Required field must not be blank: July 2017

Friday, July 28, 2017

Sunday, July 23, 2017

Pocher Progress, Alfa Part 19

While it was winter, the Posher Alfa was sitting fairly idle since the next steps, for the most part, involved body paint and sanding that I wanted to do in warm weather outdoors.

Well over the past couple of weeks I did do a little work.

Here is the radiator and nose, in place! The first body part finished and attached to the chassis... Actually, it still needs some polish, but I plan to do that to everything at once.

The next thing I plan to tackle is the doors and associated interior details.

The model has "working" latches. I place the word "working" in quotes because short of completely re-designing and making all the related parts from scratch, there is no way these latches are going to work.

I guess most models either redo the whole thing, or they skip it and let the doors just stick closed by friction, which they will. I am going to split the difference and make the latches and handles move, but not actually latche.

This photo of the backsides of the door panels shows a typical Pocher problem. The black part will be spring loaded and turn up (to "unlatch") with the door handle. On the right side is the left door. The inside panels are held with screws, and left side is ridiculous. The screw post is literally right over the latch. There is no way the latch can lift up, the screw completely blocks it.

On the other door the situation is better, but the screw still blocks the latch some (why are the doors even different? Some questions are better off left unasked...).

I plan to cut those screw posts off and hold the inside panels on with just two screws and some glue.

Which brings us to the next problem. The screws are much too long and will go right out the outside of the door. They have to be cut significantly shorter.

Also, the big screw heads stick up and will interfere with the leather interior.

I used the lathe to cut four original Pocher screws shorter, and tapper the heads so I can put them down flush.

The screws are so bad that I found them not even consistent in size. I had to use a different size collet for half of them.

Here is the original screw above, and the altered screw...

So, why not just glue the panel on and use no screws? Why not use some completely different screws that are a better size? Good question... It's a philosophical point. I am trying, as much as possible, to "build the kit" on this car. It won't be as perfect a scale model as some Pochers, that do extensive enhancements, turn out to be, sure. But I kind of want this to be a Pocher model "out of the box" as it were, as much as I can.

The complete album for this project is here. See all my posts on Pocher models here.

For more on scale models, look here.

Six Months!

Harlan the African Grey Parrot has been with us for six months now! Time flies... So what have we learned?

He'll talk, but he'll say whatever he wants and not what you hope he'll say.

It's a challenge to get him used to new experiences.

He will bite me sometimes, but he bites other people a lot more. We'll work on that.

It's going to be difficult to make sure he's well cared for when we go on trips. Still wondering about that...

He still doesn't rip things apart as much as he should, especially things like wood. I worry that he won't be getting enough beak-wear.

And finally, grey parrots are awesome!