Humming Through The Green Hell

[Mike999]

The Marathon de la Route (1965-71):

"Ha! I see your wimpy French 24-hour race, and raise you...SIXTY HOURS!"

That was the Marathon de la Route, which required cars to run non-stop for 84 hours. It was one of the most extreme endurance races ever, held on one of the world's meanest tracks: Germany's Nurburgring. Nicknamed "The Green Hell" by Jackie Stewart, that track and its often-miserable weather nearly killed Niki Lauda in 1976.

Along with its sheer grinding length, the Marathon had many strict and bizarre rules.  For example, a pit stop lasting longer than one minute earned a one-lap penalty. Drivers were not penalized if they pulled off the track and made repairs themselves, so cars carried spare parts and tools onboard. 

The driver could also do repairs in a dedicated non-pit area, with a team technician or engineer advising.  But the adviser could not actually help with the repair, only provide verbal advice. "No, no, turn it the OTHER way...!"

The Marathon Mazda Cosmos:

In 1968 Mazda was developing its revolutionary Wankel rotary engine, and decided the Marathon would make the perfect stress test for the Wankel.  The engine was attached to Mazda's zippy little 2-seat sports car, the Cosmo. 

Mazda prepared 2 Wankel-powered Cosmos for the '68 Marathon.  The suspension was modified for stability, power brakes were installed and a bigger grille added for better cooling. The bumpers were removed, a clear bug screen installed on the hood and a fuel filler extension pipe added to the rear deck.

The only differences in the two cars were stripes and numbers: red for car #18 and yellow for car #19.  Mazda recruited 2 teams of top-level rally endurance drivers.  Car #18 was piloted by an all-Japanese team:  Nobuo Koga, Yoshimi Katayama and Masami Katakura. Car #19's team was Belgian, made up of Jean-Pierre Ackermans, Yves Deprez, and Leon Last.

The two Cosmos ran in fourth and fifth place for most of the race.  In Hour 82, with only 2 hours left, the red-striped car #18 of the Japanese team suddenly veered off the track and shot into the Eifel Forest. Engineers had drilled a small hole in the rear axle to mount test equipment, and the weakened axle broke.

The Belgian team in Car #19 finished fourth, behind 2 Porsche 911's and a Lancia Fulvia.  Not a bad showing at all, for what was basically an experimental, prototype engine.

The Kit, Hasegawa #20274 Mazda Cosmo Sport, 1968 Marathon De La Route:

Molded in white (body), black (interior/chassis), chrome and clear. Also a piece of black mesh for the grille, and a sheet of self-adhesive metal emblems. Pretty impressive for a kit dating back to 1994!

This is a curbside kit with no engine.  Hasegawa did release one Cosmo kit with a Wankel engine many years ago, but it is Unobtainium today and goes for big bucks if you can find it.

The chassis is very well detailed, with separate suspension parts, exhaust pipe, and even the skid plate unique to this racing version.  Front wheels are poseable.

The body is one piece, very sharp and well done. Even the side vents and tiny cowl vents under the windshield are molded open.  Some faint molding lines need to be sanded down on the front and rear fenders and sides of the roof.  

The interior is nicely detailed with separate door panels and decals for all gauges and the checked houndstooth seats.

BUT...those seat decals are too small!  They should cover the whole seat-cushion area, but only cover part of each seat.  Other Hasegawa Cosmo kits have decals that are the right size, so I don't know how they blew it on this version.  I scanned the decal sheet and printed a copy, then pieced the seat decals together. 

Overall, this is a well-mannered kit that goes together without any major drama or ugly surprises.  Final assembly looks scary at first:  the glass is glued into the body, followed by the dashboard and door panels, then finally the chassis. Thanks to the precise kit engineering, everything fits great. There isn't much gluing area for the side panels, but the pins on the parts help align them.

The most important tip: let the glue dry on all those parts overnight before adding the chassis.  Glue isn't even needed to attach the chassis to the body;  it snaps in place easily with 2 mounting tabs, front and rear.

The Marchal front driving lights look good, but their brackets only have a tiny gluing surface.  Keeping them lined up is tricky, even using slow-drying 5-minute epoxy.  I should have drilled a hole through the bracket, into the body, and pinned these parts to keep them straight. Mine are not quite straight, which I will blame on racing damage...

The self-adhesive metal transfers include 5 tiny M-A-Z-D-A letters across the back, the very tiny trunk lock (!) and the "Cosmo" and Mazda front emblems.  If you don't want to fool with metal transfers, all these items are also provided on the decal sheet. 

WARNING:  the instructions are complete in showing the mods for the racing version.  But they are also very complex and cluttered, with many tiny and confusing symbols for "drill," "fill holes," "glue/no glue," etc.  Study carefully before  building, and especially note the holes that need to be drilled or filled.

Here's a quick Cheat Sheet:

DRILL: 2 holes in the hood for the transparent bug screen, and 1 hole in the trunk for the fuel-filler pipe.  In the interior, drill holes for the roll bar.

FILL:  all 4 bumper holes, front and rear. Every builder seems to miss at least 2 of those holes, and I almost did too.  Also fill the holes for the JDM rear-view mirrors on both front fenders. These cars didn't run with mirrors, they would have turned into shrapnel on the track.

The Build:

I wanted to build the unlucky car #18, as it looked near the end of the race.  The Nurburgring is an asphalt track surrounded by forests that cars frequently run into, spattering them with plenty of mud, grass clumps and other grunge.  I found a few pics of the Cosmos on the Internet.  All photos showed a heavy coat of black asphalt dust on the rocker panels.  I'm not happy with the weathering (as always!) and may fool with it a little more.

The interior got a lot of added detail like a seatbelt and dashboard toggle switches, most of which can't be seen now. Oh well, I know it's there...

I drilled out the round side marker lights in the front fenders and replaced them with HO scale clear lights, painted Tamiya Clear Orange.

I also added paint chips and dust/dirt.  And since a bug screen needs bugs, I added a few of those with tiny specks of Tamiya Clear Green and Flat Black paint.

 

Edited April 25, 2019 by Mike999

[slusher]

Impressive!!

[cobraman]

Very well done.

[Breezy]

An inspirational model for sure. Super cool. 

Thanks for the very detailed description.

Edited April 26, 2019 by Breezy

[Dave Darby]

Excellent!

[Hard_2_Handle_454]

[89AKurt]

Excellent all around, from the narrative, to execution.  I really appreciate that you weathered it, I do that on most of my builds.  I add bug splats too, using gloss clear, black, yellow, and maybe green.  You said "I'm not happy with the weathering ..." so assume you think the asphalt dust is too dark, did you use Dullcoat with a few drops of flat black mixed in?  But don't worry about it, love it!

[Mike999]

Thanks for the comments, everybody!

I think the weathering maybe needs some "streaking grime," especially in places that are still clean.  Still thinking about doing that.  If I remember right, the asphalt dust is a thin coat of Lifecolor Grimy Black acrylic paint, with a little dark gray pastel dust added while it was still damp.  I added clumps of mud and grass, but they're mostly out of sight in the fender wells.

It was fun researching the story of these cars and the race. That's why I bored you all with the TL;DR.

[afx]

Porsche liked to test their car by competing in this event as well.  Great build.

[Peter Lombardo]

Love the background story and the build...... great job.

 

[Jonathan]

Stunning!  Excellent work!

[Belugawrx]

That looks great ?

And thank you for the write up.. well done.

[Dominik]

On ‎27‎.‎04‎.‎2019 at 2:28 AM, Belugawrx said:

That looks great ?

And thank you for the write up.. well done.

x2. interesting Story.

[1959scudetto]

Excellent model, Mike (I just happened to discover it now) and interesting story, too (yesterday I learned that Mazda took 4th place in this endurance race)

[ChrisR]

NICE!