Ace-Garageguy

I agree the plastic dip-coating material could also be out of scale initially, but as it's a single-component product and dries by evaporation, it should be possible to thin it to get the desired film-thickness remaining after the excess drips off. Probably take some fine-tuning to hit it just right, but once the reduction ratio is dialed in and recorded, it should be repeatable. I can see how both the shrink and the dip methods could possibly produce very realistic harnesses.

Sean's giving you good advice. You'll need someone with pattern-making skills to repair the missing letter, and who can also make a mold and cast a replacement part. This is WAY beyond a simple "brazing" repair. Good luck with this interesting project.

The only double-blower setup to run a pyramid manifold like that (that I know of, anyway) would have been from Romeo Palamides (later to become American Speed Equipment), and dates from the early 1960s, but the fuel injection setup on your model, with the butterfly valves visible in front, is a little later. Dating the parts on the car to a particular time-window is step number one, and then fitting the setup of the model into the drag rules for that time window is step number two. A quick scan of the '63 NHRA rules, for example, would put a car like that in either the Altered (AA /A or BB/A, supercharged) or Competition (AA/C, supercharged) class. The specific class would depend on vehicle weight, engine displacement, and exact modifications and other specs. Here's a list of links to the drag rules of the general time, and going through them to determine exactly where your model would fit is your best bet. http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/topic/87579-link-to-nhra-rule-books-1958-to-1960s/ The FI units on your model appear to represent the very popular Enderle "Bugcatcher, Birdcatcher" style, which was in wide use by 1965.

I was thinking more in terms of the wall-thickness of the material, but at 1mm diameter, it should be pretty thin. I'll be interested to see your results. Heat-shrink works well for a variety of other tasks in modeling, so it may very well be a good option in this application, depending on the desired effect and scale.

Heat-shrink tube is going to be WAY oversize for a 1/25 scale harness, and it's not really all that flexible, either. But do what you want.

Yes, the Stone-Woods-Cook Willys cars were were built for the gas-class, "gassers", and at the time, operational equipment was required by the class. As Force said above though, it depends on the class and fuel a particular car is running, and a blown car like your model above could be correct with no cooling system other than a crossover / fill tube, and coolant in the block and head water passages. Many of the dry-lakes land-speed-record cars even ran closed cooling systems, no radiator, and simply circulated coolant from an onboard tank through the engine. Consider some of these cars ran for several miles, flat out.

The great majority of rail, altered, comp coupe, etc. style drag cars in that time period ran pretty much zero cooling system....no radiator. The coolant that was in the block and heads was all there was, and a lot of supercharged cars didn't even run a water pump to circulate it. Some cars would run a crossover tube between the front of the heads, with a radiator cap on it, to facilitate filling. Here's a blown 392 in a rail. You can see a crossover with the radiator cap below the blower front cover, just behind the belt tensioner support plate. On this injected early Hemi, you can see how the factory-style crossover tube, with hose neck in the center, bolts to the water jacket ports in the end of the heads.

I think it's really cool on a model, where someone has achieved a very high level of realism like some of the builds we see here from time to time. But on a REAL car? Especially a 'glass car? Lame.

I've fiddled with this experimentally, and though I rarely do late-model cars that need this type of harness, I've found a trick that works well. Get some REALLY fine wire, twist it into a harness with stubs coming out in logical locations that fit your engine or engine bay, and then dip the whole mess in something like this. Let the excess drip off, and you can produce quite realistic looking results.

All best possible wishes for a speedy recovery.

Lance has an excellent point. The heat required for brazing can rapidly destroy a thin-gauge stamped steel part, and if the part is brass or copper, forget it. What's the material, and can you post a photo of the badge so we can see the damage that needs to be corrected? Making a composite mold of the badge, as suggested by Lance, really isn't that difficult. Specific resins are manufactured for just that purpose...to make press-dies (1/8 inch thick steel tank-wheel centers have been pressed successfully)...and I've personally used them to reproduce aluminum parts accurately.

Just my personal opinion...I like to see a "survivor" that's been pulled out of a barn, had the manure and bird droppings washed off, made to run, and otherwise left pretty much as-found, in silent testimony to its history...especially old race cars that look like they were put up hot and wet after the last run, and just kinda forgotten about. I don't find 'fake' weathered lettering applied to a legitimately weathered old truck, when it's actually being driven as a working shop truck, to be too offensive either. I also kinda like to see a "traditional" (?) hot-rod built with a low-cost paint job, and less than Ridler-winning detail. Cars that are made to be DRIVEN, and driven HARD, appeal to me more than cars that are primarily for display. Though I fully appreciate the work, skill and sweat that goes into building a world-class showcar, I'd just rather drive something than look at it. And saying that, to me, there's no excuse for poor workmanship or engineering. A MACHINE deserves a certain amount of respect-for-function, and if you can't or don't want to bother learning how to do decent work, please find another "creative" outlet. But overall fake patina? Nah. I really despise fake anything...including the oddly shaped lumps some members of the other gender seem obsessed with attaching to themselves.

Thanks to all for your interest and comments. It's a trade name for fumed silica, a very fine thickening agent used for a variety of products, widely used in composite adhesive applications. It's much finer than talc or microballoon. http://www.eagerplastics.com/cab.htm

Same answer for either will be fine.

Wonderful photograph, Ed.

This oughta do it. If you look carefully, you can make out the exact wire routing.

You can also try putting the parts or whatever in a closed box and sprinkling baking soda all over everything, letting it sit for a while. If baking soda will pull the stink out of my sneakers, it ought to work on just about anything known to man. Note: It can be REALLY hard to get cigarette smoke smell out of some materials. I got a lovely used office chair last fall to use at the model bench. Repeated soakings in Fabreeze kinda worked, but I've had to leave it outside for months...yes, months...to get it to the point I can bear to have it in the house.

Cool finds.

Greg's right, but actually, the "silver" part is the vacuum actuator that shifts the gears in the housing. That rear end, without the two-speed setup, looks like this... The two-speed Columbia uses a different RH side axle housing from the standard Ford assembly. The Columbia was used occasionally to help with high-speed runs on dry-lakes cars, way back in the wayback.

Pretty cool. Love the whole idea. Those are some good looking jets on there too, man. Very creative.

Comet, hot water, old toothbrush. I make a paste in a little cup, dipping into it frequently to get fresh material, as Comet loses its abrasiveness pretty quickly. Not all abrasive cleansers have bleach in them. The Comet product I've been using hasn't caused any problems so far...about 6 years. I also recommend a final wipe with 70% isopropyl alcohol just prior to painting...especially if your model has sat around for a while. It's a good insurance against fisheyes caused by surface contamination...which I HAVE had happen to models that have been sitting, after primer, for a week or so. PS: There are gonna be almost as many opinions as there are answers, and lots of different techniques work for different guys. My answers only reflect what works for ME, every time.

For most paints, primer needs to be pretty damm nice to get the best possible topcoat. On REAL cars, we sand it to at least 400 grit before shooting color...600 grit or above if it's going to get a fine-grained pearl, etc. You DON'T need or want to go really slick though. It's unnecessary and accomplishes nothing. For the VERY FINEST pearls, or buffing metalizers, 1500 grit is as far as you need to go. If you have no orange peel, then don't sweat sanding it too much. Orange peel will telegraph right through the topcoats. Paint doesn't magically fill surface irregularities, no matter what you may hear. If your primer is peel-free, I still recommend a thorough scuffing with Comet, etc. This will knock off the slight grittiess you feel, and make a nice, even tooth for the paint to adhere to.

Okay...i suggested this one to otherunicorn yesterday, he suggested I put it up today...and I promptly dropped the ball. So here it is, better late than never. Usual rules, no hints or answer posted on the thread, message me with your answers and PLEASE don't be tempted to use image-lookup 'cause that spoils the fun. Happy hunting.

Yeah, I know, but it's a stupid game. I'll NEVER buy anything that pops-up with the sound turned way high, screaming how wonderful this or that crapp is and that I need it today, don't delay, this is a limited time offer and all my friends are getting it so I have to keep up or be not-cool or if not I can be the first one on my block and the side-effects of this allergy medicine may be cancer, liver damage. dementia or death your mileage may vary at 5.5% APR and yada yada yada yada yada. Want to make SURE I'll NEVER buy a product? Run popup ads. Kinda the reverse of how advertising (oh sorry, it's "marketing" now) is supposed to work, huh? Does ANYONE REALLY BUY STUFF that popups advertise? Or is it just a pretend game to add cost to products and provide employment for thousands of "professionals" who couldn't actually do any REAL work if their lives depended on it?

Here's a link to a Titanic forum. Who knew. http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/forums/forum.php