Fiat F-2 Racer 1907 Scratch Build?

[Roger Zimmermann]

Your work is good looking! Sure, 1:8 scale is less delicate than 1:12, but what I saw until now is well done!

[Pouln]

Stunning work so far. you could have fooled me when you stated that this is your first scratch build . Lots of details on what you have built now.

[Shed Man]

Thanks Poulin This is the first car, but I have built was a beam engine from castings. But I think that was easy compared to cars.

[Shed Man]

I have made some progress on the bonnet or hood as the Americans would call it. I wanted to create a fully opening hood similar to the real car and with a bit more detail around two of the the cowls.







To make the hinge I silver soldered a thin brass tube to the plate. And then milled away the spaces.



I offset the two parts of the bonnet so I could mill both at the same time.

[Shed Man]

The next step was to make the louvers. I have no means of pressing them so each were cut shaped and then soft soldered to the bonnet.







To make the small cowl and flange I turned the cowl body, made a washer cut the latter in half and soldered it to the body.

[Shed Man]

There is still a fair bit more work to get the fit correct but I thought I would do a trial on the car.

[Roger Zimmermann]

Nice work! I like the numerous rivets from hood.

[Shed Man]

Having completed the bonnet/hood I have made a start on the radiator. I produced an oak former and then bent the brass around that.



Here soldering the outer strip. The inner brass strip was silver soldered and the outer soft soldered.


Shell prior to clean up


Initial clean up



Balanced on chassis.


This shot also shows the starting handle shaft, bracket and support arrangement.


Still to make the mounting brackets but I have managed to find a supplier of some square mesh so hopefully in a few days I can complete the radiator.

[Dougritt]

Beautiful!

[ThierryD86]

Absolutely wonderful !

[Shed Man]

Guys, thanks for your kind comments they are appreciated.
The mesh for the radiator grill arrived and it looks pretty good, square holes (20 to the inch) and fairly strong. I think once painted it will look convincing.

I started to shape the mesh by first reducing the size of the wooden former to accommodate the thickness of the mesh. Then made another one the same size clamped the two together with the mesh in the middle and gently bent it over the former.








I wanted to try and simulate the effect of the radiator core and as I had some thin brass shim I had a go at folding it to form a concertina.





Not perfect but once the mesh is installed it does not look too bad.
I made and fitted some brackets to the side of the radiator and then drilled some mounting bolts on the underside to keep things stable.







At the moment the mesh is not fixed in place and I am not sure how to do it. Should I attempt to glue it and if so with what, any ideas would be gratefully received.

[Jo NZ]

If the mesh is stainless steel I'd advise against trying to solder it directly. I have been down that route... you need a 55% silver solder and special flux to solder steel to brass, and it needs a lot of heat. I ended up with burnt mesh, the thin wire melts in the heat.
How about soft soldering some brass tags inside the radiator shell that grip the mesh?

[Shed Man]

Jo
Thanks for this, I think you are right, I would have a lot of difficulty if I tried to solder the mesh directly not only is the mesh difficult to solder but the majority of the construction is with soft solder so I could not use silver solder at this stage. I think your suggestion of some small tags is the way to go.
Thanks
Graham

[markus68]

Beautiful work. I like it. Markus

[David Cowin]

I've followed other Pocher Fiat threads as well as this impressive scratchbuild which I couldn't hope to emulate. It's an opportunity to offer a detail of a 1905 120hp Fiat racer which appears in the Automotor Journal 1906:

There are also photo of both sides of the engine but I seem unable to post these at present.