Bernard Kron

I’ve been away from the workbench all summer and just got back to it a couple of weeks ago. My goal is to complete a vintage drag model for a challenge build on the Vintage Drag Model (oddly enough) web site. The Challenge has a cutoff of October 15th so things are really tight, but I’m making good progress despite some problems with a brittle older resin body shell. I’m building a mid-60’s style Fiat Competition Coupe. Thanx for Lookin’ B. The basic chassis is based on the late 60’s, early 70’s long wheelbase chassis first introduced by AMT on the Tommy Ivo front-engined dragster and based on a Don Long design. The chassis is found in many different kits including the AMT Digger ‘Cuda. In this case I sourced it from the Model King Too Much twin-engined dragster variant. In stock form it measures out to a 7.5” wheelbase which translates to a classic 187.5 scale inches. I shortened the frame forward of the engine area to 6.125” or a more mid-60’s friendly 153 scale inches. Here’s a comparison with the stock length frame. The motor is based on one of the 426 Hemis from the Too Much kit. The only significant change was using an Enderle “Barn Door” injector from the Revell Tony Nancy Double Dragster kit. The blower is finished in Magnesium and Burnt Metal testors Metalizer paints. The injectors will receive an era-correct Enderle injector scoop during final assembly. The driver compartment area of the chassis was fiven aluminum paneling along the sides and on the floor fashioned from .010” styrene sheet finished in Aluminum Plate Metalizer paint. The wheels are 60’s vintage Halibrand “Bear Claw” pieces from Competition Resins finished in Testors Acryl Jiet Exhaust paint to represent the classic Dow 7 coating of the period. The tires are AMT Parts Pack 11” M&H’s. Here’s the chassis as a roller with the motor installed” The Fiat body was bought on EBay and a little internet research reveals it to be from AFX Resins, but no longer available. I cut open the roof which unfortunately introduced some stress cracks in the body shell requiring extensive repair work. Hopefully they’ll hold come paint time. Paint will be in a light shade, perhaps even white. I have also worked out some basic logo art as shown below. The long logotype will go above the windshield and along the lower edge of the body at the rear below the trunk area.

Having seen quite a few nearly out-of-the-box builds already, in the few short weeks since this kit became generally available, my opinion is that the channeled version in particular needs substantial reworking to look proper. As I've commented before, the OOB stance of this variant is terrible, IMHO, with far too much space between the undercarriage and the ground. So much so that the channeled version barely sits lower that the Deuce-railed highboy. You're right, at the very least the front end needs to be lowered - your modification improves the look enormously. But I think the rear end needs to come down as well to look like a proper channeled rod. My thinking is that Revell simply didn't Z the frame enough, Without these additional mods your build is as nice a version as I have yet seen. The grill shell sits right, and ,accepting the high Stance Revell has provided, the rake you have given it is very tasty indeed. It's great to see your work once again. There's a clean, purposeful simplicity to your approach that's very satisfying. The color and the subtle changes and details that you've given it work really well together. Despite some frustrating shortcomings, I think Revell has offered us a kit that will prove to be a classic and an enduring commercial success. I think you'll find the highboy closer to being "right" to begin with and easier to dial in to your liking. The approach you're taking to it sounds great. I'm looking forward to seeing your version!

The Navarro blower setup, thought to have first run in either late 1946 or early 1947: Navarro was one of hot rodding's sharpest minds, creative on a level rivaled by few in his field or his generation. His articles in the first issues of Hot Rod Magazine and Hop Up are masterpieces of scientific education. Not only was he an inventor, machinist, and racing driver but he was involved in the early days of fuel chemistry as well. His articles on combustion, fuels, valve timing and supercharging are must-reads even today. Navarro was an early convert to turbocharging and consulted to Garret AirResearch, Alfa Romeo, and the Ford Motor Company on the matter. In later years he also developed heart-lung machine technologies using his extensive knowledge of fluid dynamics. He died in 2007 at the age of 88. His company, Navarro Engineering, survived him, continuing to manufacture nostalgia racing parts, including his famous High-Dome flathead racing heads. The legendary blown flathead not only figured in Navarro's roadsters own record runs but was loaned out to others who made their mark in the early days of hot rodding, including Tom Beatty's lakester and the SoCal Speed Shop crew (Alex Xydias and Dean Batchelor) for their streamliner. Barney: The Navarro roadster doin' the business: The master at work: Navarro (left) and Tom Beatty at El Mirage in 1948 working on the Navarro blown flathead installed in Bob Trammel's '27T:

If I had to guess, Potvin's approach was determined by the most common high performance applications of the period, which was immediately of the second world war. During the 20's and 30's when supercharging was the go-to strategy for significantly increasing the output of an engine of given displacement, the distinction between blown and unblown motors was less prejudicial and supercharging was considered no different an option than multiple carburetion, for example. The most prevalent mounting strategy was a geared mechanical drive, either off the front as on the blower Bentley or via a shaft off the front cam tower and accessory drive with the blower mounted on the side of the engine block to reduce length (on Alfa Romeos for example). The potential deficiencies of belt and chain drives are well covered above. Top mounted blowers emerged when the challenge of fitting supercharging to a pre-existing chassis or engine compartment space became an important design consideration, for example as seen in the aftermarket oriented S.C.o.T. blower setup. It is simpler to cut a hole in the hood of a car than to relocate the cooling system or modify the chassis or suspension. A major disadvantage of a front-mounted blower in drag racing applications became apparent as drag racers found it desirable to concentrate weight over the rear wheels and towards the back of the car. I believe this, as much as anything, led to the demise of the front-mounted blower, and the Potvin in particular, during the 1960's. The advent of reliable toothed belt technology then assured that issues of cost, weight and pumping losses also would have hastened its exit from the drag racing world.

This is the first channeled version with the out-of-the box chassis height that looks right, stance-wise, to me. The critical change is the chopped windshield. Amazing what a difference it makes. Also, the grill swap helps, since it gets ride of some of that verticalness at the front. Cool build...

This combination actually works quite well, big engine and all. The strong colors and graphics are certainly an important part of the effect. Very cool! I must remember the Revell midget nose cone for these, since it scales so much better that the one than comes with the venerable Revellogram Rat Rod kits...

Love this era of global formula racing, when the technologies were still within reach of relatively small organizations and reasonable amounts of capital. It was a hotbed for creative, talented entrepreneurs and driver/engineers like Bruce McLaren, Jack Brabham, Ken Miles, Carroll Shelby, Mark Donahue, Roger Penske, and Dan Gurney. For some reason Parnelli Jones often gets overlooked but was among the big players in this golden age. His cars showed his enormous talents to great advantage, often being among the most striking and original in their conception and styling. This build beautifully captures so much of that!

Aesthetically a departure from many of your previous creations, with brighter colors and more contrast among the details. It has a balanced, close coupled look that should be very attractive once completed.

Love this kit and the overall character of the car. The only one completed thus far uses an aftermarket resin Fordor body shell but is otherwise close to the basic kit: The body shell really lends itself to sectioning and ,chopping. Here are a couple of w.i.p.s exploring this area. First a collaboration with Raul Perez who so far has done the majority of the work. Unusual for me, it's done in a modern style: Just sectioning the car and leaving the the top stock height yields a classic late '50's - early 60's full custom look. Here are couple of pics showing the basic body cuts and the intended result via Photoshop:

Nice build! Not sure why you couldn't post the actual pictures, but's it's too nice not to share more conveniently:

Really thorough detailing, from the flared air cleaner opening, already mentioned, to the painted headlight buckets and the I-beamed front axle, totally transform the character of this Revell 1/25th scale Deuce build. At first glance I thought you had found a way to work miracles on the ex-Monogram 1/24th offering! Some savvy kit bashing going on here, which delivers a top-notch result. A beautiful car, which would make an interesting and compelling 1:1. Bravo!

Model Car Garage offer a pretty fair rendition of the Eddie Dye nose piece. But I think in your case you'll probably accept the challenge of scratching together your own. The Dye roadster is one of my modeling holy grails and one of the few builds where I would accept nothing less than a true replica. Good luck on this one! Along with the Louie Bettancourt '49 Merc, it is inconvertible evidence of the genius of the Ayala Bros.

Liked this a bunch on the first go-round but I must admit the crispness of the new Revel rails will add a lot to the final result. I'm a bit disappointed to see how much the frame rails extend beyond the AMT shell. It's far from a drop fit given the standards that you set for yourself in these builds. The Eric Black illustration certainly highlights the problem with the Revell headers - the grouped pairs look is somewhat lost on them and quite apparent in the rendering. I'm not sure I like the header covers along the frame rails, though... Looking forward to seeing this progress with your usual thoroughness with respect to matters both aesthetic and mechanical.

A sophisticated, attentive approach to the challenge of achieving well-balanced proportions when using the thinner, less substantial Model-A frame rails for a highboy. The '29A highboy, with it's more old fashioned bodywork, is a whole other animal to the Deuce variety. Not an easy task! The Deuce frame horns help a lot, and the suspension work will prove critical to dialing in "The Look". For those of us into the Hot Rod tradition there's a lot to chew on here.

The first and so far only trailer I've built. Made from styrene channel, flat sheet, and strip. Some of the most fun I've had at the workbench. Every race car deserves a trailer. This definitely won't be my last!

Really sweet proportions and stance and lovely chassis work. It looks like you have trimmed the grill shell to mount it sitting on the front cross member. To my eyes it looks like you could move the whole assembly (crossmember, axle and grill) rearward slightly to close up some space between the front of the engine and the radiator. That and trimming a little more from the bottom of grill shell would really tighten up the already nice setup. Of course, since there doesn't appear to be a front accessory drive and cooling fan mounted, I could be wrong... In any case it's a super-nice build so far and I look forward to more progress.

Love the section job. It is super-successful - it radically changes the stance and proportions of the bodywork, all to good effect. Great Modern Rod. I will need to spend some time studying your build thread...

First off, at the risk of somewhat repeating myself, the pictures of the completed OOB channeled version underscores just how valuable these straight out-of-the-box initial reviews are to the automotive modeler. One of the unique things about car modeling (shared in recent decades with the emergence of the fantasy modeling world), is that replicas are only one aspect of the richness of our hobby. These "reference builds" that you have given us, Tim, are rich with important information about what the potential of this kit is to provide each of us with the raw material for our own, personal, "right" version. For this, once again, much thanks. I agree with Dennis regarding the issue of the grill placement, and indeed, in the case of the channeled version, whether the Model A style grill should be used at all. The headlight issues are an outgrowth of the need to place and align them with the grill as it is set up in the kit. All of this can be changed to suit the builder's tastes and is part of the fun... The side view reveals a couple of things I will think about as I contemplate my first swing at this kit in the weeks to come. First off, it confirms what I suspected, that the raised rear wheel well arch looks most right in the channeled version and the stock height highboy variation would benefit from more body panel as provided by the lower stock arch placements. I will be curious about the compatibility of the AMT roadster shell in this regard. Secondly, to my eye there is still too much "air" beneath the body in the channeled version. Even chopping the windshield frame won't fix that. It make me think the ideal variation will prove to be the Deuce railed highboy with a rear end z'd to raise the tires into the position they have in the channeled version. That, combined with the grill shell corrections Dennis brought up, would be a mighty fine hot rod. The other approach is to further lower the highboy chassis front and rear, for a radically low channeled rod look more in line with the Red Roadster Photoshop mockup I posted earlier in Tims' highboy buildup thread. This would require both additional z-ing the of the rear end and finding a way to bring the front end down. Perhaps these will be my two initial versions, with an attempt to combine the Revell '29A roadster kit with additional parts from the old AMT '29A roadster and some wheels, tires motor and suspension bits from my parts box to get 2 complete cars from one kit. Again, all this initial thinking-through of my strategy is thanks to Tim's two OOB buildups since I don't as yet have a kit in my hands. And finally, whatever my thoughts might be about my own personal "right" A-bone, the channeled version you just completed is a mighty fine little hot rod, and a fitting complement to the highboy you presented to us just a few days ago, Thanx Tim.

Excellent first impressions, very useful! My rules of thumb when it comes to parts kits is "The Rule of 5's": if a kit yields the cost equivalent of 5 aftermarket parts for the price of the kit I will buy it with no anticipation of ever building the full kit. Any additional parts used is a bonus... So many things for Revell to include in subsequent variations: q.c. rear end, stock buggy spring setup, '40 Ford style flat spring setup, hairpins, big-bolster late 40's traditional interior, flathead or Olds motor, Deuce grill shell, full hood setup, softop, etc., etc, etc. A whole new parts-kit franchise is in the offing! And yes, manufacturers need to pay more careful attention to attachment points on the chrome trees! It shouldn't be such a major fail after more than 50 years of this stuf!

Here are two ideas I've had for using the new Revell kit. First is what I believe to be the most beautiful contemporary-traditional rod ever built, the ultimate in Lobeck-style highboys, the fabulous Ed Pink '29A. I almost never build replicas, but I am tempted mightily by this one!: The other is in the lowboy mode. When I was contemplating resuming car modeling some 8-9 years ago I was using photoshop to "model" cars I'd like to build. One I want very much to build and would be perfect for the lowboy side of the Revell kit is this one (showing 2 variants):

Thanx Tim. I've been traveling this summer and won't be back to my bench until mid-September, at which time I've got some other projects in line before considering a build based on this new '29 From Revell. However, I figure I'll buy one to get some thoughts going about what best to do with it. I have a small stash of the AMT '29 Roadsters so my inclination will be towards getting the most out of a combination of the two, an exploration of your comment that the Revell kit comes close to being a double kit. Along those lines, I think your OOB highboy build reveals that the raised rear wheel wells, easily the most controversial aspect of the new offering, is probably best suited for the channeled variant. The side view of your build shows that the enlarged arch of the Revell body shell only serves to emphasize the slab-sided "verticalness" of the '29, IMHO. So I figure I'll investigate using an AMT shell for the Deuce-railed highboy and build a Revell lowboy largely from the kit. While, from a marketing perspective, the Nailhead assures maximum impact, from the point-of-view of someone who has already built far too many hot rods, the Buick is awfully stylized and I'll be inclined, as many others on this thread have already commented, to explore other motor options. Regarding the hood sides/Deuce shell issue. Norm Veber already has such a combo included in his excellent '29 A transkit for the Revell Deuce. In the past I have been able to order the hood setup alone from him. The only downside is that they are almost completely smooth and lack any detail. But the fit to Norm's excellent aftermarket grille Deuce grill shell for the Model Car Garage p/e set is perfect. I have used this combo repeatedly, most successfully on my "Challenger" replica from the Deuce of Spades movie. Norm should be encouraged to add some detail to this part as a quick way to bring it to market. Here's what that combination looks like on the AMT '29 A shell (on Revell Deuce rails}: The louvers are raised resin decals from Archer.

I have used the simple headers found in various AMT '39/'40 Ford kits, notably the Tudor Sedan and the Coca-Cola version of the Coupe. These are not standard headers. I suspect stock style headers can be found in various AMT Buick Riviera kits. Here's one application in a Deuce where I was tight for space due to the hood sides: Regarding a full-fendered version, the 1/25th scale source for fenders would be the AMT '29 Ford Roadster kit. At a minimum, the fenders wouldn't fit due to the raised rear fender openings on the new Revell body which would require filling the resultant gap. A far simpler approach is to work directly from the AMT kit and adapt various suspension, motor, interior, etc. parts from the Revell kit.

First of all, a pure OOB build is exactly what every new release requires, especially important all-new kits like this one. Reporting succinctly and clearly on the details and approach taken by the kit designers, as you have done in the linked Fotki pages you've included, gives us a clear view of the kit really offers. For this a huge Thanx!!!, Tim. Secondly, your review shows what a crisply detailed and modern kit this is. Like you there are aspects of the kit that are not to my liking, including the contemporary rear suspension and the stance issues you mention in your review, but I can't think of a single model car kit I've ever built that made me want to build it exactly as the manufacturer supplied it. Frankly these "shortcomings", unless they place making "my" version completely out of reach, have never dissuaded me purchasing a well engineered and conceived kit of a subject I wanted to model. To a traditional hot rod modeler like me this kit screams "buy me" and will join the venerable Revell Deuces among my bread and butter "stash kits". As I followed through your review it occurred to me what a brilliant donor kit this is to build an "ideal" Deuce highboy by combining it with the original issue Revell kit for the body and main frame rails and the '29 for the chassis details, suspension, wheels, tires, front suspension mounts, headlamps and taillights (I love how thin they are). Now for my aftermarket wishlist: Two piece headlamps with chromed rims and painted buckets.Leaf spring rear suspension conversion kit.Deuce grill shell kitHighboy full hood kit (for either the stock shell or the above mentioned Deuce shell).I hope we can see an OOB review/build up of the channeled version soon.