[David Lawson]

You probably think I have finally gone completely round the bend but the hint in the thread title to the Kevin Costner film "Dances with Wolves" comes about because we have very confident foxes in my neighbourhood and for the last few years our garden has been used by them most days with several of them sleeping and warming in the sun for hours at an end on the lawn.

Quite often when I am carving, sanding down or painting a slot car body shell in the garden I am accompanied by one of the foxes who will quite happily sit about 10 feet away and watch me at work. I find this very relaxing and really adds to the pleasure of the model-making process.

Anyway, the purpose of this thread is to describe a scratch built Lotus 23 I have just made, I thought it was about time I added this car to my collection of Jim Clark slot cars.

This is Jim Clark in the Normand Racing Lotus 23 winning the British Empire Trophy at the Oulton Park Spring Meeting in 1963.

I used balsa wood for the bodyshell and although I have no drawings of the car I do have lots of photographs and the dimensions so this carving is by eye rather than a slavishly accurate model but it will do for my purposes. This is the shell at an early stage.

The shell here has had the final shaping and surface detailing added, it has been hollowed out underneath and then had superglue rubbed into the surface before a light sand and sprayed with a Halfords primer and paint.

I masked and sprayed the blue and red stripes of the Normand Racing team which was a rather laborious process maybe I should have used decal paper instead. The interior tray is a thin sheet of plastic card with a balsa dashboard.

I vac-formed a windscreen using my "Sedona Vac Former" that John Cahill kindly made for me a few years ago.

The finished shell with driver figure, mirror and race numbers added. Now I have a Lotus 23 I need somewhere to race it, hopefully it will get a run at Colchester's annual meeting next year.

David

 

[scudbong]

Superb work David and the story about the tame foxes still facinates me.

A Lotus 23 is still missing from my 1/32 Lotus collection, hopefully mine will turn out as good as yours.

A job very well done,

Pete

 

[roblees]

Lovely shell, really nice.
I do love the picture of the original, though, with its misfitted panels, dents in the sills and very less-than-concours paint job. Have any brave and brilliant modellers tried to capture this 1960s scruffy look?

 

[ecurie ecosse]

That is a super looking car David.
I look forward to seeing it in the flesh.
Clive

 

[superhornets]

Hi Rob
My cars normally turn out that way anyway

.and i seem to remember someone at the weekend racing a pontiac bonneville that had ill fitting panels and dents all over it

cheers tony

 

[Ian H]

Absolutely delightful work!

How do you do the headlamp glasses!

 

[HAPPY]

Nice work and interesting thread.

 

[John Cahill]

Beautiful rendition of a Lotus we rarely see modeled.
I think we need a pic of your foxes too please *grin*

John

 

[Abarth Mike]

QUOTE (roblees @ 8 Aug 2012, 19:28) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I do love the picture of the original, though, with its misfitted panels, dents in the sills and very less-than-concours paint job. Have any brave and brilliant modellers tried to capture this 1960s scruffy look?

Not scratch build but I am in the process of re modeling and painting a SuperStox to 1976 colours (baby steps first) but the scruffy aspect fits in with my skill level and patience.

Regardless of the finish I end up with I do however think it may be beyond my skills to actually give the car some patina. Doing a scruffy Lotus, I suspect, may be more difficult than it at first appears.

QUOTE I think we need a pic of your foxes too please *grin*

I think we need a picture of the foxes grinning

 

[David Lawson]

QUOTE (Ian H @ 8 Aug 2012, 21:01) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Absolutely delightful work!

How do you do the headlamp glasses!

I cut out a small piece of clear plastic (usually packaging material) put the plastic on my thigh and roll a curve into it by rolling a round needle file handle over it, keep working it until you get the right contour. I then put it in place on the bodyshell and trace the shape of the headlight opening into the plastic with a compass point then cut and sand to the final shape. There are other ways of doing it but I find I can make up a pair of headlight covers in about 10 minutes this way so I stick with this method. I hope this makes sense, it is easier to do than explain.

QUOTE (John Cahill @ 9 Aug 2012, 00:28) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Beautiful rendition of a Lotus we rarely see modeled.
I think we need a pic of your foxes too please *grin*

This one obviously got bored watching the carving and nodded off.

I have lived in my current house for 31 years and never seen a woodpecker but suddenly one has moved in to a tall tree and sometimes feeds in my garden.

While I'm carving I hear him doing his woodwork, pecking at the trunk of the tree...

John

 

[JasonVizor]

Hi David,
Beautiful Lotus, your cars always are. With regards to your Woodpecker, its a young Green Woodpecker, you'll always see these feeding on the ground as their main diet is ants, its unlikely to be this bird you hear drumming on the trunks of trees, this behavior is typical of the Great Spotted Woodpecker. If you put up a peanut feeder you'll virtually guarantee yourself good views of this bird also. Kindest Regards Jason

Lovely Photos by the way

 

[Dick Smith]

I hate to tell you this now you have finished David but I have got a Lotus 23 plan. It is in 1/24th scale , from Road and Track magazine I think, but your interpretation from photographs looks great to me.

For your information the 1/24th plan measures at 62mm wide by 144mm long.

 

[David Lawson]

Jason
Thanks for the info about the Woodpecker, very interesting. The bird was eating ants when I took the picture of him/her.

Dick
Going by the dimensions of your 1/24 plans my 1/32 shell is 2mm short and 1mm too wide. I am planning on doing a more accurate master and casting a resin shell, if you would kindly send me a 1/32 scaled plan from your original I will happily send you a shell for your trouble.

David

 

[Abarth Mike]

QUOTE (David Lawson @ 10 Aug 2012, 14:28) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Going by the dimensions of your 1/24 plans my 1/32 shell is 2mm short and 1mm too wide.

David

David,

Sell your current master to NSR.

 

[Hobby]

David's shell is acurate.
Someone with his 'eye' would always get very close to the correct size, even without original plans or dimensions
If only all the big makers could get that close, we would all get better scale Slot models.
Super work BTW.
Regards Bill.

 

[JasonVizor]

Hi David,
Glad to provide a little information, personally I find birds fascinating, all wildlife and the outdoors really. Your bird is a juvenile female, the male has red on the cheek, I'll guess you often hear a strange bird call that sounds a little like maniacal laughter, this is the Green Woodpecker.
Kindest Regards Jason

 

[Dick Smith]

David, I would say that plus 1mm on the width is very accurate and probably necessary to get the right feel of a low racing car.

Here is the plan. Unfortunately I can't reduce/enlarge with my current printer/scanner set up, but the plan has got a foot scale on it if you are able to set your printer so that each foot is 3/8inch..but then you know that!

 

[superhornets]

Hi Da vid
lovely story about the foxes ,lovely car
if you are doing a resin I.ll have one off you
saw the great jim clark win a race at crystal palace in 1964 with the normand racing lotus 23 ,been one of my fave sports racers ever since
cheers tony

 

[Jaak]

David,

That looks great,
never seen this car but it seems like a low cart i bet it will be abel to handle some proper corners.

Love the fox too that's a pretty one, seen a lot in Switzerland but they where all lighter colored,
seen one here at me new place in France but it was a youngster.

Had a Badger walk around late at night, i turned the lights on outside it was like 2 meters away from me and could not care less that i was there...
somehow a bit intimidating.

 

[David Lawson]

QUOTE (JasonVizor @ 10 Aug 2012, 14:51) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Hi David,
Glad to provide a little information, personally I find birds fascinating, all wildlife and the outdoors really. Your bird is a juvenile female, the male has red on the cheek, I'll guess you often hear a strange bird call that sounds a little like maniacal laughter, this is the Green Woodpecker.
Kindest Regards Jason

Jason
Like you I love the outdoors. What I am surprised at is that I have had numerous walking holidays all over the UK including various woodland areas and never seen a woodpecker but now I have one in my garden.

QUOTE (JaakBeentjes @ 10 Aug 2012, 20:13) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>David,

That looks great,
never seen this car but it seems like a low cart i bet it will be abel to handle some proper corners.

Love the fox too that's a pretty one, seen a lot in Switzerland but they where all lighter colored,
seen one here at me new place in France but it was a youngster.

Had a Badger walk around late at night, i turned the lights on outside it was like 2 meters away from me and could not care less that i was there...
somehow a bit intimidating.

Jaak
I've had very close encounters with foxes but I have never seen a badger although there are quite a few sets in the area, to be that close to one must have been wonderful.

Dick
Thanks very much for the drawings. I resize drawings in Photoshop rather than doing it in the printer. I will make a start on the master shortly.

David