Jim Clarks #92 Lotus

[BIGTRUCK]

Kit #2 from the MPC Hall of Fame 3 car set . This kit can be done 1 of 3 ways, Clarks green #92 or Gurney White #93 or a developmental version with a early double overhead cam . Kit come with all decal versions. This kit ,so far ,is pretty straight forward. The 2 pc plastic tires are a little lame but at least they are not the vinyl ones.

[DustyMojave]

This kit was 1st produced by AMT, introduced in late '63 as I got one of these and a Parnelli Jones Watson Offy race winner model for Christmas that year along with a new TV in our brand new house. My brother had recently gotten out of the hospital after getting bitten by a rattlesnake on my birthday. It was a memorable Christmas for me. It was re-issued by AMT a few times. I later got one of these kits with a poster for the inaugural Indy car race at Michigan International Speedway although that should have been a Lotus 38, not a 29. This version this one is built from was re-issued many years later as a triple kit under the MPC name after AMT merged with MPC.  I have a couple of that version too. The early ones I built back in the 60s were destroyed along with many other models in a major earthquake in 1971. I also have the IMC Lotus 38. I have long believed that this AMT/MPC Lotus 29 kit was mastered by the same guy who mastered the MPC kit of the Lotus Turbine Indy car of 1968, and the IMC Ford GT kits of the 60s. They all have the same Ford pushrod and DOHC engines with the same gearbox. Virtually identical pieces. And the Lotuses have a similar too narrow and straight sided windscreen.

The tires were always too tall for the Lotus. Better suited to the Watson-Offy, although too tall and narrow for that too.

The kit is mostly pretty fair in accuracy and can be built to look pretty good. Certainly NOT a Model Factory Hiro kit. But with an original kit price as printed on the box of $1.50, one can hardly expect MFH quality.

I came back to edit because I just remembered that my 2nd kit (the MIS one) I built with a poseable steering. I cut the steering rack from the front upper control arms and replaced it with a piece of aluminum tube rack housing with a wire rack. I dechromed and painted some parts for that one too. The exhaust trumpets were paint brush ferrules. The tires came from another source that I can't remember now but were far closer to "correct" for the car. I think it was a cheap toy car and I cut the wheels out to put the tires on the kit Halibrand front wheels and Dunlop rears. That one I did with the #93 Dan Gurney markings.

Edited October 13, 2022 by DustyMojave

[Bainford]

Cool! I'll be watching this resurrection.

[Racersonly]

Ken…..I have a partial kit if you’re looking for some parts.