Hi all well move went well new job is going well and I have negotiated a modelling area (well when we don't have guests that is) so gulp I've jumped in to try this scratch build, ive managed to find some profile drawings of the body so I've copied them onto paper and glued it to this ply wood.





I'm hoping to make a former from this as a rough starting point. I'm expecting this to be  a long build, somewhere between 3 and 60 years (but that's just an approximate guess could be much longer

An impressive start to a very ambitious project Ken!

I will be following your progress on this one.

Cheers, D

Hi Ken,

Haven’t seen you post in a while, but you’re back with a pretty daring build - wow!

Cheers
Nick

Ken,
Good thing I'm retired and can stay the course of your build. I wouldn't miss a single update of it, as it's going to something very special.

I've followed a master modeler from England who builds scratch built 1/8 scale Porsches. So far he's build a 908/3, a 935 Moby Dick, and now he's working on a 956. The builds are all super detailed, and the only power tool he has is a Dremel! His builds run 3-4 years in length as a rough guide.

Joel

Thanks Damian Nick and Joel
Joel this will not be up to your master builds standards as it's my first attempt at a scratch built car ( I do have the advantage that my new job allows access to the actual car) and several other classic cars I was actually torn between 2 different cars but chose this one, the actual car is tiny.

Ken, that is absolutely very interesting to watch. It is resembles the process of rendering 3D virtual objects on computer. I'm all in for this one!

Gabriel

Well first lesson learned I tried to made a cylinder head and bought card stock of the correct thickness and cut out 15 cylinder bits and 17 fins then glued them together after which they should have measured 10.25 mm well after gluing 10 of the fins together it measured 13 mm so I thought I will compress them in my vice trouble with that was it compressed the cylinder bits but not the fins and ended up looking like this






Instead of how it should look. I can only assume the extra thickness was due to the glue so I think I will have to experiment with different thicknesses.

Hi Ken,

Yes - stacking card and making it look right, not easy. I’ve had similar problems - not just with thickness but in making the cooling fins look evenly spaced - they seem to warp the more you try to keep them from doing so. As this is a big scale, would you consider stacking thin aluminum sheet instead? Once you get the shape you want, it will stay. Can glue with medium CA. Edges can be filed and it’s pretty easy to drill with a pin vice and fairly easy to cut and shape. Or not! I know your work is strong!

Ok - looking forward to your progress -

Nick

Thanks mate, I have a few ideas in mind.

Ken,
thanks for the compliment, but I'm no master modeler. I just try my best, and love what I'm building. The love really does help.

As for your cylinder head issues, I'm sure you guys are right in that the water based glue was the cause of the issue. I'm just not so sure that working with little pcs of Aluminum would be much easier as cutting them out seems like really hard task. Why not try using Evergreen plastic sheet stock. It comes sever thicknesses. I've got .010, .020, & .040. Most likely the .020 would be more of what you're looking for. It's very easy to cut as I use a Mister Chopper II, to square of the pcs, then just sand and or file to shape. For the spaces you can just use a punch set.

Having direct access to the car is a dream come true. Can you actually seat in it? Now that's inspiration for sure.

Joel