BMW 507 Cabrio 1957 - Elvis Presley's one - Revell old kit 1:24

[Big Messer]

7 hours ago, CrazyCrank said:

Thanks a lot for your kind words, Big Messer

And to reward you:

 

Dedication vs good enough...

[CrazyCrank]

Hello happy followers

The body shell was attached to the chassis.
These parts were not glued yet, because I'd still a lot of work to do  on the inner junctions, particularly at doors's level.

 

   

 

   

In fact, however, the fit between these elements seemed correct, except for the rocker panel under the passenger door. I knew I could find a way to fix this.

Fitting the body to the chassis wasn't easy, as I completely reworked these parts and "it didn't work like the kit plan". 

The bonnet was, of course, hinged to the bodywork, and the mechanism for raising and closing it was installed and was operational.

There's a lack of lubricant  :

 

A few moments later, I noticed another problem with how the parts fitted together.

 

The bonnet closed properly, but then its front part was raised by about 0.7 mm, as you can see from the photos in my previous post, which was very unsightly and unacceptable!
What's more, while I was trying to find the reason for this, the left-hand hinge finally broke off as a result of raising and lowering the bonnet too much times.

I tried to identify the cause of this maladjustment, using my spare bonnet
- First, I tried to fit the spare bonnet from my second kit, without fitting the spare frame that stiffens it on its inner side: and then, this spare bonnet fitted on the body without any misfit.
- Then I taped the frame to the inside of the bonnet, and tried again, and the same problem as with the painted bonnet appeared!

It seemed to be the frame that was causing the problem at the front of the bonnet when you wanted to close it.

One thing leading to another, I was able to determine that only a small part of the frame was responsible, so I removed it from the spare frame and tried the operation again.... 

And then, miraculously, everything went well, the fit was perfect and the bonnet didn't stick out once it was closed!

 

   

 

 

I then carried out a risky and delicate operation on the painted bonnet, namely removing this same part of the frame. 

Once the operation was done, with no damage other than to the paint on the inside of the bonnet, the fit was better, as well.

 

   

 

All that remained was to make a hinge for the left-hand side and hide the misery on the paintwork on the front of the inner part of the bonnet, what I did using semi gloss black paint (because it would have been tedious and risky to sanding the damaged part of the bonnet, moreover without having certainty to obtain a perfectly smooth surface)

 

 

Once this done, finally, the fit was better : the bonnet raised now with only  about 0.3-0.4 mm at the front, while I'd not yet fixed the hinges, what could reduce a bit more the defect.

   

 

That said,  I was not still frankly happy, because the bonnet wasn't still flush with the body.

Fortunately, after multiple tests, I realised that sanding the frame on the inside of the bonnet to thin it out, would greatly improve things, the remaining fit defect having become minimal.

So, I sanded down the inner frame of the bonnet as much as possible. Of course, I also had to repaint it and try to hide the defects caused by my repairs as much as possible.
I took then the opportunity to add, purely on a whim, some sound insulation felt panels, made from cut-outs in a sheet of paper (0.11 mm thick), painted matt black and varnished matt.

Purists will retort that, yes, such plates are found on all cars nowadays, but that this was not necessarily the case on cars of that era, and that in any case, on the few photos of the restoration of Elvis Presley's BMW, you can't see such accessories, any more than on most of the photos of other BMW 507s that can be found on the net.

So my answer to them is:
- yes, but there's nothing to say that they weren't added later on to Elvis's BMW, because I can tell you that having seen a video in which we see this V8 engined car driving, we also hear it, VERY LOUDLY!
- that if you look hard enough on the net, you can find photos of the engine bay of some BMW 507s, where the body colour is not black, but the inside of the bonnet is black. So either there are felt panels for sound insulation, or the inside of the bonnet has been painted black to better absorb and eliminate the heat generated by the engine.

For example, these photos:

   

 

- And it's a restoration, the engine wasn't even available any more, nor were many of the original parts, and the artists who worked on it sometimes took liberties, so ...
- And finally, I had no choice but to hide the misery caused by the removal of part of the frame after gluing (see previous posts).

But the result of my work in the end, wasn't  too bad (and I'm not saying that to reassure myself), but you be the judge:

 

  

 

   

 

 

I made then a new mechanism for raising and closing the bonnet:

The new hinge was drawn and 3D printed, assembled and painted and then put in place, not without difficulties, due to the lack of room to put my fingers in the engine bay 😅

 

   

 

 

I used this 3D printed part, a tiny piece of clear sheet (phone covering protection) that I glued on it, and the same metal stripped I'd previously  crafted, and which slides into the "box" formed by the clear sheet and the 3 D printed part

 

   

 

 

And now, some overviews of the achieved bodywork

   

 

   

 

Stay tuned for  the next episode: completing the engine bay

Thanks for watching