Bernard Kron

Nicely done on a very interesting concept. The Monogram hot rod kits are. IMHO, the very best of the hot rod model kits, despite the fact that some lack a separate chassis. They capture the era in which they were created almost perfectly, and the updates, as in the case of the various '36 and '37 Fords, usually do an equally good job of representing the new decades in which they were first released. The fact that the chassis for '36 and '37 is so similar has always escaped me, and the notion that the bodywork would be closely related, as well. When you bother to look into it it becomes apparent and this is a great exploration of what can be done. Very nice post-billet modern rod, indeed!

1959 Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta Corto Passo This is my first Ferrari build since my return to car modeling 9 years ago. Even though I know a fair amount about sports cars and road racing, up to now I’ve focused entirely on hot rods, dry lakes and drag racing subjects, and customs. To get started in this area I thought it would be advisable to avoid building a high dollar kit and was fortunate to be able to obtain a copy of the much-maligned ESCI/AMT/ERTL version of the iconic Ferrari 250 GT SWB Berlinetta quite cheaply on eBay. It’s an odd kit, criticized for its inaccurate body shape and sometimes poor detail. Certainly the body is not accurate, and the wheels and tires are just plain horrible, but the chassis and motor are quite nicely detailed and with some TLC can be made to look quite presentable. But, despite the full detail motor you need to cut open the hood which is molded in place and the kit is missing some odd details like a battery, despite the full detail motor, and coolant hoses. The intake stacks on the carbs are pitifully small and out of scale, and some parts that you thought would be chromed, like the knockoff spinners (despite the fact that the wheels are chromed), fender mirror and the exhaust tips, are bare plastic. But overall parts fit is excellent, instructions quite clear with only a few minor errors and, with some attention to detail, can be built into a pretty fair version of this famous classic. My approach was to stick to the instructions wherever possible and keep the project as straightforward as I could with minimal modifications to the kit. But correcting the more glaring faults, like the terrible rolling stock, the un-chromed trim parts, and, with the hood cut open, doing something about those wimpy intake trumpets, required some extra work. The wheels and tires were replaced with a set of exquisite hand-laced Borranni wire wheels and correct tires from Fernando Pinto, a Portuguese master modeler who sells his wares on eBay under the name crazycar19. They were expensive but the improvement to the look of the model is well worth it IMHO. The intake stacks were replaced with a set of aluminum Weber stacks from Detail Master. I wired the motor using a pair of Morgan Auto Detail pre-wired magneto caps to represent the Marelli distributor caps, and I made my own ignition wire guides from plastic rod. Unfortunately all that work is hidden under the big aluminum cold air box on top of the carbs! Paint is Duplicolor Silver Acrylic Lacquer sealed under three coats of Duplicolor clear. The Italian tre-colore racing stripe, the Cavalino shields on the fenders, and the Modena license plates were all done with homemade decals. The chroming chores were handled using Molotow Liquid Chrome, which I must say is quite impressive stuff. Overall it came out better than I had thought it would and was sufficiently satisfying to convince me to try my hand at some other classic Ferraris in the not too distant future. I hope you all like it. Thanx for lookin’, B.

I'll leave it to the others who have posted so far to detail all the nice things about this excellent model. The thing I want to point out is that as far as I can tell, with the exception of some necessary suspension and chassis fabrication to get it down in the weeds, everything in this build came out of the kit box! It's kind of Out-Of-The-Box on acid. Am I right about that? I've never gotten my hands on this kit so I can't spot anything that I haven't seen in other versions of the Revell '30 Coupe. This is a tour de force of technique and self-expression. Brilliant!

Between the color, the '37 grill, the fenders, the hubcaps and the un-chopped highboy look, it's really evocative of the "little pages" era ('56-'62) of highly finished street rods. I especially like the careful detailing you put in to the engine area. Really fine modeling all around. We often see efforts at presenting "traditional" hot rod models, but rarely do we see such a creative assortment of parts come together this successfully.

Seeing this thread pop up again reminds me that I recently found one of my holy grails: Scarab: Race Log of the All-American Specials 1957-1965 by Preston Lerner, a one-off publication by Autobooks in 1991, never to be seen again. For many years it was ultra-expensive and impossible to find, usually trading for north of $250.00. For some reason recently a whole bunch of them have hit the market and, while pricey when in mint condition (easily on either side of $200.00) I managed to luck out on a mint copy on eBay for just over $50.00 including shipping. Great read about an extraordinary period in American sportscar racing. When Lance Reventlow shut down the Scarab operation Carroll Shelby took it over virtually lock, stock and barrel to become the Cobra development team and, of course, the rest is history...

It's not a Chaparral. It's a modern car, clearly based on the old Can Am M8 McLarens. Here a link to the car's description: http://www.unlimitedracingchampionship.com/the-cars To quote from it: I'm no model car kit historian but I know that MPC, Tamiya and Accurate Miniatures all have made kits of it. The MPC kit is 1:20, Tamiya 1:18, and Accurate Miniatures 1:24.

The motor and chassis are complete. Below are pics of the motor and the rolling chassis. The wheels aren't glued in place. Despite this kits' less than stellar reputation you can see that the chassis is quite nicely detailed and that the motor, with a little care, can be made to look quite nice. The tiny metal foil Ferrari stickers on the valve covers help things, as does adding ignition wiring and the aluminum carb stacks. Those FPP Modelo wire wheels don't hurt either! Left to do are the final assembly of the interior and engine compartment tinwork. The way the kit is structured these assemblies are glued to the chassis so that virtually the entire car is ready for a simple final assembly. What will be left will be foiling, window glass, bumpers, lights and attaching the body to the chassis and interior. This is the critical time where, if the build is going to go south on me, I'll typically find ways to do. So careful does it for my first Ferrari build... Thanx for lookin', B.

Thanks guys! Thanks Bill. Compared to just about any other regularly available wire wheels I think the FPP Modelos are outstanding. At $63 USD delivered to the USA they're maybe $10.00 more than the Fujimi p/e aftermarket items but superior is appearnce, IMHO. Fernando makes other sets for pre- and postwar European sportscars. The best approach seems to be to tell him what you will be using them for and he will quote you price and description for the appropriate items. The scripts are tiny, as you can imagin, but they give you tons of them so you can make a few mistakes along the way.

Lookin' good!

Well thought out and executed mods. The hood side panels and the channel job in particular represent big improvements to the look. As others have said, this is a highly successful representation of a more contemporary look. Nice job!

I'm currently building the infamous ESCI-AMT-ERTL version, warts and all, doing what I can to overcome them. I'm fascinated by the differences with this kit and really enjoying the nice work you're doing. I was surprised to see you paint the fascias before gluing them to the rest of the body. What was your,thinking be in taking this approach? So far the build looks great. Should be one sweet Berlinetta Passo Corto indeed.

The parts I ordered from Portugal and China arrived and are in the process of being used. I thought I'd post this brief update showing what I got. I ordered some miniature metal transers from vendor globaltoy on eBay (see http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-18-1-12-1-24-1-20-1-43-chrome-metal-decals-Ferrari-B-2077-/182741002250?hash=item2a8c36680a ). They were shipped from China and are stick-on metal transfers of the Ferrari Logo and the "cavallino" prancing horse. The sheet includes various sizes for 1/18, 1/12, 1/24, 1/20 and 1/43 scale. They will be used on the rear deck, valve covers and grill center. They took about 2 weeks to get to me in the USA. I also ordered some beautiful hand-laced Borrani wire wheels and tires from Fernando Pinto at FPP Modelos. They are drop dead gorgeous and fit the model without any modifications. They can be ordered either through eBay at http://www.ebay.com/usr/crazycar19 or by contacting him through the FPP Modelos website ( http://fppmodels.wixsite.com/fppmodelos ). They took about 2-3 weeks to get to me. Lastly, I also did some minor modifications to the intakes, adding some Detail Master Weber stacks to replace the pitifully wimpy plastic tubes that come in the kit. The transfers have been installed and the engine is being modified to add more detail to hopefully bring it more in line with the awesome FPP wheels and tires. I'll post an update in the next few days. Hopefully I'm not too far from final assembly now. Thanx for lookin', B. The metal transfer sheet from eBay vendor globaltoy: The FPP Modelos hand-laced 1/24th scale Borranis: The Detail Matser Weber stacks modification:

I always enjoy seeing what is done with these '27 T Roadster resin bodies because there is absolutely no kit for them - it's a pure exercise in scratchin' and bashin'. The windshield and interior in particular can be a real challenge. Looks like the Revell 29 Roadster seat is a near perfect fit. Something to rember.... This is a nice tasty example here, full of yummy details. I'm amazed that you were able to get everything but the carbs under the hood. Looks cool!

An overused expression these days, but that is awesome, but also inspirational. If you're going to do a whole car body as practice you're getting awfully close already to the original Troutman & Barnes special (precursor to the Scarab Mk. 1, the first Chaparral, the Sadler special, and all manner of Max Balchowsky's Old Yallers).: The Troutman & Barnes Special (ca. 1952 - see http://tomstrongman.com/troutman-barnes-special/ ):

Thanks Ton. I found a source for these on eBay and have received them. They'll do the trick!

Thanks, Christopher and Gordon. Glad you all dig it.

Total scale modeling. Always a pleasure to see your end-to-end high detail efforts, Nice styling in a sort of post-GM 1990's style. Nice proportions and details. The skills involved to achieve these results go without saying, of course... Do you have a front 3/4 view? If you click on the any one picture you'll open a slide show view of all the posted pictures in an undistorted form.

Thanks everyone. Glad you liked it. It's certainly true that home made decals are a way to personalize your model.

Yup, works for me in Mozilla Firefox, but only if I went to the corrected link . (I tested it with my oldest thread on the MCM board, from 2008...). Also, you need the current version of Firefox. It was ported to Firefox from the Google version, so it stands to reason it can be ported to other browsers. As a longtime IE user (yes, we still exist...) I'd love to see it introduced for the Microsoft browsers. I'll keep an eye out for it! Thanks Bruce! And also thanks Anthony for the corrected link!

Thanks for the great look-see at what has to be one of racings most brilliant careers - as driver, constructor, promoter, mechanic, engineer, Dan Gurney may be the sports greatest renaissance man. Along with Harry Miller, Carroll Shelby, Jim Hall and Mickey Thompson, he also ranks at the very pinnacle of American motor sports in terms of influence.

All done! Here are the final completion photos. Thanx to all who followed along, B.

I know exactly what you mean. Wheels & tires are such a critical component. They control the era, style and stance of the project, and more than once, when they have looked just right to me I felt as if doing all the rest was "just details". A terrible temptation!

The chassis and interior are done and the body cleared. I livened up the fornt end a little by adding an additonal Nova Express logo to the front pan. This is a very basic model so I've been adding occasional detail as I go along, although I must admit to being inconsistent in this regard. For example the sides of the interior bucket are absolutely plain with no markings whatsoever. Nonetheless I didn't touch them, just shot them with the same Duplicolor Black Primer as the rest of the interior. And yet, because the model doesn't come with brakes I added discs from a Revell 32 Ford kit on all four corners, even though you'll never see them. The tires are from the kit,.Even though they're funky two-piece solid plastic numbers, they're actually nicely detaioed and with a shot of flat black they look quite nice. I swapped out the kit mags for a pair of deep reverse rim steelies from an AMT '49 Ford kit on the rear, and a set of MPC funny car Halibrand mag spindle mounts at the front. The motor is about half done and will be the subject of the next update. But, generally speaking, this build is pretty close to out-of-the-box. Thanx for lookin', B.

Glad to see you staying close to the original body layout. IMHO this is such a well integrated and pure design that most radical customizing of it is doomed to failure. The best Loewy Studes are those that "sell" its strong suits which are it's incredibly original and modern lines and it's superbly graceful flow and proportions. Your mockup does this very well. When I did mine a few years back I surprised myself by using many of the AMT customizing parts. Unlike most AMT 3-in-1 kits the customizing parts on this one don't fight the design but complement and simplify it. I landed up using the rear clip and lower half of the custom front end - the rolled pan and lower grills. That and a completed shave and deck job did the trick. I even landed up using the stock wheel covers. Your choice of rolling stock complements the body nicely and sets the tone for a sweet resto-mod look. Can't wait to see where you take it...

Thanks everyone! Not, not coincidence, but a mistake (or myopia) on my part. When I do my decals I try to include real references from the period of the build. In this case mid-late 60's, so I searched on images of 60's Chevrolet dealers. How could anyone pass up an image like the one below, even if I did mis-read the V for a W?... The Bob Peck Chevrolet dealership at the corner of Wilson Boulevard and Glebe Road was one of Arlington’s most recognizable structures. The transparent circular auto showroom with the diamond motif canopy spelling out the dealership’s name has long been the focal point at that busy intersection. Architect Tony Musolino, who designed the building for Bob Peck recalls that Mr. Peck "wanted an exceptional building." He says, "I was trying to make the roof a billboard. . .and I was trying to make the roof look like it floats." I use an inexpensive all-in-one inkjet printer (scanner, printer, copier), a Canon MP560. It's now discontinued but similar ones are available from Canon for much less than $100.00. I like the Canon system because it uses separate ink cartridges for each color, including photo back as well as document black. Replacement no-name cartridges are incredibly cheap on eBay. In any case it's nothing special, and because it's an inkjet it doesn't print white, so either I print on white decal paper, or on clear decal paper on a light colored background. In this case the car is white so I printed everything on clear.