1/12 scale Alfa Romeo 8c 2300 roadster build log [COMPLETED BUILD]

[François]

You are correct to say that a car of that era would not have had seat belts. That being said, my ref car is an actual 1932 Alfa. It was destroyed in a race in 1934 and from what I can understand, remained in that state till the late 70's where it was restored. Many modifications were done to the original car, one of them being the seat belts, another being the tapered rear deck. As for the color, I just find it cool and different from all the other Ferrari red alfa's. And yes, it's my choice.

 

[ah100m]

I also meant to say I admire your work. I'm currently working on a 1/12 Mephistophele and have also replaced the wheel spokes with wire (stainless steel insect pins with nipples). One advantage I have is that there are no color pictures of the original car (in the Fiat museum it's painted red which they admit is wrong) so I can paint it any color I want! Also detailing the engine with real nuts and bolts.

Black with red wires and seat...

 

[François]

The Mephistofele is a very nice model, it was on my list. The engine on this car is a real monster!! Do you have any pictures of your work?

 

[ah100m]

No photos yet. Much of the work has been in making the frame more accurate and doing the wire wheels. I may do some photos upon further work.

 

[François]

The kits gas cap is supposer to be glued in place. I decided to hinge it so it could be opened.

The original affair
Hinge carving on tank spout
Hinge on cap

Finished job

 

[Tony P]

The large scale Italeri kits are nice. Wonders can be done with them. Great work

 

[François]

Did the lever shocks today, there is a lot of parts in total. The instruction say to screw the assy from the front with a flat head screw... not happening. On the real car, it's ajusted via a winged nut that is threaded on a bolt, that's what I did. I also replace a small plastic disc ( just behind the winged nut) by a proper aluminium disc.

The kit's assembly

My assemblies

A sneak peek at whats to come. This is the kit's underside of the fuel tank, it just won't do. I'm redoing this completetly.
Stay tuned!!

 

[François]

Ok so here's my thinking. On this car, the fuel tank is located behind the seat. So far so good, the kit has that except that it stops at the rear deck. But we can clearly see that on the real car, there is also something under the rear deck.
It could simply be some bodywork, but I opted to think It could be the fuel tank going louer. So I set out to fabricate an extension to the tank. This way, I could spit the rear deck as it should be.
A support bracket for the rear deck

And again, what the kit looks like.

I also started on the front steering composants. I replaced a moulded ajustements screw (left) by a brass hex screw (right).

 

[François]

The front end is pretty much complete. I'm replacing most plastic linkage by aluminium ones as I go along. Sorry about the picture quality!!

Brake ajuster screw

rod end

scratch built steering linkage (bottom) compared to kit's linkage (red)

scratch built front end control arm (2 at top) compared to kit's (red)

some assy pictures

 

[Peter Voogt]

Fascinating detail on your ‘restoration of the Italeri-kit’, François.
Regards, Peter

 

[Uwek]

Great details - Bravo!

 

[Heinrich]

What a beautiful build. I am sure all the Alfisti around the world (including myself) will rejoice!

 

[François]

Thank you all!

 

[Walterone]

It results a real car

 

[Corsair]

Your attention to detail is fantastic and your execution of that detail is stunningly beautiful!

 

[François]

On all 4's!

 

[Paulpk]

François, beautiful work. In particular I liked your approach to the spoked wheels.
Do you have any historic photo reference material or are your details based on restored car photos?

 

[François]

Thank you Paul. I'm using this car as reference

It's an actual 1932 car that was crashed in 1934 and rebuilt in the 70's.
You can see a full set of pictures with this link.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/htBaRNKiuM788cjV7

 

[François]

Worked on the front brake linkage today.

My front barke linkage compared to the kit's (red)

linkage installed

The 2 long rods going towards the back of the car are actuated by a small mechanism mounted on the transmission and would be linked to the brake petal (real world), The kit provides the mechanism in a much simpler and static way,


I tried to make my own so that it could actually move but I didn't like the result. The white cylinder is a guide bushing for the actuator rod,

So I decided to go hybrid by modifing the kit's part and using my guide bushing. The result is a working actuator that should (maybe) eventually move both the front and the rear brake linkage.

In position


out position

All this working linkage is included in a 1/8 scale Pocher kit. My kit being a 1/12 scale makes it all that much harder to do... But it's still fun to try!!

 

[François]

Completed the front brake linkage tonight. Next up is the rear brake linkage. There's a missing pivot point on the Italeri kit, l'll have to figure it out.
The 2 shafts pointed by bleu arrows will be where I'II hook up the rear linkage.