Fireball Robert’s 56 Sunliner Update

I took time this weekend to dedicate some attention to Fireball’s ride. The Sunliner is taking shape and I have finished basically all the big work – now it is time for the details. As you may see on the pic above, I took the chance to correct one thing. At first the car had the standard valve covers. While doing some research and looking at old pictures, I realized that this car actually had a Thunderbird engine – with the Thunderbird covers. So I took the blue ones off and put the black Thunderbird’s in.

As you can see, all the trim is done as well. I used bare metal foil here. One small detail I also found while looking at the pictures is that this car didn’t have any tail lights. Instead, it had the tail light bezels – and since the lights were missing, you see the screw holes and the hole for the light bulb. It may be hard to see on this pic, but it is still visible – there you see a bigger hole for the bulb and smaller holes around  the bezel for the screws.

Now, the cover is glued in placed, showing only the driver seat. As the real ride. I’m quite happy with the result of the clinches. It was quite of a hazle to align the rolling bar and the cover with the rest of the interior. My brother started this ride, he had it all measured and did most of the heavy duty scratch building (such as the chasis, the roof cut and the roll bar). As I took over, I had to figure out where the roll bar was supposed to be (exactly!) since the holes on the cover didn’t leave much room for mistake (as it is suposed to be). So I had to loosely fit all the parts and try a bit. I must say that is one of the things I like the most in this kind of builds, to figure out how to fit custom built parts.

For the Black Widow fans: This ride is getting also there. Most of the trim is done, the interior is finished and glued in place. All I have to do now is to finish the missing trims (tail mostly) and a few touches here and there.

Now I’m wondering.. are you more of on the Black Widow or the Sunliner side? Racewise, I mean….

So what’s next?

• Decals: I have the Revell decals for the Black Widow plus I bought some after market decals for Fireball’s Sunliner.
• Details: as I said, I have to finish the trims on the black widow plus a few minor things like the radiator and such. For both the Sunliner and the Black Widow, I have to scratch build the hood and trunk holders (you know, this “ropes” that avoided the trunk and the hood to open).
• Weathering: yes, these racing beauties are going to be weathered. But not as junkers! They are going to be weathered as cars that just finished the race. So called “Checkered Flag”. The Black Widows driver’s door bump is part of a racing “injury” 😉

Tagged as: 1/24, 1/25, 56 sunlner, 57 Chevrolet, black widow, Checkered Flag, fireball roberts, Ford Fairlane, stock cars