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1/8th models

1/8th models (6)

860 Monza Mille Miglia

The Sebring 860 Monza

history

 

In 1956, the scuderia used varied types of cars for the Sports Car Worldchampionship races.

They entered  V-12, 4.9L  410S at Buenos Ayres, 4 cyl 3.5L 857S at Buenos Ayres and Sebring, 4 cyl 3.5L 860 Monza at Sebring, the Mille Miglia, the Nurburgring and the Swedish GP, , V-12 3.5L 290MM at the Mille Miglia, the Nurburgring and the Swedish GP and 4 cyl 3L 625LM at Le Mans

Two 860 Monza and a 857S raced at Sebring.  The 860 had a 4 cyl, 3.5L engine Tipo 129,  built on the Lampredi ideas. The chassis Tipo 520, it had in common with the 290MM, was derived from the Tipo 510 of the 750 Monza and 857S. It featured a de Dion rear transaxle (four-speed gearbox in unit with the differential), double wishbone independent front suspension and included a tubular chassis structure. The engine had a lot of torque and when the car was available, Juan Manuel Fangio  preferred the 860 to the 290MM..

The 860 Monza collected half the points the scuderia needed to win the championship.

Very interesting passage about the cars at Sebring from the book “Kings of the Road” by the great automotive writer, Ken Purdy :

"Years ago I was looking at three cars in the Ferrari pits at Sebring. It had rained in the afternoon and the Florida sun, dropping to the rim of the great plain, shone red in the black pools of water on the circuit. There were only a few cars running in practice, howling separately in the distance, out of sight most of the time. The blood-red Ferrari cars would go a few laps as soon as the mechanics were finished with them. These were stark, open two-seaters. Their paint was flat and crude. The bucket seats were upholstered in wide-wale corduroy. Everything else in the cars except the wood steering wheels was roughly finished. Heavy welding seams joined the thin tubes of the frames. Shiny streaks here and there showed where oil had been mopped up. A man next to me turned, remembering the old pilots' gag: "You wouldn't send the kid up in THAT!" he said. A small, dark, red-eyed mechanic got into one of the cars. An ignition key looped in a piece of sisal wrapping twine stuck out of the dashboard. He leaned on it with the heel of his hand and a bare-metal clanging and clattering began. You wanted to move away before the thing exploded. It fired suddenly, all of a piece, and pumped out a gout of blue smoke that drifted low over the wet grass of the infield. The mechanic sat there with his foot in it for five minutes.

There was somebody in each of the other cars, and they were running, too. Juan Manuel Fangio materialized, pear-shaped in a rain jacket. He looked sleepy, he looked bored, he looked indifferent, until one noticed the incessant flickering of his eyes. The mechanic yelled somethin into his ear. Fangio let him see a sad smile, he shrugged massively. He got into the automobile, stared briefly at the instruments and then he went away and the other two, Eugenio Castellotti and Luigi Musso, howled after him, down the straight and under the bridge and around the corner out of sight. We could hear them through the esses and into the Warehouse road and then not again until they showed up on the back straight, the three of them in echelon astern, the howling of the engines squeezed down by distance to a thin buzz, their progress across the horizon apparently so leisurely that you wondered why this would be called racing. They were running around 140 mph.

They went down through the gears for the hairpin turn, a 180-degree reversal, the rear wheels spinning, or trying to, and then sudenly they were in the hole at the bottom of the finishing straight, drifting up to the edge of the concrete, coming past the pits, Fangio first, sitting there limp as pasta, the Castellotti, then Musso, all of them turning 7000 rpm and then one after another they shifted up a gear, three successive explosive 'whacks' as the engines bit, and they were gone again.

They ran over the five-mile circuit a dozen laps like that, tight together, so stable they seemed locked to the ground like buildings, but flying past light as deer at the same time. Wet with rain, the hurried-on paint glistened like oven-fired enamel as the cars screamed down the shiny concrete chute, the drivers sitting back from the wheels, their arms straight.

These were beautiful objects, perfect of their kind, there was nothing of crudity or starkness about them now. I was hard to believe that any of the other sixty cars that would start the race the next day could run ahead of the red Ferraris, and none of them did."

From: Kings of the Road by Ken Purdy

And indeed did Fangio win the 12H of Sebring with Eugenio Castellotti on 0604M. 0602M completing the good results by finishing second, Harry Schell and Luigi Musso driving.

Our model represents the winning 860 of Juan Manuel Fangio and Eugenio Castellotti as it was at the start of practice as, for the race, the car presented various hurriedly made openings on each sides of the mouth, in front of the cockpit and on the front top of the rear wings to ease cooling down the brakes and the driver. We wanted to preserve the extremely good looking and thoroughbred lines of the car.

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250 TR58 (#0728)

A bit of history

 

This is a model of the 250 TR58 (chassis #0728) that Phil Hill and Olivier Gendebien drove to victory at the 1958 24 hours of Le Mans. The first of a long and prolific partnership that would add 2 other wins in 1961 and 1962.

Moss, in his usual flamboyant style, led the race with a comfortable lead in an Aston Martin DBR1,but to see his engine fail. The race conditions were appalling during the night and Phil Hill showed his wet weather driving skills. Duncan Hamilton, on his private D-Type, a great wet weather driver  too, took the lead but lost it to change brake pads. Gendebien, then, just had to follow the one lap down D-Type. Torrential rain made that race very difficult and Hamilton, trying to catch his one lap delay, ran faster and faster, while Gendebien eased off a bit to avoid taking too much risks. Unfortunately, the D-Type left the race when Hamilton had to avoid a slower car and went off in a big accident. Gendebien-Hill just had to nurse their TR58 to the finish to secure the Scuderia first Le Mans victory since 1954 and the 1958 Sports Car World Championship.

 

 

 

The 1/8 scale model

 

The 250 TR58 is the third 1/8th scale  curbside model in this range. It does not feature opening parts, but, as for the two other models, everything that is visible on the car is minutely and realistically detailed. The paint is made of several rubbed and polished coats to achieve a non-too glossy finish that would not be correct for that period. The cockpit area is full of interesting details. Interesting also is the shape of the bonnet bulge that makes you wonder of its efficiency as a forced air intake for the engine.  The wheels are painstakingly made by hand spoke by spoke as on the real Borranis and are painted green at the front and pale blue at the rear as it was in use at the time.  To achieve realism we did not necessarily use the real material as leather for leather parts or tissue for seats or wood for the steering wheel, paint techniques are far more rewarding and give a far better result.

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The Mille Miglia 335S

A bit of history

 

For the 1957 Mille Miglia, the factory sent four cars, two 315S (3.8L) for Taruffi (#684) and von Trips (#0674) and two 335S (4.1L) for de Portago-Nelson (#0646) and Collins-Klementaski (#0700). 0646 started at Buenos Ayres as a 290S (3.5L engine) with Castelloti, Musso and Trintignant and did not finish. At Sebring, in the 315S form, powered by the 3.8L engine, Musso ans de Portago finished 7th. Unfortunately the story of this car, then in the 335S trim (4.1L engine) ended at the Mille Miglia with a dramatic accident killing both the driver and co-pilot, but also several spectators in the final stages of the race. This accident meant the end of the mythic Mille Miglia.

Portago was third in Rome after Collins had been forced to retire while leading. But about 45 km from the finish, disaster struck, between Mantova and Brescia, in a large and very quick bend, the left front type of 0646 blew off and Portago could not keep it on the road and the car crashed after several rolls. In July 1961, four years after the crash, an Italian court took off the blame from the factory and Englebert, the tyre manufacturer, stating that the tyre had been damaged by the "occi di gatto", cat's eyes that were common on all the Italian road by then, after that, all cat's eyes were taken off those roads.

 

 

The 1/8 scale model

 

The de Portago 335S (#0646) is a 1/8th scale curbside model similar in its conception to the von Trips 1957 Mille Miglia 315S (#0674) or the same car driven by the Collins-Trintignant 1957 Sebring but with enough differences in shape and details to require a new master and new moulds. The front area of 0646 is smaller and presents two circular air intakes for the cooling of the brakes (0674 had the mouth including those air intakes), the bulge on the bonnet, the single scoop between the bonnet and the left front wing (two on 0674), the smaller bonnet with two small bulges on either side of the main one, the windscreen, the side openings on the body, different treatment of the cockpit to lodge Ed Nelson make those two models quite different.

It takes about 150 hours to complete the building of this model, it means that production will inevitably be slow and very limited.

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The Mille Miglia 315S

A bit of history

 

This is a model of the 315S (chassis 0674) that Wolfgang von Trips drove to second place at the 1957 Mille Miglia. 315spetit4Von Trips, driving alone, hence the tonneau cover, also led the Mille Miglia at Ravenne, soon to be overtaken by Collins and Taruffi. He finished second at Brescia, a few meters behind Piero Taruffi, i.e. a little more than three minutes after 1,600 km of racing.

This 315S had a wider grill than the other 315S or 335S, that included the front brake air intakes, and had two scoops (instead of one) either side of the bonnet alongside the front wings. 315spetit3For Sebring and the Mille Miglia, the car was fitted with a 3.8 litre double-camshaft engine (140 Type), later for the remaining races of the championship a 4.1 litre (141 Type) replaced the 3.8 litre.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 1/8 scale model

 

It took us countless hours to research and collect information and to design and create this master. The model is made of more than 1,500 parts, 600 alone for the wheels. They are handmade spoke by spoke, there are 72 of them per wheels which means we have to drill 144 holes on the rim and the hub. The tyres have the accurate profile and pattern to go with the original Englebert. The wheels are painted as it was the use then.


Also noteworthy are the grill, the detailing of the cockpit with the electric board, the battery, the gearbox linkage and the dashboard with its readable meters. The seats are particularly realistic, as are the wheel wing nuts marked at the name and logo of the maker. Even the fitting way is mentioned. The headlights are an accurately scaled-down reproduction of the period Marshal. The Sebring model has the correct three-spoke steering wheel although, like Mike Hawthorn, Peter Collins would rather have a four-spoke one.

It takes about 150 hours to complete the building of this model, it means that production will inevitably be slow and very limited.

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The Sebring 315S

This is a model of the 315S (chassis 0674) that Peter Collins and Maurice Trintignant drove to the six place at the 1957 12 Hours of Sebring.

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