Hawking the brat about

The thing I always found most difficult when modelmaking full time was getting known in a wider sphere. I was well known enough as a brass patternmaker, a builder of masters, but I wanted to be asked by rich people to build models of their cars, boats, houses, etc..


The only way I could think of to convince any likely big spender that I was their man was to build models "on spec."
So I knocked up the odd item from time to time when things were a little slow in the master world.


One such was the McLaren M8F Can-Am car, which I found at Scott Racing in Brandon, Suffolk. Near enough to my house to be an easy trip for measuring and photographing.


Trevor, Scott's proprietor and his son were helpfulness personified and I had a great couple of days measuring and sketching every detail of the car.
The gearbox and clutch housing of the 1/12th scale M8F model with the suspension bracket made in brass. The engine and gearbox are made in plastic strip and sheet and will be moulded in resin for strength.

My chum Chas has a fotki photo site and he insisted I do a step-by-step album of the build, so here's the URL for that. There are pictures of every stage of the construction up until I moved aboard my boat. Much later I continued to work on it and will finish it sometime.

Find the build at http://public.fotki.com/cafox513/m8f_112th_step-by-step/


Unfortunately the price Bonham's suggested I put on it as a reserve would not these days be attained, or anywhere near. I've also discovered how auction houses rip a one man band off with all their extra charges which they either don't explain when you trust them with your work or don't quantify before they sell it. I once sold another "on spec" model of Miss Britain III via them and I got £2100, six MONTHS after the auction at which the new owner bid £2850, on which he would have paid buyers commission as well!!

Is it any wonder e-bay has stormed the world?

I'll have a Bloody Mary

Back in 1929, two school boys looking for something interesting to do in the "long vac" decided to build a car. Not a push cart or soap box...a real car!
They were the Bolster brothers, Richard and John. With a rescued V-Twin motorbike engine, some ash, metal bits and a hand-drill, they put together what was to become one of the most famous hillclimb and sprint specials of all time.
John, it was, who fostered the project after his brother went on to other things and eventually the definitive Bloody Mary was developed into a fearsome beast which often held Fastest Time awards and in fact held a course record from 1948-1953 for unsupercharged cars in the vintage class. I've always had a fascination for specials and for the ultra specialised competition of hillclimbing, ever since my uncle took me to a meeting at Wiscombe Park in Devon years ago.
So I resolved to build a model of Bloody Mary in 1/32nd scale... A working model which, according to my self-imposed modelmaking rules for hillclimbers, should have the motors where the engines were on the real car.
When I say engines, in the plural, I mean just that, for young John soon found another J.A.P. V-twin and installed it next to the first in an extended frame. Connected by chains to each other and thence to a motorcycle gearbox, these two firebrands of engines then were connected to a solid back axle by chain also.
No diff was used, a la Frazer-Nash. Brakes were a vestigial pair on the front axle of Austin Seven vintage. Rear hubs and wheels were from a Frazer Nash, so there were 36 spoke wheels on the front and 48 on the rear!

I started my model by making a drawing using all the pictures I could find and the above old Profile Publication, but quite a few features remain a bit foggy.

Once the drawing was more or less done I made a frame from brass tube in a square section and soldered it up as a simple rectangle.; Eventually it should have a member right down the middle too, but fitting motors may mean that has to be modified.

Then I made a front axle from 3/32" stainless rod. For bearings, the car used a double yoke system which took springs above and radius rods below, so I turned a couple of bobbin shapes in the Peatol/Taig lathe and filed them so that the lugs were of a diamond shape above and below the bearing.

Springs were fashioned from brass and given a slightly irregular look, because they were bound with twine in the fashion of the times.

Keen to start bashing aluminium, which I love to do, I also made the right hand body side from thin proprietary sheet from the modelmaker's friend, K&S Metal Centre. This is a particularly good aluminium for shaping. Cut with scissors, knife and files. This is progress, so far

A blog begins.........

Hello, I'm known as Odds, don't ask why, I won't tell you anyway.
Having been on and left a lot of forums, groups and general collectives of supposedly like-minded people, I have been advised now by my good friend on Slotty Salad, Tom Wysom, to just stick with a blog. The hell with forums and groups and their cliquey, nit-picky, anal smallmindedness.
This is me and my interests, opinions, methods, achievements and frustrations, for what it is all worth, which, let's face it, because we are all very small, is probably not very much.

My interests include modelmaking of most types except military, old cars, old boats, old bikes.

I also draw in an illustratorly, rather than arty-farty style. I like to draw any of the above subjects and paint them too, with watercolours and gouache, because I haven't the patience and skill for oils or the tolerance of acrylic's foibles. I like to use pastel and pencil.
I try landscape and scenic subjects from time to time.

I have a fascination for vernacular architecture and have helped restore old houses with friends.

I have lived on boats, coastal and canal, in caravans, in houses old and new, home and abroad.
I used to work abroad, still modelmaking, for the car industry along with many other Englishmen, for the Englishman's attitude at work is highly prized by Johnny Foriegner as long as he's not actually on the books and under the laws of the host land! Dear me, no. That wouldn't do at all.

I have an interest in certain poets and writers. I can read L.T.C. "Tom" Rolt all day for his philosophy and sheer elegance of the use of English and for his vision.
Philip Larkin and John Betjeman make me smile as does an occasional dollop of PG Wodehouse.
Ian Rankin and Colin Dexter keep me turning pages when I need a mystery to escape to.

Time for tea, I think.