1964 Ferrari 158 (redux)

[Mark Huber]

I was lured back to building a car, and after 3 plus years I think I'm ready.

Anyway, this car will be heading to the UK to run in the same event as David Mitcham's Lotus-BRM and Brabham-BRM. I discovered a vintage Supershells 158 in my Ferrari bin.

The PSR spec chassis is (almost too) easy to assemble but has the modeling disadvantage of locating the motor right in the middle of the cockpit. This is going to create some major problems for driver positioning and I'm already certain that no matter what I do to whittle away the IM body, John Surtees is going to be sitting too high.

The Supershells body is based on the earlier 158s before the large NACA ducts were added to the nose, and the engine cowling was a bit cleaner. The size is almost perfect after trimming the sides down a bit.   Figuring out how to secure a mounting post will be a major issue although that may not be readily apparent from the photos--the front post hole on the PSR chassis is directly below where the lip of the cowling meets the front edge of the windscreen.    Ranch Design wheels and Vintage Monogram replica tires.

I'll model my car after the 158 that Surtees drove to a third place finish at Brands Hatch in the 1964 British Grand Prix. 

I've shaved this Immense Miniatures body even thinner since I took the picture but it still isn't enough.  Perhaps I should just paint a body on the top of the motor and give the participants 3D glasses. 

These white metal header/exhausts are pretty close to what I want although the pipes are a bit too large.  I wonder if I can surgically remove them and replace with some thin aluminum tubing?  I may experiment on with some other white metal exhausts before making a hash of these.

[Andrew Rowland]

Wow, Mark who?
Great to see you back.
Nice build
Andi

[Taffy]

Mark is back! Very fine news!!

Andi, it might be a solution to take a photo of a driver´s figure from above, to print it outand to combine the print with a much more reduced and thinned drivers bust. Steve Ward fom Penelope Pitlane had done this for the Lotus 18-kit of the car with the removed side panels from the Monaco-race. I have built that car several years ago, and I think this print wasn´t too bad...

Best regards, Taffy

[f143]

Hoorayyyyy, Mark is back. So good to see you here Mark. The Ferrari looks great.

Regards
Nigel

[Peter Seager-Thomas]

Hi Mark, good to see you back.

Re the 158, could the chassis be lowered a little? I've has a little play around here, and with the Supershells body sitting on a slimline motor, the body sides are less than a millimetre from the worktop, and bring the top of the motor about 2.5mm below the top of the cockpit sides.
Not a lot of course, but every bit counts....





Peter.

[Mark Huber]

Peter,

I'll give it a try, but I don't have that much margin to work with as I trimmed down the sides of the shell long ago to lower the profile. That was at a time when I never thought I might someday use this Supershells body on a PSR chassis.

Cheers!

[munter]

Nice to read this thread.
Welcome back to the "scene" Mark.

The 158 is a favourite of mine.
The motor protruding into the cockpit is a perennial problem....I like the 030 motors to partially cure this, especially the solarbotics item.

My suggestion is a painting of the driver torso on the motor with the head glued in place.

My 158 "nearly there" build using a resin repop body kit but full cockpit.

[Mark Huber]

John,

Thanks for the welcome. Your 158 looks gorgeous, and I love the full driver figure. Unfortunately I can't do the same with this build (I need to stop complaining about that!)

I still want to purchase a 156/3 from you. Will you please message me with the details for payment, etc?

Cheers!

[Aurora]

Hey Mark, great to have you back!

Your 158 has a sleek pleasing shape, I've heard positive things about the Supershells bodies.

Matt

[Mark Huber]

Since the only "Surtees" decals I have are the wrong color (red lettering instead of blue) and are missing the "J." Apparently the first name initial was added to the name badge at the British GP in 1964 (!) So, I'm moving up a couple of races in the season.

Surtees drove chassis 0006 with #2 at the Dutch Grand Prix in the second Championship race of the 1964 season. He qualified 4th and finished 2nd, earning his first points that year towards his eventual World Championship--thanks to some imaginative driving by Lorenzo Bandini at the Mexican Grand Prix, the season's last race. But that's another story.

Here's hoping this will be my last car change before the proxy starts.. But don't count on it.



I did a few small things the other day which took a fair amount of time, as small things often do. I continued to shape the driver figure, carefully separating the arms from the torso and legs and bending the arms and legs after a 30 second soak in hot water. I test fitted the Surtees head after inserting a piano wire pin. I scrapped the heavy metal headers and pipes for a much lighter set that I had assembled from stock plastic headers with aluminum tubing for the pipes. I'll even out the joints with a bit of putty tomorrow.

[munter]

search for a new photo hosting site

When the Pbucket debacle happened I switched to postimage.org and apart from one hiccup they have been very good.

[Mark Huber]

Enzo Ferrari was said to have referred to some of his British rivals as Garagiste. I'm not sure if he actually used the term, but the story is out there.

In the model making world, when yours truly runs into a technical problem with my Ferrari, I'm fortunate and grateful to rely on the talent and skill of Team Lotus, now relocated in Essex.

Due to the vagaries of Montana weather, I was thankful to be able to ship my Ferrari shell to England last week for painting. It arrived in the UK the other day, and I was informed that there was an obvious reason my shell was sitting too low on the chassis--I had trimmed the sides down too much. That's reparable but it's an embarrassing mistake on my part. Why didn't I catch that when I lined up the Supershells body on my blueprints? Well, if your blueprints are a a bit too small (a simple math error on my part when I made the printer settings), it can lead to this sort of cock up. Why I didn't check the wheelbase more carefully when I realized I had to build a 158 rather than the 156/3 is something I can't answer.

I reprinted the blueprint earlier today, which made it clear that I should widen the front and rear track by about 1mm and lengthen the wheelbase by about 1.25mm. My original car dimensions prior to this were within race regulations, but why not get it right especially since both track and wheelbase are easy to adjust? So, I fixed that this afternoon.

While my shell is being superbly painted in glorious Italian racing red at the Lotus factory, (and I'm aware that opens up the debate about what constitutes Italian racing red, as the Ferraris, Alfa Romeos and Maseratis--I'd mention the ATS car, but it wasn't around all that long) used different shades of red, I've been using another shell as my 'test bed' for dry fitting parts.

I'm 90% sure this is a re pop made by John Kit (?) based on the Monogram kit. I think my picture actually flatters the shell, as it is too low, too narrow and has an unsightly kink and bulge on the right rear quarter (the side you can't see because I try to always photograph this shell from the left hand side). I've been dry fitting various accessories knowing that some of them will have to be adjusted for the Supershells body.

The windscreen is too wide for this car, but it fits the Supershells body perfectly. I like the look of the front suspension pieces but I'm not sure if they will hold up for a race series; I've got a back up construction that is sturdier. I'm pleased with the exhausts and there is a resin gear box tacked onto the back of the PSR chassis. My driver doesn't quite fit in this shell, but he shouldn't since the shell is too narrow. Final trimming will wait as will my favorite part--building the cockpit details.

[munter]

I alway thought the Monogram body was a bit of a porker but after a view from above of the Monogram and SS shell beside each other I see there is not much difference in width. The main difference is the height.



I really need to get more done on my 158 but have been fiddling with this in recent days.

[Mark Huber]

Help is on the way. The cavalry to the rescue! It will be great to have this Supershells body, now in beautiful red, back home so that I can finish this build.

[Mark Huber]

The running gear is in place and has been tested, and I ran in the gears this morning. (I removed the guide for this picture so I could position the car on my ceramic work board). I can't procrastinate much longer; I really need to attach the body mounting posts.