Stutz Blackhawk - Part 3: Completed

The Stutz is now complete.  There were a number of metal pieces to polish up with the Dremel, like the radiator below.

The grille was washed in black before putting the transfer on, and then superglued to the body.  The body was sprayed black, and the leather straps, seats, dashboard and supercharger painted with acrylics.

The body was then fixed to the chassis and the painted driver fixed in the driving seat, with the steering wheel fixed last in his hands.  Also fitted to the car are headlights, a petrol cap, Stutz step-plates, a windscreen folded flat onto the bonnet, and a small windshield in front of the driver.

The finished car...

Although it's now in the display cabinet, this has been built to be raced.  Here's the car on the track where it performs rather well.  It doesn't run fast but it's smooth and the lack of magnets means it gets the rear end out nicely on the corners.  Now to build something of similar vintage to race against it...

Bullitt in 1:32 coming soon

I blogged last year about the two Bullitt cars I had bought.  Someone else has bought them and used them to create a stop-motion 1:32 slot car version of the famous San Francisco chase scene from Bullitt.  The final version has been awaited for some time - the first YouTube trailer said February 2011...

...but now there's a much more cinematic trailer...

Stutz Blackhawk - Part 2: Rolling Chassis

The bespoke chassis comes flat and needs bending into shape.

A few minutes with some pliers and installing the motor, pick-up guide and axles, and you get this.

The wheels are a little more complicated.  They need to be primed and then painted, and then fitted with two different painted inserts to represent the inner and outer sets of spokes on wire wheels.  With a metal spinner cap in place (quickly buzzed over with the Dremel tool to make it shine), they look like this.

With all four wheels fitted, I took the rolling chassis for a quick spin around the track.  The motor isn't too fast, which feels right for a vintage car.  Next step the body.

Stutz Blackhawk - Part 1: Introduction

Andy bought me a slot car kit for Christmas.  Kieron thinks I've crossed a line by moving into building my own cars but I just see this as like building Airfix kits, but with the bonus of having something to play with rather than just display at the end of it.

There are a surprisingly number of small companies who sell resin bodies to make slot cars from, and many provide chassis and wheels and other bits to make it a running car.

Andy chose me a Stutz Blackhawk, an American car from the 1920s similar to a British Bentley.  Here's a  real version that still takes part in historic races:

Here's what the finished kit could look like:

And here's what it looked like when it arrived:

Clockwise from top left - the body, wheel inserts, motor and chassis, wheels, tyres, transfers, chrome bits like windshield and radiator.

A Stutz Blackhawk Special was also driven by Frank Lockhart, who is a bit of a legend in American racing, in a bid for the land speed record in 1928.

Sadly, in his second run back up Daytona Beach a tyre was cut, probably on seashell, causing a fatal crash.  A replica of the car has been built in the US:

I've started the build on this car and acquired a Bentley kit too so I'll be blogging on how it goes.

Andy has also bought himself a Stutz kit, but this one based on the Jones Special which raced at Indianopolis in 1930:

Swindon and Lancias

Andy and I went to Swindon last Sunday week for the annual Scalextric Swapmeet.  It was a surreal and fun journey since Andy drove his enormous left-hand-drive Hymer motorhome - not yet available as a slot car, although if it was, it would cover both lanes!

There were a few tracks set up, including a superb farmyard rally track that I'd been following the build of on SlotCarIllustrated, but the main draw is lots of collectors and dealers with cars for sale.

I've always liked Lancias, especially the rally cars, and bought a couple to add to one I recently bought.  These days Lancia is part of the Fiat Group, which also owns Chrysler Jeep (I think there are only about three different car companies left!) and sadly the Lancia name isn't used in the UK anymore - they're all Chryslers now.

So added to the collection are a Lancia 037...

 ...with lots of detail...

A Lancia Stratos, the most wedge-shaped rally car ever...

...and a Lancia Delta S4...

Andy managed to find what are probably now the last remaining 1980s Scalextric Metros (he's got most of the rest already) with plans to repaint and renovate them and run a Metro race series sometime.

Another camera car

One of my Christmas presents from Louise is a very rare Fly model of a Porsche 917K in Gulf livery.

This is part of a limited edition series of cars issued a few years back to commemorate the making of the classic Steve McQueen film "Le Mans".

The car was driven by Vic Elford for high speed filming on the Mulsanne Straight with a film camera mounted on the bonnet, which made for very interesting handling characteristics!

Unique dust cover for slot car track

Slightly bizarre housing for a slot car track, not least because you'd be on your knees to play with it, but it does look pretty cool.  Full story here.

Didn't see this one coming...

The new Scalextric 2012 catalogue is out.  I promise this is genuine - there's a new tie-in for Scalextric... with Star Wars!

Two new sets will be available later this year - "Death Star Attack" in micro 1:64 scale...

..and "Battle Of Endor" in the usual 1:32 scale...

Hopefully Darth Maul won't be on the final box artwork since he's got nothing to do with the original (proper) trilogy but I am impressed they went for "A New Hope" and "Return of the Jedi" themes rather than little Anakin in his pod racer.  It's almost like they've designed this to appeal to kids who grew up in the 70s and 80s ;-)

May the Force be with you.