Don't know who manufactured the casting. They weren't that proud of their job and didn't put anything on the bottom other than a number and MADE IN HONG KONG. Actually it was a pretty shoddy casting. That's why when I figure out what to replace them with, I'll probably drill out the fuel filler caps and make them look better. As it is; all of the vent openings were ground out and opened up. A turbine engine was made from a Krazy Glue cap and guitar string windings. The exhaust tubes are from 1/16 aluminum tubing cut to length. The interior, which consisted of two seats, was improved upon by adding a dash made from 3M foil, painted flat black and guages scribed into the paint. A steering wheel was made by punching a piece of blister out, rimming it with flat black and sticking a straight pin through the center. A fire wall also seperates the engine from the driver's compartment. A new windshield replaced the cracked yellow plastic one. Blister was cut to fit the side windows and see-thru turbine cover. Front fender flares were made from J&B KWIK. The rear has a screened in back and the tail lamps were made by pressing transparent red wrapping paper (saved from last Christmas) onto 3M foil and taking the hole punch and punching out the lamps. They were then glued on with rubber cement. The front head lamps were ground out and epoxied over. I made some decals that conform to the 1968 SCCA Marlboro race car, which dominated that race from start to finish. Infact there were two cars produced by Ray Heppenstall in conjunction with American Howmet Corporation. Howmet was a major producer of turbine castings for aircraft back in '68. Two cars were campaigned in the SCCA and at LeMans for one season. Though LeMans was a disapointment the two car team had success on the SCCA circut and has the distinction of being the most successful turbine racing car ever produced. Though the replication has some short comings it looks much better than it started out....Even if I did use CO-MOLDS for wheels!!!!


http://img502.imageshack.us/img502/5678/howmetfinrtrrtopauxweb9wj.th.jpg (http://img502.imageshack.us/my.php?image=howmetfinrtrrtopauxweb9wj.jpg)http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/595/howmetlftsdweb8fl.th.jpg (http://img147.imageshack.us/my.php?image=howmetlftsdweb8fl.jpg)http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/7286/howmetrtfrtopauxweb4ns.th.jpg (http://img147.imageshack.us/my.php?image=howmetrtfrtopauxweb4ns.jpg)http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/3236/howettweb2ht.th.jpg (http://img147.imageshack.us/my.php?image=howettweb2ht.jpg)

Considering what you started out with I would say you did a real fine job CH. Even if you did use co-molds...nah, I'm just joshing you. It is a far cry from what you started out with.

How easy is it to work with J&B KWIK? Is it easy to file and sand once dried?

Far out

Thanks....Yeah! J&B is made for sanding, fileing or grinding.

Big dif.

Very cool!

Someone on another board just told me this morning they thought it was a "Tinstoy." I'd never heard of them until then. I hope by "improving" this one I didn't devaluate something that was a "couple of a kind." The casting still sucked. And unless someone was willing to have given me over $20.00 for it; I'm not going to gnash my teeth. So if anyone was.....don't tell me now. :o

Thanks for another CH original! I don't think you have to worry about that casting being worth 20 bucks in the before state. Anyway its value is priceless now :)

Oooops don't know what happened. This should have been a new thread. I'll try again. Sorry