Chopped, full-fendered '34 Ford 3-window AMT/Monogram mashup

[Ace-Garageguy]

Just a little Q&D mockup to prove a point to myself. There is NO decent 1/25 '33-'34 Ford 3W kit, and I always thought I might like to do one from what's available.

The Monogram snapper's hood is too short, so it makes a kinda goofy looking model to anyone who's really familiar with '34 Fords.

The AMT 5-window kit's hood is actually too long, and there are some other problems with it.

The Monogram body on the AMT 5W fenders shows the short hood very well, but the rest of the body fit isn't too bad.

With the too-short hood removed, and the too-long hood substituted, we're definitely on track to getting the proportions right.

Stay tuned, 'cause this is one I've wanted to do for a LONG time... 

 

Edited May 31, 2023 by Ace-Garageguy
TYPO

[OldNYJim]

I wonder why they ended up with the hood being so short - aside from the usual difficulty with numbers that we suspect some of the kit designers have.  

The rest of the body looks fairly accurate from where I’m sitting (though I’m FAR from an expert) so I wonder why just the nose ended up being noticeably wrong?  

Regardless - good start!  I’ll be making mental notes on this so I can do this myself at some point down the line…

[Ace-Garageguy]

10 hours ago, CabDriver said:

I wonder why they ended up with the hood being so short - aside from the usual difficulty with numbers that we suspect some of the kit designers have.  

The rest of the body looks fairly accurate from where I’m sitting (though I’m FAR from an expert) so I wonder why just the nose ended up being noticeably wrong?  

Regardless - good start!  I’ll be making mental notes on this so I can do this myself at some point down the line…

Of course, there are more questions about the '33-'34 Fords on the market.

Why do the two most recent AMT '33-'34 offerings use entirely different fender tooling, when in reality they are identical? To their credit, somebody at AMT realized the frames were the same...but still somehow missed that the fenders were the same.

Why is the wheelbase on the short-hood Monogram OK, but the hood is way too short?

Why is the hood on the AMT 5W I'm using almost as much too-long as the Revellogram is too-short?

Why are the front fenders of the AMT 5-window I'm using here misshapen, and the sedan's are even worse?

For that matter, why is almost every line and proportion on the AMT '33-'34 sedan wrong?

Why is the old AMT 3-window entirely wrong almost everywhere, including a frame that looks nothing like a real one?

Why is the other chopped-top Revell 3W so underscale that it works as a '34 Fiat?

I can't answer any of these definitively...but it's simply not a "cost" issue, as so many like to insist.

It doesn't cost any more to measure something right the first time, assuming the employee doing the measuring has the arithmetical competence of an 8th grader.

 

 

 

Edited June 1, 2023 by Ace-Garageguy
CLARITY

[Calb56]

4 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Of course, there are more questions about the '34 Fords on the market.

Why do the two most recent AMT '34 offerings use entirely different fender tooling, when in reality they are identical? To their credit, somebody at AMT realized the frames were the same...but still somehow missed that the fenders were the same.

Why is the wheelbase on the short-hood Monogram OK, but the hood is way too short?

Why is the hood on the AMT 5W I'm using almost as much too-long as the Revellogram is too-short?

Why are the front fenders of the AMT 5-window I'm using here misshapen, and the sedan's are even worse?

For that matter, why is almost every line and proportion on the AMT '33-'34 sedan wrong?

Why is the old AMT 3-window entirely wrong almost everywhere, including a frame that looks nothing like a real one?

Why is the chopped-top Revell 3W so underscale that it works as a '34 Fiat?

I can't answer any of these definitively...but it's simply not a "cost" issue, as so many like to insist.

It doesn't cost any more to measure something right the first time, assuming the employee doing the measuring has the arithmetical competence of an 8th grader.

 

 

 

So essentially, there still is not a decent rendering of a 34 Ford from any manufacturer?

[Ace-Garageguy]

6 minutes ago, Calb56 said:

So essentially, there still is not a decent rendering of a 34 Ford from any manufacturer?

The only one that's really quite good is the original and derivatives of Monogram's 1/24 version.

  

Edited June 1, 2023 by Ace-Garageguy

[customline]

The possible answer to all the "why" questions is simply they didn't think anyone would notice. Or....it was not that important to them. They thought the kids wouldn't know any better. Simple.  Most 11 year olds had never seen a real one except on the pages of Rod & Custom. The target market was not 70 year old car nuts like us. ?

[redscampi]

1 hour ago, customline said:

The possible answer to all the "why" questions is simply they didn't think anyone would notice. Or....it was not that important to them. They thought the kids wouldn't know any better. Simple.  Most 11 year olds had never seen a real one except on the pages of Rod & Custom. The target market was not 70 year old car nuts like us. ?

I think that their target audience was just not that picky when these were originally tooled. Today's modeler is more experienced (old?) and has access to much better and much more reference material. For that matter, why were 1970's American 1:1 cars so poorly built? I just don't think most people knew any better. 

[milo1303s]

I see your talking 3 winders but how bout the Aurora 34 5 window ford kit hows that stack up ?

[1930fordpickup]

On 6/1/2023 at 9:19 AM, Ace-Garageguy said:

Why is the other chopped-top Revell 3W so underscale that it works as a '34 Fiat?

This one is because they made the body fit the Lil John Chassis from the T-kits that had his chassis. 

The others are a good question.

[Dennis Lacy]

2 hours ago, milo1303s said:

I see your talking 3 winders but how bout the Aurora 34 5 window ford kit hows that stack up ?

Completely out of whack. 

[Ace-Garageguy]

13 hours ago, milo1303s said:

I see your talking 3 winders but how bout the Aurora 34 5 window ford kit hows that stack up ?

 

10 hours ago, Dennis Lacy said:

Completely out of whack. 

Yeah, that old double kit was a grail until I got one. Looks OK initially, but nothing measures out right.

[mrm]

52 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

 

Yeah, that old double kit was a grail until I got one. Looks OK initially, but nothing measures out right.

Some good info here. Thank you.

I always wanted to build a badass 33/34, but never got around doing one. I have many started in various stages, but never managed to complete one. 

[Ace-Garageguy]

3 minutes ago, mrm said:

I always wanted to build a badass 33/34, but never got around doing one. I have many started in various stages, but never managed to complete one. 

Me too...   

 

[Kit Karson]

Valient effort, Brother!

https://public.fotki.com/jferren/34-5ive-window-heav/

Simple 5W chop...

http://public.fotki.com/jferren/kit-karsons-33-ford/

One not so easy '33 3W chops...

I will be following along with our fellow '33/'34 Ford Coupe lovers! -KK

[Kit Karson]

'34 5ive Window Full Fendered Chopped Coupe & Gangster Deuce Sedan & Tubster Deuce

Found one more shot of the chopped '34 5W on its fenders... -KK

[garagepunk66]

On 6/1/2023 at 8:19 AM, Ace-Garageguy said:

Of course, there are more questions about the '33-'34 Fords on the market.

Why do the two most recent AMT '33-'34 offerings use entirely different fender tooling, when in reality they are identical? To their credit, somebody at AMT realized the frames were the same...but still somehow missed that the fenders were the same.

Why is the wheelbase on the short-hood Monogram OK, but the hood is way too short?

Why is the hood on the AMT 5W I'm using almost as much too-long as the Revellogram is too-short?

Why are the front fenders of the AMT 5-window I'm using here misshapen, and the sedan's are even worse?

For that matter, why is almost every line and proportion on the AMT '33-'34 sedan wrong?

Why is the old AMT 3-window entirely wrong almost everywhere, including a frame that looks nothing like a real one?

Why is the other chopped-top Revell 3W so underscale that it works as a '34 Fiat?

I can't answer any of these definitively...but it's simply not a "cost" issue, as so many like to insist.

It doesn't cost any more to measure something right the first time, assuming the employee doing the measuring has the arithmetical competence of an 8th grader.

 

 

 

Bill, is it possible that the wheelbase of the AMT 5W you are using is too long by a couple of scale inches ahead of the doors? The curvature along the bottom of the body of the Revell/Monogram snapper at the cowl seems accurate, but the front fender of the AMT fender unit seems too far ahead, and as you mentioned, the hood is too long.  

Edited June 9, 2023 by garagepunk66

[Ace-Garageguy]

4 minutes ago, garagepunk66 said:

 ...The curvature along the bottom of the body of the Revell/Monogram snapper at the cowl seems accurate...

Nope.

[garagepunk66]

2 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Nope.

Ah, I see. What's the plan for fixing that?

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

2 minutes ago, garagepunk66 said:

Ah, I see. What's the plan for fixing that?

 

Something along the lines of the fix I started working on for the too-short cowl on the old AMT '32 Fords...

 

[Mark]

The AMT five-window seems to have been an effort to salvage something from the extremely bad '34 two-door sedan kit.  Its chassis and engine(s) were saved, I seem to recall that the only body panels carried over to the coupe were the hood side panels, but I could be wrong on that.

The sedan had some things about it that were slap-you-in-the-face wrong.  All of the 1/25 scale Model A kits had wider fender units than that '34.  You ain't gonna tell me that Ford narrowed their cars for '33-'34, and that all those Model A kits (which are all pretty comparable) were, and are, incorrect.  The '34 sedan was the odd one out.

The AMT '34 three-window might just be the worst 1/25 scale car kit ever made by the original AMT company.  It's way, way off.

The Revell John Buttera '34 was just an effort to wring a couple more kits out of that excellent '26 T tooling.  Why they didn't just do a '27 roadster and/or coupe is beyond me.    

My bright idea, which I haven't even tried to this point, was to slice the roof off of the MPC '34 Ford dirt track 3W coupe body and graft it to the AMT 5W lower body.  But I haven't even pulled the two out for measuring, so who knows if that will work...

[Robberbaron]

1 hour ago, Mark said:

My bright idea, which I haven't even tried to this point, was to slice the roof off of the MPC '34 Ford dirt track 3W coupe body and graft it to the AMT 5W lower body.  But I haven't even pulled the two out for measuring, so who knows if that will work...

 

[Dennis Lacy]

@Ace-Garageguy

I have been wanting to share these pics with you since I saw this thread but I had to do some digging to find them. My friend Bryce Michaelmoore down in Australia built a beautiful ‘34 Roadster (starting with the AMT 34 5-Window) some years back and he corrected the front clip proportions.
 

On the AMT kit the hood is too long and the grill is too far forward. He grafted on the front of the fenders from the Revell snap kit which sunk the grill back where it belongs and shortened the hood accordingly. He also grafted the AMT outer fender corners back on because the Revell fenders don’t have a good shape there, not round enough.

Below are some pics I snagged from his Facebook. I’m not on there but it allowed me to see the whole album for this build. Having grown up in 1934 Fords I have an eye for them and in my opinion Bryce nailed the proportions. The grill is properly sunk into fenders as it should be.
 

Album link below.

https://www.facebook.com/michelmorerodandkustom/photos/a.658238904281837/795902530515473/?type=3

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

9 hours ago, Dennis Lacy said:

@Ace-Garageguy

I have been wanting to share these pics with you since I saw this thread but I had to do some digging to find them. My friend Bryce Michaelmoore down in Australia built a beautiful ‘34 Roadster (starting with the AMT 34 5-Window) some years back and he corrected the front clip proportions.

Thanks for the pix, Dennis. I was aware of the bodged front fender contours and grille placement, but hadn't started looking into what it would take to get those corrected as well.

That little red roadster looks right.  Amazing how much more attractive a correctly-proportioned and contoured model that actually looks like what it represents can be.  

[Kit Karson]

10 hours ago, Dennis Lacy said:

@Ace-Garageguy

I have been wanting to share these pics with you since I saw this thread but I had to do some digging to find them. My friend Bryce Michaelmoore down in Australia built a beautiful ‘34 Roadster (starting with the AMT 34 5-Window) some years back and he corrected the front clip proportions.
 

On the AMT kit the hood is too long and the grill is too far forward. He grafted on the front of the fenders from the Revell snap kit which sunk the grill back where it belongs and shortened the hood accordingly. He also grafted the AMT outer fender corners back on because the Revell fenders don’t have a good shape there, not round enough.

Below are some pics I snagged from his Facebook. I’m not on there but it allowed me to see the whole album for this build. Having grown up in 1934 Fords I have an eye for them and in my opinion Bryce nailed the proportions. The grill is properly sunk into fenders as it should be.
 

Album link below.

https://www.facebook.com/michelmorerodandkustom/photos/a.658238904281837/795902530515473/?type=3

 

When did we first see Bryce's roadster? Was it on TRaK?  Keep working on the 3W we're all waiting to see the results of your effort, Brother! -KK

[Kenmojr]

I took these photos of a 1933 or 34 Ford coupe in 2019 while I was returning from a car show. The car did not attend the show but was parked roadside a few miles away.