Hi Art:

Both Rear and Front tracks measured at 53.3 mm, by measuring at the axles themselves without knock offs.

Yes, even looking at a straight top view, the front rolling assembly does look wider, probably because the body tapers to a narrower width.

The Story So Far – sorry I don’t have more finished work to show.

Thank you for your note MiA.

I thought I would give a progress report, though there is not a great deal of progress yet, and much of it is still not visible. I got the wheels, motor and a few other parts from Art. I am now waiting for delivery of some other key parts, including flanged bearings and bushings. Until I can get the axle setups I can’t finish the measurements and continue planning the details of the chassis. I have the Rear suspension parts figured out. The Front is going to be much more complicated, especially for what I’m trying to do.

With this car, a Normal person would build the chassis to the right length and height, cover the axles with tubes, cut out the bottom of the body shell and attach the upper part to the chassis. Or they may retain some of the suspension detail from the kit and cut a slot for the axles to pass through, as some manufacturers have done. I sometimes wish I was Normal !

I am trying to retain all of the detail from the model kit, add a few extra details, then plan my chassis to fit within. That presents many problems. For example, in the model, the rear suspension has leaf springs under the transmission axle, which then has scissor-like dampers above it. All of this is above the chassis pan. I will be putting the in-line drive axle in place of the model kit axle, and surround it with those other components, all sandwiched between the pan chassis and the main upper body. I will have stationary drum brakes on the inside of the aluminum wheels. I should be able to support the rear bearings or bushings and axle from inside the body shell. I have a few plans for the front axle, suspension and inner wheel hubs, but I don’t know which will fit until I get the rest of the components. Either way, none of the designs will be easy to build; I’ll leave that description for a later post.

I’ve thought more than once or twice, that I may have ‘bit off more than I can chew’. I really like this car and want to do a detailed build on it. But it may be better for me to set the project aside; possibly start with one of my others from this series which does not have a closed pan chassis, or else do a closed wheel car like the Ferrari 312PB that I’m planning. Considering that I have never built a 1/32’nd scale car and never done a full scratch build of any type before, this may be too ambitious a project to start with.

Here is another view of the kit car.

(Only the three pieces of the chassis pan are fused/ liquid welded; everything else is temporarily held together with either double-sided tape, ‘shoe goo’, or masking tape.)

This is the start of the brass chassis (doesn’t look like much, but took a lot of work to get the details).

Side rails are 3/32” square tube, curved along two directions to fit smoothly against the plastic chassis. The brass plates are 1/32” sheet (as I was de-burring the cut edges I discovered that this stock is far from planar so I had to sand it flat – that’s why it’s shiny). The plates are over-sized at the moment in order to allow a wider range of contact positions. They will be cut out to accommodate the motor and drive train, then drilled to lighten.

Here is a bottom view, including the front suspension that I will be working with.

I have figured out a few options of how I’m going to work within the front suspension and wheel hubs – it will be the most complex part of the build. I have to wait for delivery of the other parts before I can test what will fit and how. I still have to plan how to work in the guide keel, and how to connect that whole assembly to the rest of the brass chassis (without cutting out much of the model detail).

Here are some of the components separated out.

(The black plates are 1 mm polystyrene. They will be fused to the inside surface of the green chassis pan to provide enough strength to hold counter-sunk screws which will thread up into the brass plates. Those joints must be strong enough to hold any stresses and strains between the whole plastic pan and body, and the whole brass chassis.)  (Soldering together the brass components precisely will be hard enough as is, even with a jig. Now I need to join the brass plates to the square side rails with a 1 mm gap underneath. I’m hoping I can find 1 mm thick aluminum spacers.)

A great deal of more work to come. I’m sure there will be other new problems encountered. Maybe now’s the time to quit!

Hope to see you at the races.  Felix.

Art, MiA, F1Nutz, thank you for your words of encouragement. Each of your cars looks excellent and seems to run beautifully. I should have done a similar build. I adopted some overly ambitious objectives without having any experience in scratch building. Also, my frame of reference is 24’th scale ‘Euro-mechano’ structured chassis, everything bolt-together, modular, adjustable, replaceable. I’ve done quite a bit of innovative building there, with designing and fabricating upgrade parts out of brass, aluminum, phenolic plate, and carbon fibre plate, to solve various structural and performance problems. But I have not yet done a full scratch built chassis.

With that mindset, I think some of my plans and objectives for 24’th scale work crept into this project. ( I have been developing plans for building 24’th scale racers from the Heller kit of the1930 Bentley Blower, 1932 Alfa Romeo 1750cc Zagato, other 30’s vintage kits, as well as the Heller kit of the 1948 Talbot Lago T26C, and the 1975 Ferrari 312T. )  Unfortunately, I’m new to 32’nd scale and don’t have an experience based understanding of what works well and what doesn’t in this scale. Personally, I’m finding that some of the parts designs, sizes, and imperial measurement units are very awkward to work with. Also, a lot of details are harder to do in 132!  So, I continue to stumble along as best I can. In the mean time, the expert advice from Art, and others, is of great help.

I received delivery of some more parts at the end of the week. However, fitting together the axles and bushings/ bearings into the chassis is still a major problem at the front end. It would be easy if I didn’t want to keep the current suspension structure and add detail, or keep the drum brakes in place. The inside hub bosses on the vintage Alu wheels, the bushings/bearings, and the drum brakes, don’t fit properly together. Also, there are other things I want to do on the car that I won’t disclose at the moment, for fear that the men in the white coats will come to carry me away today!

Thanks again.   Felix.

Sorry for my delay; I have not been keeping track of the forum. Previously I had received automatic notifications whenever a new posting occurred. Talking with Art yesterday at the Grp25 show, I was informed that what I had assumed to be ‘automatic pre-programmed notifications’ were in fact ‘automatic manual’ ones!

Unfortunately I have no progress to report on the A.M. Ulster car. At the last stage I had been waiting for another delayed delivery of a specially dimensioned brass profile, one that I needed for the combined motor-haulter/bearing-holder. In the interim I got involved with a house project, and from there onto other projects. Then there’s the 24’th scale work, building, racing, and responsibility for tech inspection on two of the series. So I finally realized that I had to pack up all of the Ulster parts into a bin, and throw in a couple of moth balls!