# My Next Project - Ford P68



## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Michael asked in my previous thread what my next project(s) would be. I was bored today and wanted a challenge, so I began carving the Ford P68 from the block of clear acrylic that I had bought several years ago. Having worked with this type of plastic before carving 1/144 airplanes, I knew what I was getting into. It carves easily and polishes up quite nicely, but it is difficult to carve panel lines and totally inflexible - meaning getting a chassis in and out is practically impossible. The inflexibility issue is why I chose to not carve the W196 out of it. 

I am hoping to get some ideas from those of you who are knowledgeable at adapting non-slot car bodies to the type of chassis that you run, ie. Hot Wheels, Matchbox, etc. My goal is to be able to remove the Speed Steer chassis easily so that way I can service it. I am completely open to ideas. Thanks!


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## Ralphthe3rd (Feb 24, 2011)

MAN- You work FAST ! WOW  It already looks awesome in the last pic :thumbsup:


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Ralph:

I'm on vacation - which, unfortunately, ends tomorrow - as will my free time. This was what I enjoyed as a kid - modeling during break. It has been so relaxing doing these two projects. Acrylic, though not the best product for carving, is certainly 10x better than the ABS that I used on the W196 project. Everything is polished up nicely now. I still need to add the tailfin and additional top vents, but here are some photos of the body on the Speed Steer chassis. I took it for a test run tonight and it glides just fine on the track and changes lanes well. I appreciate all of the nice comments and encouragement.


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## bobhch (Apr 22, 2007)

Holey Clearness Batman...POW...yeah that was fast. 
Sorry to here your vacation is over...Dang. 

Way Cool carving man!!

For and idea on mounting the body. I have used Double Sided tape that RC car drivers use to mount Servos and Speed Controls in their chassis.
It works well with a flat surface to flat surface bonding. 
You would need to replace double sided tape after removing the body to service but, that is cheap to do.

Bob...just an idea OUT OF THE SLOT 4 "U"...zilla


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## sethndaddy (Dec 4, 2004)

We need to introduce Jim to resin casting. That was fast. If I would try to build something like that, it would probably look like a little turd. literally. A little, round, none symmetrical piece of blah.
Somethings you truly need to be artistic to pull off.


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Here is a video update of the P-68, pre-paint, comparing it to the Aurora Ferrari 512M. 




Seth, I used to think the same thing. I have had lots of practice and with practice, you will get there - probably sooner than I did.

I have been doing this sorta thing since I was five years old, building model kits and hacking them. I started truly scratch-building by making my family 2D Christmas ornaments out of wood in 1991. I got married the following year that Christmas my wife bought me a Dremel skillsaw. A few years later, I began making 3D planes for the guys in my family. 

My father was in the Air National Guard and I was exposed to a lot of airplanes as a kid. He was a plane buff, owned a lot of reference material on airplanes, and built a ton of airplane kits himself. One of his books had 3-views of every U.S. jet, from the P-1 through the F-18. I always thought it would be cool to make every U.S. jet plane, from the XP-79 through the most current one and have them on display. 

I started building 1/144 scale injection-molded kits in 1984, but got stymied because only a handful of the series were made in that scale. Making airplane ornaments for my family made me realize that I could also make them for myself - DUH! I began carving using basswood and pine at first; tried my hand at resin casting and was terrible at it (the XF-90, XF-91 and XF-92 were all casts that I made); then went to carving clear acrylic. About 1/4 of the planes in my collection are scratch-built or modified versions of injection-molds or other guy's resin castings. It took me 24 years to complete, but I did it a few years ago. You should be able to see the planes at this link: 
http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/sets/72157609634016230/detail I also have carved some U-2 masters for Alex Trant at Airalex.com

Anyway, I would encourage you to give it a try. If you do not already have one, get a Dremel and lots of carving bits. I primarily use it for most of the carving, but I also have a variety of needle and rifiler files, several sanding sticks, a variety of sizes of pin vices and panel line scribers. I am going to take Slotcarman's advice and get some end mill bits. I can get the general shape of things, but I haven't really gotten into small details yet. The older I get, the worse my eyes get. If it is something anyone wants to get into and I can help, please do not hesitate to ask.


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## carlosnseattle (May 12, 2009)

Hi Jim,

You did a masterful job on that Mercedes body, both the sculpting and the painting. I'll never be able to pull anything off that's even remotely close to what you have accomplished. 

I wanted to comment on your Speedsteer video: The P68 flies off the track because of the height of the body. When it goes through the corners, both the front and rear of the car are riding on the outside ridge of the track and causing the car to lift up and over the rail. On the Mercedes, only the rear end of the car is riding up the outside of the track. And with the Ferrari body, which has a low front end and low rear end, it doesn't ride up on the outer track ridge. I discovered this problem a few years ago with certain bodies, some just can't be used at all. ﻿

If you have the original Firebird and BMW that came with the sets you'll notice that the rear end of the BMW tends to ride up on the outside of the track far more than the Firebird. So if you listen as the cars travel through the corners you can hear the rear tires "chattering" as they lose traction. Another way to help you notice this effect would be to wet the outside ridge of the curve tracks and drive a car through the corner. You can then look at the car and see where it is wet; that will tell you what parts of the car touch the outside part of the curve.

You will either have to sculpt the cars to make the rear ride lower or make custom guides for the rear end that will touch the track instead of the body.

Again, great job on the custom bodies!!:wave:


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Carlos:

Thank you for taking the time to look and the great advice, especially the water idea. I will look into it more closely when I get home tonight and closely compare where they sit on the track. 

Interestingly enough, as I recall, the Mercedes actually sits up taller than either car and the body/tab measurement to the bottom lip of the body is 5-6mm, the same as the Pontiac Firebird, which I used as a template. I do have the BMW and both of those cars run quite well on the track and do not fly off easily; however, there is something about the downforce in the Porsche 917 and Ferrari 512M that keep them on the track at full throttle with the best chassis' that I own. I also have great results with the Superbird and have even begun making different spoilers to see if the car handles differently.

Kinda on topic...last year, my 7-yr-old daughter and I used different AFX bodies on the same JL chassis to do a free-roll test and see which bodies rolled the farthest down a 2' slope. Most of the data came in that the longest bodies (Ford T-bird and Dodge Magnum) rolled the farthest. The two rigs that threw all of the data off was the Jeep CJ-7 and the VW Bug. They went farther and were the shortest bodies that I own. I am a music teacher, so I went to our science department to see why that would be as they also do roll tests in their classes. As far as we could conclude, it had to do with the center of gravity being more centrally located. 

In contrast, these two cars fly off the AFX track easily. I have not carved out very much at the top of the Ford P68, which undoubtedly has increased the weight on top. I am not discounting what you are saying, but I think that it has more to do with the center of gravity and perhaps we are saying the same thing. 

Anyway, you have given me some great food for thought. I am not a science guy, but have always been intrigued by it. The aerodynamics of these cars is quite fascinating. Thanks for the input!


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## carlosnseattle (May 12, 2009)

Hey Jim, you're right about the CoG. I think you already said that in your video so I didn't mention it. Slotless cars have some characteristics you just don't have to deal with when you have regular slot cars. The wet test is a nice diagnostic tool, but I should have mentioned that I normally use WD-40, not water, but you can use anything you want.

And all your videos have some really great information on them. I'm going to check a couple of my jam cars to see if the idler gear mounts are loose. 

CR


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

*Paint on the P68*

Here is the car painted red. I will have to wait a few days for the paint to cure before I paint the gold center stripe and the front nose white.


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

That looks sweet!! There are a few options for mounting. There's double sided tape, velcro (doubtful, but if you have some handy...), and maybe silicone (make sure it hardens in a day or you'll have a gooey mess. One other thought is hot melt glue. Get the low temp stuff (and a low temp gun). It'll get in above the hanger on the chassis and should pull out for servicing. You'll have to reapply it when you're done, but odds are you'll have to with any of the methods.


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## sidejobjon (Jun 3, 2010)

Jim,
Real nice work. What do they carve molds for Lexan bodies out of ? Did you ever see the Marchon Fighter jet HO slot "cars/Jets". Look them up.
You can make some cool variations.
Nice work
SJJ


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## bobwoodly (Aug 25, 2008)

Jim,

To your question how to "adapting non-slot car bodies to the type of chassis that you run" . I use junk Tjet screw posts and "goop" (plastic and Testors 3502 that create a liquid colored plastic adhesive for like plastic), junk AFX mounts and goop, junk Tyco mounts and goop, there are also makers of resin screw posts and mounts you can epoxy/glue.

Here is a sample Matchbox body with Tyco mounts. Look at the plastic diecast thread as there may be some ideas there as well.










Here is one where I have glued a tjet body inside another body










Poke around here and you will find all kinds of mounting techniques

I've also bought these but have yet to try them - scroll down the page - http://members.tripod.com/jims_customs/id20.html


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Slot Car Man:

For mounting the car, I used the large (of three sizes) Dremel carving wheel and cut the slots for the AFX tabs. This worked quite well and keeps the chassis on tight. The acrylic, being clear, kept me from not going through to the outside edge. I simply marked it up from the bottom 6 mm. I did have to bevel the bottom lip to allow the AFX tab to slide past it and into the notch. I then use a jeweler's screwdriver to pry it loose. 

Hot glue has been mentioned to me by Slot Car Dan as a great way to keep the bodies on the chassis without doing any permanent damage.


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

Okay, cool!! I wasn't sure if you figured out a method yet. Cool you got it with actual mounts!! :thumbsup:


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## jobobvideo (Jan 8, 2010)

bobwoodley
what depth do you set for tyco mounts? looks flush


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## jimkelsey (May 7, 2013)

Bob:

I set them between 5-6mm, which leaves about 4 mm of the chassis showing. I mount it to a scrap Ultra 5 chassis for painting purposes. My method still needs some fine-tuning yet as the Dremel bit leaves a rounded edge on either end, instead of the nice crisp one that Aurora made. The bits that I use are #197, 198, and 199. I begin with the smallest one, #197, and work my way up. I could take a close-up for you to your personal e-mail if you would like after the paint is dry - it still is a bit tacky yet.


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