Fiat Altered WIP

[chuckinredneck]

I recently went to a swap meet and came up with my new project.

The body is a Jimmy Flintstone fiat and the Winged Express Altered kit. With this build I get to do 2 things I've been wanting to do for a long time. First is build a Fiat Topolino bodied drag car, second is I'm finally giving resin a try. When I was cutting out the windows and roof I learned resin is softer than plastic luckily it wasn't a real bad opps and I was able to fix it easily. Next I assembled the chassis and taped the suspension in place so I could fit the body to the chassis and cut the hole in the hood for the blower.

I wanted the drag slicks to look like they've done a burnout or 2, so I used 220 sandpaper to take the sheen off the tires and then 80 grit to rough them up and I finished them up by turning them on 40 grit.

After I got the suspesion permanately in place I found I needed to remove more material from around the wheel wells, to clear the roll bar, and the blower belt.

This picture gives a good idea of how things are going to look when the build is done. The slicks were mounted in the direction they were turned on the 40 grit sandpaper. For right now the engine is just set together in place and that will be my next project on this build.

Chuck J

[JAFFA]

That really has a cool look to it!

[charlie]

nice start with two different kits

[flatheadgary]

you know i did the same thing. i won the winged express kit on ebay where the seller gave me the fiat body and the decals to do the mike sullivan aa/fa. i hope i can get to it pretty soon. yours looks cool already. keep us posted. i just love altereds.

[larrygre]

Lookin' good! Nothing says drag racing like a Fiat bodied altered!

[chuckinredneck]

Got a bit of work done on the Fiat. I filled the door lines on the body. The chrome on the blower was messed up so I stripped the chrome and painted it back on. fuel lines were run for the injectors, but they may get redone.

The fins on the valve covers and scoop received a red wash, Spark plug wires with boots for the plugs were run.

When I set the body back on the chassis it sat on the Magneto so I'm going to have to cut the whole in the hood a bit more.

Chuck J

[Olle F]

Really nice, can't wait to see how it turns out! 8) I like what you did to the slicks too, that's a nice touch I haven't seen before. It will go straight into my notes for future projects.

[chuckinredneck]

Got some more work done on the Fiat. I finished the front suspension and all the steering components.

The wing was painted Testors Aluminum Plate Metalizer. Not real sure I care for this big wing on here so I will have to look for the smaller wing from the Bantam Blast and see how that looks. The Headeers from the winged express kit wouldn't fit under the body so I'm making some new ones from Aluminum tubing. These need to be shortened up a little bit.

I need to make up some kind of firewall but I haven't been able to find any good pictures of the inside of the body yet, to see how they built them back then

[chuckinredneck]

here's what the headers looked like now they are done

Chuck J

[RyanSilva]

I got something that wil help you.

[chuckinredneck]

I've had some good times and bad times that combined to keep me from this build but things are settleing back down so here I go. Even though I've only had a little time here and there to work on this build over time a lot got done. I didn't like the injector line that I had on here so I changed them and ran a line down to the fuel pump.

On the body I had to strip all the paint of Because i didn't get it clean enough the first time then I shot it with more primer a silver base coat then 4 coate of Candy Apple Red

As part of the good times I got to meet Larry Henley at the Syracuse Mini Nationals and he did a seminar on painting graphics. I gave it a try and here you go I introduce to you the Cherry Bomb.

Thank you Larry there will be more graphic in the works

Chuck J

[kully55]

I've had some good times and bad times that combined to keep me from this build but things are settleing back down so here I go. Even though I've only had a little time here and there to work on this build over time a lot got done. I didn't like the injector line that I had on here so I changed them and ran a line down to the fuel pump.

On the body I had to strip all the paint of Because i didn't get it clean enough the first time then I shot it with more primer a silver base coat then 4 coate of Candy Apple Red

As part of the good times I got to meet Larry Henley at the Syracuse Mini Nationals and he did a seminar on painting graphics. I gave it a try and here you go I introduce to you the Cherry Bomb.

Thank you Larry there will be more graphic in the works

Chuck J

Where may I find tubing like you used on the headers? I have been searching for something like that for a while. Thanks! I love the look of the car and the detail to the motor!

[chuckinredneck]

Kully55 I made the headers from aluminum tubing I picked up at a local hobby shop in the train section. It's from K&S Engineering or K&S metals I'm not sure which it was now. To bend it I stuck a piece of wire the same as the inside diameterinto the tubing then bent the tubing and pull the wire out or else the tubing will collapse on you. After the tube was bent and cut to size I drilled the end out as much as I dared to. Good luck with your project.

[kully55]

Kully55 I made the headers from aluminum tubing I picked up at a local hobby shop in the train section. It's from K&S Engineering or K&S metals I'm not sure which it was now. To bend it I stuck a piece of wire the same as the inside diameterinto the tubing then bent the tubing and pull the wire out or else the tubing will collapse on you. After the tube was bent and cut to size I drilled the end out as much as I dared to. Good luck with your project.

Thanks, I found some today. I'm installing dual exhaust on my 1941 plymouth coupe with a viper motor in it. the tubing is working great. thanks!

[chuckinredneck]

Thanks, I found some today. I'm installing dual exhaust on my 1941 plymouth coupe with a viper motor in it. the tubing is working great. thanks!

Good to hear it Kully55 sounds like an interesting build. I have a 41 Plymouth setting on the shelf waiting to do something to it. I was thinking fenderless with a hemi and huge meats in the back.

I tried to paint Cherry Bomb on the side of the Fiat and I turely messed it up. I was able to cover it up with some flames that don't look too bad. The body needs to be cleared and I'm making a couple changes to the Chassis then this build will be done.

Chuck J

[chuckinredneck]

Ineeded to do a little more cover-up work from my attempt to letter the body so I added to the flames. I think they look a bit better now as well.

I figured this was going to be about as far as I would go with the paint job so I shot the body with clear. the paint on the cherry on the rear cracked up for some reason while everthing else came out fine. All the grafics were done with the same paint.

and here is the front

Going to have to figure a way to fix it or at least make the best of a bad situation

Chuck J

[chuckinredneck]

I was able to do some wet sanding and shoot some clear poly on the body and it don't look too bad, it won't win any awards for best paint but I wasn't going to start over, LOL. I'll learn from the mistakes I made on this one and do better on the next one. When I got done with the body I decided the chassis wasn't right so I changed it a little bit

After a few touch-ups and a couple more little changes I'm going to stamp this one done.

[jbwelda]

wow that is awesome and nice save on the lettering, those flames look great now!

those were some cool magazine articles on the real thing too.