Ace-Garageguy Posted February 16 Posted February 16 I would wager that nobody in the history of the universe has gone as far with this kit...at least while keeping it a midget in the scale it came in. 1
OldNYJim Posted February 16 Author Posted February 16 1 hour ago, Ace-Garageguy said: I would wager that nobody in the history of the universe has gone as far with this kit...at least while keeping it a midget in the scale it came in. Well, that’s because everyone else was smarter than me 🤪😂 I WOULD like to build this variation too though… 1
Ace-Garageguy Posted February 16 Posted February 16 4 hours ago, OldNYJim said: I WOULD like to build this variation too though… Thanks for posting that. I'm pretty sure that old R&C article is where I first got the idea to build a 1/25 scale sprint car from the old Monogram midget kit...years before I had the skill to do it, or even much interest in sprint cars. 1
OldNYJim Posted February 17 Author Posted February 17 9 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said: Thanks for posting that. I'm pretty sure that old R&C article is where I first got the idea to build a 1/25 scale sprint car from the old Monogram midget kit...years before I had the skill to do it, or even much interest in sprint cars. I have very nearly collected all the parts mentioned in that article to build a replica of this one - and I feel less bad about building it now the Midget kits are easily available again! A little more progress today…test fit printed wheels to resin cast tires to make sure everything fits together how it should… I ran out of time to do this last night so today I gave the freshly-printed parts an ultrasonic bath in some Dawn, UV cured them and got to see wheels and tires together properly. I think they’ll work! Next up, working from the wheels in, I needed to figure out brakes. Spun up a disk from some ABS rod on my lathe, reshaped some preciously-printed calipers left over from another project to match my reference material and then made a little mold so I can cast four of the things: Incidentally, the little silver thing is another of those mini magnets - I’m going to test to see if the wheels will hold in place with a couple of these, but if not I’ll replace with some 1/8” roundbar pins. Would be cool to have the wheel be removable, but I’m not going to sacrifice the look of the finished build to make it work…more experimenting to be done on that… Something of a side project, I’ve been working on a little Mattel Vac-u-form trying to get it to perform well enough that I could use it to form a curved windshield for this build, maybe. Did some work on the vacuum portion today and I’ve very nearly got this thing working well enough to make some usable parts I think: That part isn’t for this build, but I was so pleased to get something usable from this little machine anyway… Next project, starting work on an in-out box to sit behind the motor. Made the basic round parts from some ABS bar, added various styrene shapes to match some reference pics that I’m working with and I have a decent start on a ‘trans’: Now, I struggled finding good blueprints to work with for this part OR good dimensions…seems there were a bunch of manufacturers, a bunch of somewhat-similar styles and researching the history of which parts where available when is proving tough. It’s a starting point tho…and looks like this, in the car: I need to tweak the placement so that a driveshaft would clear that crossmember - that crossmember is actually L-channel on a real Kurtis and not quite as large, but I used some beefier square tube because I was scared of the frame being too delicate - and from any normal viewing angle on the finished car you wouldn’t be able to tell that I cheated anyhow, but I’ll need to make sure my in-out box sits low enough now to work feasibly. And that’s about my progress today besides making a couple of little brackets and ordering supplies for the next steps…thanks for looking, more soon, soon as I’ve done more! 3
OldNYJim Posted February 21 Author Posted February 21 Thanks fellas! Had a coupla three slow days at the bench but got a little project completed anyway…knock-offs for the rear wheels! I wanted the same design as the molded-in knock-offs on the kit wheels, but with some depth…when I designed the wheels and printed them I tweaked the design a LITTLE so I’d have some depth to allow for these parts to have a little depth and dimension, but otherwise I just copied what Monogram did originally: Other thing I’ve been pondering, almost since I opened this kit, is what to do about the leather that wraps up from the interior over the side of the body. I can just mask and paint it to match the seat (which I also have to make) but I’m wondering if I can actually slice around the edge of that molded-in material, separate it from the body and almost make an interior ‘tub’ that drops back in for some increased depth and realism, and slightly easier painting: My other idea is to take a casting of it somehow, make a resin master of that detail (albeit in separate pieces) and vac-form it, or replicate it in epoxy putty so I can add some little creases and wrinkles to add a little realism. Or, yeah, just mask it and paint it after I guess 😂 Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!
Pierre Rivard Posted February 21 Posted February 21 Superb work Jim. Starting with a vintage kit and then adding styrene, brass, resin and printed component fabrication makes for beautiful scale modeling for us to follow. What you do is special. Have you considered Milliput for making the seat and other leather parts. Feels a bit like plasticine and pretty of tine to shape and texture surfaces before it starts hardening.
iBorg Posted February 21 Posted February 21 That's an amazing silk purse you're making. I agree no one has ever tried to make this kit this accurate. 1
OldNYJim Posted February 23 Author Posted February 23 On 2/21/2025 at 8:34 AM, Pierre Rivard said: Superb work Jim. Starting with a vintage kit and then adding styrene, brass, resin and printed component fabrication makes for beautiful scale modeling for us to follow. What you do is special. Have you considered Milliput for making the seat and other leather parts. Feels a bit like plasticine and pretty of tine to shape and texture surfaces before it starts hardening. Thank you Pierre! I actually have some Tamiya 2-part putty here that I was thinking of trying for the leather - but similar process, yes! On 2/21/2025 at 9:55 AM, iBorg said: That's an amazing silk purse you're making. I agree no one has ever tried to make this kit this accurate. Thank you! Today’s project was the radiator, for not reason other than the parts were going to take a while to print and I was going to be home to watch the printer… Laid out a design in CAD - I DID consider scratchbuilding or kit-bashing this piece, but the printer can make finer details nicer than I can… I actually made TWO versions - one with a hollow mesh that you could maybe see through…but I was almost certain my printer would struggle to print the part given the tiny pattern: And…it ALMOST worked, but the part is REALLY fragile, didn’t print perfectly and I couldn’t get all the leftover resin out of the holes (or it was already dried in there as the print was happening…) I think I COULD make a few more attempts at making this work and probably get something acceptable in the end, but I’m not sure the juice is worth the squeeze - you almost certainly won’t be able to see enough when it’s in the car to tell the difference…and if I end up needed to shoot this with gloss enamel to get a nice brass finish on it then I bet those holes would clog right up anyway. Acceptable print of a solid version: And the finished part, with a less-perfect print of the same in the tracknose to check that it fits. A fun day experimenting - and I spent a few hours digging through my parts stash and dozens of kits to find some parts for the rear end, so that’ll probably be tomorrow’s project. Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!
OldNYJim Posted February 24 Author Posted February 24 (edited) A little more progress today… Started some work proper on the rear axle. I went parts-box digging for a leaf spring that looked like the reference pics I found and that was nicely molded…ended up with a part from the Revell Model A kits. Now, I know they’re 1/25, and this kit is (about) 1/20, but Midgets are small and this spring looks and fits right just right: The axle tube is aluminum, not for any particular reason other than that’s the material I had that was the right size - the center is machined ABS rod with a couple of printed cones to make it somewhat represent the part in the kit (which I think is supposed to be a Ford Banjo axle). Still some detailing to do, and I want to see if I have room on the frame for a pair of friction shocks, but I’m further along than I was this morning. That crossmember is brass square tube, horizontal milled to make it into a channel to receive the spring and hold it really tight and securely, then soldered in place. For this part I’m not matching how the 1/1 cars look - you won’t be able to see this bracket when I’m done so I went for the strongest option I could . With the axle’s location locked in place where it should be, time to tackle the rear suspension linkages, which double as some little triangular nerf bars to protect the rear tires. I was actually going to remake these out of brass, assuming they were round tube, but closer inspection shows they’re more like an early Ford split wishbone - rectangular and tapered from front to back: So, that actually makes my job a little easier - I definitely don’t have the tools to make a better version of these, aside from fixing the clunky nerf-bar portion of the assembly, so I bend up some more in-scale brass, cleaned up the kit parts and just improved upon them a little: Still need to mate them to frame and axle…that’ll probably be tomorrow’s task. And finally for today, now I know the axle location and the trans location I can start figuring out the little torque tube (I think) to connect the two - not super interesting yet, but everything still JUST fits as it should: Still a lot of parts to pack into this 5lb bag though… Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Edited February 24 by OldNYJim 1
BK9300 Posted February 24 Posted February 24 So many quality enhancements to this little car - great progress so far! 1
OldNYJim Posted February 26 Author Posted February 26 On 2/24/2025 at 1:30 AM, BK9300 said: So many quality enhancements to this little car - great progress so far! Thank you sir! It feels like it’s taking me forever, but I’m having fun! Tonight’s little nuggets of progress… I picked up a product on Amazon named Hinodeeeagle Plastic Nerd (!) - it’s a plastic that you can heat in boiling water to make a temporary mold to resin cast a whatever you need to mold a copy of. The body of this Midget has a molded-in cowl steering crank, and making a traditional RTV mold of that little piece would be way harder than using this stuff (if it actually works…). Here goes… Heat a stick of the material in freshly boiled water for three minutes… Once heated it turns soft and gloopy, so I smooshed it over the part of the body I’m trying to recreate: Next up, dunked the body (and ominous black blob) into cold water and let it sit another couple of minutes, removed the mold and fed it some 2-part resin: Let the resin harden, then removed…and success! Actually, not a total success - I didn’t mold this one quite perfectly and can do another without the extra flash, but I was concerned about the resin getting stuck in there so I overfilled a little. Turns out I didn’t need to worry, the mold, once cooled, is pretty flexible but seems to be holding its shape ready for another try tomorrow. I might lay a little piece of brass rod in there on the next try, just to strengthen the finished part a little. Once I get a good one, I’ll sand off the part on the body and mount the new part with a little air-gap for some more realism. Aside from that excitement (it’s always fun getting to play with a new product), mounted my modified rear wishbones - drilled out the axle to receive the far end and glued the receivers on the front to the frame, and that’s another piece of the puzzle: And I had a slow work day today and had some time to model a rear axle center in 3D…I was going to scratchbuild that part and improve upon the piece I have mocked-up in the pics above, but I printed a few anyway this evening to see how they look: I’ve been having some failed prints on my printer layer - replaced the film in the bed (which was getting pretty well-used at this point)… …with a nice new one… …AND I gave it a drink of some fresh new resin but I’m still getting more failed prints than I’d like - you can see above some supports that have failed before anything printed. Might need to mess with the machine some more…but meantime I’m going to clean those parts up tomorrow and cure them and see if we have something better than we had before I started 🤪 Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more!
James2 Posted February 26 Posted February 26 Well I’m just glad to be looking over your shoulder to see the process.
OldNYJim Posted February 27 Author Posted February 27 (edited) 16 hours ago, James2 said: Well I’m just glad to be looking over your shoulder to see the process. Ha! Thank you! Sat at the bench three hours tonight and basically all I achieved was cleaning up the new Banjo rear end I printed last night… …and fitting it. Had to modify the belly pan a little, and the body needed a little trim to clear the leaf spring but nothing too major… Need to measure the axle before locking the center in place with a little CA (it looks off-center in the pic because it moved and I didn’t notice until after I left the shop for the evening…) but I guess a LITTLE progress is better than none 🤷♂️ I should probably finish up the steering links next, but I’ve also got some more work to do on the frame and like 50 other things that might make me squirrel…more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Edited February 27 by OldNYJim
OldNYJim Posted March 2 Author Posted March 2 Ok, another Saturday, another little morsel of progress… I wanted to finish up the front steering setup, but I need to print some rod ends…but I did figure out the link from cowl to the upper steering arm at least: Would’ve been a WAY easier task if my dumb brain hadn’t had the idea to have a little portion of the rod be threaded, which forced me to figure out how to achieve that without a tiny set of dies. I DID find some small diameter brass tube at the local Ace though, and dug through my stash of watch parts and found a small diameter watch winder part that I could modify to make work. Literally HOURS of foolin’ around to add that tiny detail that most people will never notice or care about… With that achieved, and the printer running on some little rod ends so I can finish up the rest of this, I moved onto the gas tank. My research makes me think there were various capacity tanks common to these cars, but they’re all a fairly similar design - something like this: They mount behind the driver on top of the frame, and I GUESS are refilled by removing the driver’s seat (or a portion of it): I measured the area I have spare in the tail of the body, and I can’t QUITE match the proportions and exact shape of either of those examples above and still have room for the other stuff I’d like to add back there (primarily friction shocks), but I can make SOMETHING approximating the look of these anyway. Started off with a block of prototyping material - a cheap version of Renshape, for those who know what that is: Renshape is a carveable, sandable, drillable material that is REALLY nice to work with for projects like this…carving a lip into the top edge to mimic my reference pictures: The top of the 1:1 tanks have some interesting curves and contours and I don’t think I QUITE nailed it, but I don’t have a tonne of reference pics to work from either so I’m happy with ‘looks kinda like it’ for this piece…added a strip of styrene to simulate the weld and printed a filler inlet and cap to match the concave design of the one in the one photo: Sits in the car somewhat like this: And fits inside the tail just fine: Actually, it sits back further than that, but it was tough to photograph with it balancing on the crossmember… Now I need to figure out how to mount it to the frame, and finally finish up those steering links…more tomorrow, hopefully! Thanks for looking! 1
OldNYJim Posted March 6 Author Posted March 6 (edited) On 3/1/2025 at 11:28 PM, Belugawrx said: Really nice stuff here Jim. (2thumsup) Thank you sir!! A little more progress…I’ve been trying to figure out how I wanted to handle that leather trim around the body; it needs to be a different color than the body so I could just mask it and paint it after, but that didn’t feel like the BEST solution. Plus, I wanted to bulk it out a little, make it look a little less flat and add some creases and wrinkles and make it look a little more dimensional. So, the last three evenings were spent carefully scribing out the leather from the body… The remaining part was REALLY fragile, as you can imagine, but I ran a little gap filling superglue into the top to bulk it up a little… Then, next up, mixed up some Tamiya 2-part epoxy and laid it over top: And then spent a couple of hours just kinda shaping it and adding some subtle little wrinkles and half-folds and creases just to make it look a little more fabric-like: This leather, on a 1:1 I THINK is mostly to protect the driver’s arms and shoulders from what I suspect is a sharp-ish bare aluminum edge on the body, and it seems like those leather pieces are generally pretty flat…but I’ll be painting this part plain old black and I know from playing with this trick before that once the parts are black most of that detail disappears or is MUCH harder to see, so I’ve added a little more thickness than is probably normal to help combat that. I’m still really new at this style of sculpting but it’s fun to mess with…once this piece sets up I’ll be able to sand it to fix any flaws (and also thin it down somewhat in a few spots to make it look pulled-tight) and also drill it for some little pop rivets that I still need to figure out how best to achieve. Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Edited March 6 by OldNYJim 1
OldNYJim Posted March 6 Author Posted March 6 Oh, forgot to post this…if any of you have Instragram, a little clip of the working steering…was glad to get that wrapped up this week too! https://www.instagram.com/reel/DGtZumcJ2Hg/?igsh=Nmkzd2IyM2k1aWtq
OldNYJim Posted March 9 Author Posted March 9 Another couple of days bench time, another couple of little projects completed. Starting to work through this thing front to back, filling in the parts missing… First part missing was some plumbing - not super exciting, but the upper pipe particularly took a couple of tries because the real ones taper…ended up stretching some sprue over a candle just a little to get the look: The lower one coming out of the side of the block runs to a water pump run off the crank, with a second piece running into the bottom of the rad. Next thing to tackle was the carb and manifold setup - this is how it looks on the kit block: I THINK that is supposed to replicate something like this: So, I started making something like that… Not quite done yet, have some more shaping and detailing to do, have the linkages to add, and I can’t figure out where the fuel lines should run…anyone know? Next challenge was figuring out the exhaust…I was hoping to use the kit piece, but the kit block is too short, and thus the pipe spacing is wrong now. So, what I did was slice it up and get those pipes where they need to live now: Filled in the gaps and sanded to shape (roughly, for now…), and replaced the rest with some aluminum tube to match the kit part, but hollow… Looks like this (and clears the new leather stuff I made this week…) Still looks like it would burn your arm pretty easily, so I guess the solution is not to put your arm on it 🤪 And finally for today, figuring out a gas pedal. Now, I REALLY like Moon pedals, and I wanted to use one, but figured they weren’t around early enough to be appropriate for this early-mid 50s build. Did a little research, and found that actually the very earliest examples were made right after the end of the Korean War…right in the time period I was thinking. Would one have found its way onto a typical Midget like this in 54, 55? Probably not…but I like them, and I learned a thing, and rewarded myself but allowing myself to use one. Resin cast the largest variation of a Moon pedal that I found in my stash: It’s actually a little small still, for the scale of this build…but there’s not much room in the footwell of these little cars anyway, so if Dean Moon HAD made a slightly smaller version, I’m sure that would’ve been preferable: I need to angle it up a touch so there could be proper travel, but it would JUST clear the in-out box if it could move, so I’m happy with that. No brake pedal required - these cars run a hand-operated brake which is still on my list to tackle. Not sure where the driver rests his heel - none of the reference pictures I have of this era of car show anything in this area to make it more practical to drive, but maybe you’re so crammed into the cockpit of these little things anyway that you can’t move too much anyway 🤷♂️ And that’s the last couple of day’s progress - next thing I really need to lock it, now I know where the gas pedal lives, is the cowl mount steering stuff and associated framework for that…more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Thanks for looking! 2
BK9300 Posted March 9 Posted March 9 Terrific handiwork, Jim - very interesting to see how you are making all the add-ons along the way.
OldNYJim Posted March 10 Author Posted March 10 (edited) 9 hours ago, BK9300 said: Terrific handiwork, Jim - very interesting to see how you are making all the add-ons along the way. Thank you!! Did a serious spring clean of my shop today, so a little less progress than normal for a weekend, but a little anyway… Today’s project was the steering box - not super exciting, but I scratchbuilt one to replicate an Evans Denver setup, which was one of the hot tickets for this era of Midget, apparently. It’ll be completely hidden under the dash though when the body is in place so I didn’t go nuts with it…it’s basically there to hold the wheel in place - ha! The steering wheel itself though, IS very much visible, and the kit part is actually nicely done…so obviously I went looking for ways to improve upon it and ended up making my own. Main thing I would change if I had my way would be to make the rim and center separate for easier painting, so that’s just what I did… Rim: Center: Center snaps right into the rim: And looks like this in the car: Little side project I’m working on also, that is mostly relevant to this thread, is a printed copy of the Revell Hot Shot, which was a 60s 1/24 Midget kit that was released as a somewhat successor to this one. Actually, it was a slotcar, then a really simple curbside-type static kit, and actually is probably even simpler than this earlier kit that I’m building…figured it would be nice to have one of those on the shelf too, even if the print file I found is going to need some work to make a decent replica of the styrene kit it’s modeled on. Just a fun simple project to mess with while I’m working on this more involved build: Thanks for looking - more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Edited March 10 by OldNYJim 1
Belugawrx Posted March 10 Posted March 10 Beautiful fabbing scratchbuilding going on Jim... I don't get up to Nascar too much...gotta bookmark this one (2thumsup)
Rattlecan Dan Posted March 12 Posted March 12 Incredible dedication. Great modeling all the way. This build has got to be great! 1
OldNYJim Posted March 14 Author Posted March 14 (edited) A little more progress; tonight, modifying a part’s box seat…. Found one that fits pretty good… Reshaped slightly, added that distinctive circular headrest that a lot of these Midgets ran: And I ALMOST could’ve left it at that, but the look of this is too sixties for me (no shock, it’s from a Mid 60s Mustang) and I imagined just a plane Jane no-frills simple racecar seat with just a simple covering and it’s ready for the track. NOTE: I don’t KNOW, but my research leads me to think that these early 50s era cars didn’t have fancy tuck’n’roll patterns, and were a lot more utilitarian…seems like as you get into the 60s more a fancy upholstery job became much more common - so I’m going with the simpler option here - even tho I really wanted to do tuck’n’roll… Mixed up some more epoxy, rolled it super thin and laid it over the seat and shaped it a little: This Tamiya epoxy carves, sands and shapes REALLY nicely, so I can add more detail once it sets up for a couple of days. The finished build will probably have a driver’s helmet sitting in the seat, so I sliced off the driver figure’s head and carefully scribed the helmet separate: And a test fit after a little sanding and a spritz of primer: Tomorrow I can add a little material so the seat fits snug to the leather ‘collar’ around the body, but I want to keep the two parts separate so the seat can be removed to expose the gas tank back there and give a peak at the rear axle. Just a little update, and more to do on this part but I hadn’t posted for a few days…more soon, soon as I’ve done more! Edited March 14 by OldNYJim 1
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