Bugatti Fan

Anyone out there that lives in or near San Francisco who might be able to help me? I have recently bought a 1/22nd scale kit for a single ended Cable Car that plies the Powell Street lines. It is specifically car No 16 that is finished in a blue livery that I wish to build from it. What I am looking for as a model maker would be plenty of detail pictures of this particular car both inside and out to make the model as accurate as possible. I have pulled what I can from the internet up to now. Would be very grateful if anyone can help. Thanks.

I heard a really brilliant bit of AI being used on the UK BBC Radio 2 programme today. It was featured on a show by Jeremy Vine at about mid day. Anyone interested may be able to pick it up on BBC Sounds. Looks like one or more of the phone companies has developed an AI program to replicate a little old lady to keep scammers on the line for hours by pretending to be a bit doddery whilst not giving anything away, butting in to ask the scammer odd questions to interrupt their flow, like saying that they had hit the wrong key etc etc. It is deliberately programmed to really waste hours of the scammers time as they are incentivised per con achieved. I heard some of the transcript and it was hilarious. There was a recording played of this thing in action against a scammer (possibly in India judging by the accent). You could hear the scammer getting more and more frustrated believing that he was talking to a real person they were trying to con. And the beauty is that the AI could be used thousand fold at the same time against scammers on the phone.

If one can afford a 3D printer and the time to learn how to use it, then it can become a hobby in itself. 3D printer technology was NOT originally developed for hobby use it has to be remembered. It was actually primarily developed for the RAPID PROTOTYPING of parts for industry. That said though, as Pete has intimated, it can be a hobby in itself now that many have become affordable. It really depends on how one wants to use it. If one just likes to make things on it for the sake of it then it can be used as a creative hobby in itself. On the other hand if one is making parts on it to create a kit, or parts thereof to rectify or improve a model, then to my way of thinking as an engineer it is really another tool. Very sophisticated, but still just another tool, like any other machine that is used to produce things.

Horses for courses as always. It depends on what the individual either needs of desires. Considering the cost of a decent 3D printer, material used in it and a learning curve to become proficient in 3D design one has to consider if it is really worth it or not. Yes I know that previously drawn up design files can be bought as downloads ready to use, but even so, would the cost outweigh the usage if very minimal? Don't get me wrong, as I appreciate that 3D printing has opened up possibilities for model makers hitherto unavailable before. The short run resin kit and after market companies have very quickly latched on to this technology by not having to produce masters to take moulds from are a testament to this. The perennial argument will probably keep rearing its ugly head where some consider 3D printing is scratch building and others disagree. I fall into the latter category as in my view 3D printing is the result of a computer kit or part design exercise downloaded for a machine to fully make for the end user. Is 3D printing worth it? That was the original question, and my short answer is that it depends on overall usage.

Besides the new angle cutting toois being discussed, I cought a glimpse of an Xacto flat try square being used. The Xacto square looks like a good bit of kit too. I have engineers squares but the Xacto flat one would make a lot of jobs easier than using a conventional engineers square. Bosco mentioned that the company making that special tool was asking for his Email password and he sensibly gave it a miss. Hmmm. Makes you wonder why they were asking for it? Scam maybe or something more sinister?

Lovely scratch built models Manfred. Those old cable cars have so much character and so many variations and colour schemes. I have been following your website homepage and You Tube videos and learning so much from them for when I start my own build.

Had a quick look at those decals in the link that Matt placed in his last post. Agreed, a bit pricey Rich. But certainly would be a very good investment to revive your Eidai Grip kit in the grand scheme of things considering you have had the kit for ages. A new set of decals will really give a bit of a lift to the final appearance of the model.

A really good tutorial Steve. I will be referring to this one !

Sorry about my misleading suggestion Rich. Matt is quite right. And he should know having built the Pocher kit. I stand corrected Matt ! Hope to see you at Telford this Sunday. Noel

Rich, if you have not replaced the decals a!ready, it might be worth contacting Hornby in the UK. They might be able to supply a replacement set of Pocher ones that might do the trick for your Edai Grip kit.

Anyone remember 35mm film canisters? Great little storage items !

Thanks for the Model Auto Review link Les. Even more so as it is a website I was unaware of. Funnily enough I looked up Premier Ford 100E on the internet last night and found just a pic of the box art. The MAR review made interesting reading about that kit. Needless to say I will be trolling the MAR site quite a bit to look at other stuff now that you kindly made me aware of the site.

Thanks for the feed back Les. My friend's kit was indeed a multi piece body as I remember. I will have to look up Premier kits. Your mention of that brand from way back vaguely rings a bell !

Easiest way would be to accurately check what the wheel base of each real car is. Then measure up the wheel base of each kit by doing a mock up with the relevant parts and use a calculator to work out if 1/25th or 1/24 th.

All that work paid off David. Nice to see a completed model of the original concept car that eventually got customised into the TV Batmobile.

KFS is a UK company with a good range of trans kits for truck model builders, particularly older British vehicles. They also have some really useful generic items in 1/24th scale too. Besides this they carry a range of 1/24th scale military vehicles, .mainly British. Their web site is well worth looking at.

The Pocher kit has had mixed reviews, but it might be worth while looking at build threads for it to pick up on some of the detailing work other model makers have done on this particular car subject.

The two Renault Dauphines look interesting Les. Are they 1/24 th scale ? I remember Airfix doing one in 1/32nd scale way back

The consensus on here is that Palmer kits were poor to say the least. Their box art was quite impressive whoever the artist was. I had forgotten what the Palmer logo with the micrometer looked like until it was posted up in this thread. It was a well designed logo, credit where it is due, it only the kits lived up to the logo's suggestion of accuracy using the micrometer for the capital 'P'. I guess that the kits get bought as collectables or out of curiosity these days. There was a kit of American origin that I can remember a friend of mine owning. It was of a small English Ford 100E saloon car. Was it a Palmer kit ? Maybe someone reading this knows ? Interested to know about it as my Dad owned one way back and started to teach me to drive in it. Very basic car. Side valve engine, three forward gears only, manual clutch operated car.

Sad when any top notch after market supplier decides to call it a day. Unless the business can be sold on it is inevitable unfortunately.

Probably right on there about my tablet's AI Les ! Lol.I ref Ace's post. if You Tube had an Internet Forum certificate for a certified Bulls......r we could have real fun with that one !

One black one, one white one and all made with sponsor ads on. They're all made out of carbon fibre and they all look just the same !

I pity the idiot going for a job at Lockheed Martin with that qualification? and watch them fall off their chairs in laughter ! Lol I have enough problems with stone age AI altering words on my tablet to be going on with !

Nice model Pat ! Reminds me I will have to get Tamiya's standard Fiat 500 kit and build a model of one I used to own in the early eighties now it has been re released.

Nice model build. Looks really good to me. This kit seems to have a few less Hellerisms about it than others I have experienced, but none the less has its own idiosyncrasies to overcome judging by the comments posted on this thread. As for subject matter, Heller do come up with some more unusual things, this Renault Gordini being one. Maybe one day we might get a Facel Vega Excellence from them. Who knows?