Lotus 32B from Resin Joker 33 kit - long story

[absmiami]

This will be fun ...

and confusing 

first I wanted to open a new build topic on my phone - trying to pretend that I’m not too far behind the “curve”

second What you are looking at is a twenty five year old Japanese resin kit by Joker.  Got it many years ago and I finally figured out what To do with it...

but that’s complicated ...

[absmiami]

Forgot to mention the scale

for those of you too tender in years to know of the Joker kits - they made a series of 24th scale kits - sports cars and GP cars in the early years of resin/craft kits - before the age of the internet ...  They were made in low numbers and sold through distributors.  Back in those days Motoi (calif) was my resin “pusher”.  I would scour his ad in Mike Quarterman’s magazine and send Motoi my orders - with a check - never quite sure what would arrive in the mail three weeks later ... So you can see from the photo that these kits could actually produce a very nice 24th scale model ...

[absmiami]

These photos were done after some minimal cleanup. The castings have some light flash and a few holes on the casting edges. Nothing too bad. In fact for their age - these were quite good.  
but look carefully at the chassis in the first two photos - those of you who obsess over Chapman’s chassis engineering (I know you’re out there) will notice a couple of three inaccuracies - features that render the casting inaccurate for the Lotus 33 monocoque 

gold stars to the first obsessive to identify these errors ....

[Dave B]

Hi Andrew, tks for posting this, it looks like they build into a very nice kit, with a little patience that is!!

Dave B

[absmiami]

The Joker kits are rare and are not often ebayed - and yes they are good kits of Race cars from my favorite era - in my favorite scale ... But about this chassis ...  ...

[RancheroSteve]

After looking at images of the real car, it appears that the rear of the opening for the injector stacks in the engine cover is too rounded, for one?

[Gramps46]

Thank you for posting a new thread on the Lotus and providing some background.  The names like Quarterman and Motoi bring back some very pleasant memories.

[absmiami]

Oh I forgot ...

Motoi had a newsletter that he mailed to you - that’s right -he MAILED it to you. Full of xeroxed images of stuff currently available So I would take it to lunch and drool all over it in between bites of my Wendy’s chicken sandwich.  I still got one or two somewhere ...it’s funny what us resin addicts used to have to do to get our fixes...

ranchero. Have a look at some good chassis photos. Any book on Lotus you might have by Doug Nye will answer the question about the question ...

[LDO]

The suspense is killing me. 

[250 Testa Rossa]

Does anybody have a complete list of all the kits that were offered by Joker?

[absmiami]

I’ll have to find one of motoi’s  “happy man’s bibles”  there should at least a partial listing. Or I’ll email  Motoi.  And mike quarterman would know ...

Joker produced quite a few kits. -  many were subjects that no one else has yet done in 24th scale.  But they were not shy about copying stuff. As an example  - they produced a kit Of the Lotus 49 Early spec. The ‘67 car. But they used a resin cast copy of the heller kit engine - mistakes and all ...

still no one has solved the chassis riddle.... ??

[Gramps46]

I was going to suggest Motoi and Mike Q also.  I only have one Joker kit, the 1965 Ford GT40 LM Longnose, and it is a transkit body for a Fujimi.

[absmiami]

Very nice Gramps

now what is wrong with the “Lotus 33 chassis casting   ?? ??

[Gramps46]

12 hours ago, absmiami said:

now what is wrong with the “Lotus 33 chassis casting   ?? ??

I found a cutaway of the chassis but I am not seeing what is wrong with the casting.

 

[absmiami]

Very good cutaway. But only chassis photos will show the mistakes.  The driving compartment openings on both the Lotus 25 and the Lotus 33 were Tapered.  The footwell was about nine inches across and the seat opening was just a wider    - maybe 12 or 13 inches wide. Just wide enough for Clark. Too narrow for most of us. There is a reason why there are no pictures of Chapman in a 25 or a 33  -  he didn’t fit...  the chassis sides were kinked  or bent half way back
- see the great chassis photos for the restoration of Gurney’s Indy Lotus 29 on the IMS museum site .  The chassis sides on the 33 tapered in a straight line - without the kink ...so the error on the kit chassis casting is - there is no taper - the chassis sides are about 13 scale inches apart front to back ...

[absmiami]

Now to the Lotus 32B ...

this car was built by Team Lotus for Clark’s ‘65 Tasman series entries.  It looks like a 33. But it’s chassis was based upon the design of the Lotus 27. Which had perpendicular chassis sides - no taper - and it was about an inch narrower than the 25 and the 33. So if you create some channels on the underside of the chassis casting - the water and oil lines located in these channels - like the 25 and the 33 - you’ve got the makings of an accurate Lotus 32B chassis. Not what Joker had in mind - but hey - that’s OK. ...

[absmiami]

About the engine ...  the 32B had a

Climax four - 2.6(?) liter - instead of the Smaller Climax 8 used in the Grand Prix cars.  But I got

that covered. So I’ll remove the engine casting and away we go ....

[250 Testa Rossa]

Is there a list of all of the 1/24 scale kits that were produced by Joker? 

[absmiami]

Surgical theater.  the Engine block is sawed Away using a Tamiya saw and a series of holes drilled into the resin casting in a cavity in front of the engine 

after some filing I glued pieces of renshape to the chassis sides and shaped them. The Lotus 32 and 22B did not have the tapered engine bay chassis sides because they used Four cylinder engines   - there was no need to shape the sides of the chassis for the exhaust pipes - as was necessary with the Climax eight ... more space for fuel and a little easier to construct ...

[absmiami]

Next is some more scraping and filing to open Channels in the bottom of the chassis  - for oil and water lines .  And opening the solid block of resin where the foot box is located ... the white metal casting from the kit serves as an assembly for the suspension arms and the brackets from which the pedals are suspended. It’s a pretty good casting I’ll probably use it ...

[absmiami]

So the other correction to the chassis casting is to reshape the chassis sides forward of the location of the dashboard.   The chassis sides hold the same profile from the suspension bulkhead back to the engine bulkhead.  So I filed the correct shape and then sharpened the fold line with an Xacto knife.  

[absmiami]

Taking stuff off

and putting scuff on ...

the chassis takes shape with some more Evergreen strip ...

and a lot of filing - lots of filing

now I can add some front bulkhead compartments  - like the steering rack and the pivot / brace for the lower suspension brace and the shock mount 

 

[absmiami]

On the Lotus 32B - the engine cover is separate from the bodywork  - -  like the Lotus 25 ...  on the 33 the engine cover is altogether with the rest of the body work - Not ready to work on the body yet - but I sawed off the engine cover to check the fit of the suspension casting - needed some minor mods to the body work but everything should fit when I am done ...

[absmiami]

How good was the Lotus 32B?

this is another screen grab fr Wikipedia  -  have a look at the ‘65 Tasman season results.  You could argue that this was Clark’s - and Chapman’s most successful open wheeler !  Not bad ...

[absmiami]

The in-board shocks are suspended from the rocker arms and drop into a housing on either side of the footwell .  This feature is made from a couple of blocked of renshape  - filed sanded and CA glued to the chassis casting ...