarket sources pretty well, but the vintage sporty-car arena is new tpo m,e, at least in scale (I do know the 1:1 world pretty well, I think). I do know that Replicas & Miniatures have offered various bits in this area, and Model Builders Warehouse does a good job of aggregating parts from sources like Historic Racing Miniatures and the German supplier Scale Production. Any other suggestions as to where I should be looking?

Great in-depth info on this famous historic machine. Seems to me you may know more about this kind of project than you're letting on Mr. Himmel, LOL!

Thanks to you all for your replies. But... I'm interested not so much in the chrome paint but in their line of color paints, both solids and candies. Any information about them would be greatly appreciated.

I'm thinking about experimenting with alternatives to my usual Duplicolor/Tamiya/Testors array of body paints. The ground rules are that the paint needs to play nice with styrene and is available in aerosol since I have yet to be able to set up an airbrush paint station. First on my list is Spaz Stix since they seem to have a good reputation, their chrome system is very highly rated, and with recent increases in prices and on-line tax policies they are price competetitive when ordered from the manufacturer. Do any of you have experience with these paints? I notice that they are designed for application under clear Lexan R/C bodies , but that Spaz Stix represents that their system will work fine applied over plastic (styrene) bodies. They show them as enamel paints. So here are my questions: 1) What primers do they work well with? 2) What is drying time like, both to a handleable state, and full cure? 3) If you had a negative experience what was it that turned you off? 4) How compatible have you found them with other brands of paint (over or under)? One reason I'm interested in Spaz Stix is that they make a full range of true candies. The other is that they offer free shipping with a $75.00 order which, if they turned out to work well, would be practical if I also tried their Chrome system at the same time. Thanks for any advice or input. B.

They're round, the edges are crisp and the thickness scales. If you can get the flanges to behave, with a little minor cleanup you're there. As you no doubt know, this is a key detail. When I used the Speed City injectors, as nice as they were, besides the fact that they were for a big block (how could he overlook the small block?), the thickness of the stacks meant that my model would be permanently flawed. So, stick with it, it's worth it! Besides a finely crafted one-off like this, I think the only solution, in any quantity at all, will have to be 3D printing, IMHO. But if someone does it they will be a popular detail, since they are so charismatic In the meantime, build on!.

Below is a picture of the Maple Leaf Modelworks Stromberg 97s with SP tops which Chris offers. This is from a completed application I finished in December. They are as received from Shapeways and I paid the small premium for their highest resolution output medium. The have zero prep work except for a soaking in Bleche White. The main bodies were brush painted with Tamiya Titan Gold and the intake tops finished in Molotow Chrome applied with a 2 mm tip.

This, of course, is the difference between analog and digital. Anyone who ever thought about the issue when first traveling from geometry and trigonometry to calculus has encountered the issue. In the practical "real world" the whole issue is resolved, sometimes with a step "backwards", with a consensus decision about what is "good enough". I'm thinking, for example, of digital audio technology where, to my ears in any case, a consensus decision regarding high fidelity (an apt term) has resulted in an overall degradation in audio fidelity with more artifacts and equalization compromises as older analog technologies have been increasingly abandoned by artists and producers. It has fundamentally changed how recordings sound. Are things worse for it? I'm unsure, even if I think that they sound worse to my ears. That's because of the positive impact it's had on the affordability and accessibility of relatively noise-free, simple to create audio recordings where before only those with sophisticated, bulky and expensive equipment could create relatively high quality audio. Instead, the creative community, as well as the general listener community, have adjusted what they expect to hear. And the creative community, in particular, has benefited mightily from the change, since good audio is within reach of so many. But I agree that at this point this technology exists, even as it improves rapidly in its capabilities, more as a complement to older casting technologies, than it does as an end in itself. But for some, like Doug, Pico and Randy, it is already a very real means of creation and self expression.

Yes they are. I believe Ed made some corrections to the masters for this run but he can comment better than I can. IN my case it's long enough ago that I can't recall what I did to correct for it, or indeed even if I did... Edit: I just checked my photos of the project and apparently I did correct for it at a later point...

Stupidly, I didn't take any photos while attending this year. In searching on the web I still haven't found any of the usual mega-posts of photographs. Did anyone who attended take a bunch of photos of even a significant portion of the hundreds of models that were there? I would love to see them! And Thank You Chris, for your excellent taste of what was on the tables!