Minix (and other) car improvements

[ianmacc]

On 08/06/2019 at 13:53, quicksilvercoaches said:

Time to revive my old thread as I've just completed a restoration I'm very pleased with. This poor old Dinky Dublo Singer had seen better days.

 

It took four applications of Nitromors and much scraping to get all that paint off. Still red as most of the photos I found online are of red ones and I didn't think the original yellow suited it, but a much better finish. The wheels and screen are from an Oxford Diecast Morris 8.

Very nice and reminiscent of the EFE sports car range. Just goes to show how reasonable the original moulding was in the first place. 

 

Are the others in the background next for the treatment? 

[quicksilvercoaches]

Another one but just some minor cosmetic tweaks to a modern Oxford model this time - not 100% accurate but close enough for me. Does anyone here watch HubNut on YouTube? If you do then I'm sure you'll recognise Elly.

 

 

 

She's actually the second red and white 2CV Dolly in my collection as another friend owns the G-reg car

[Hesperus]

Do you fancy a go at The Mighty Dacia next? 

 

  https://www.shapeways.com/product/WS8Z5586N/dacia-1300-renault-12-break-body-scale-1-87?optionId=89475360&li=marketplace

[GRUNFOS]

Great inspiration and ideas, have done this to a matchbox TV van.

 

 

 

 

[Guest JiLo]

A chap in my street owned a Ford Pop when I was a nipper in the 70's, from memory it was either cream or manky white with parts from a blue one, presumably obtained from the scrap yard.  I was mesmerised by it, so decided to recreate it with the Oxford Diecast as a base....

 

 

 

Done this a few years back

 

Joe

[fodenway]

An Uncle of mine had something similar around 1958-9. His Pop was originally a buff colour, but following a slight argument with his gatepost, it needed a new offside front wing. Not being able to afford one, even from the scrappers, he made one from wood in the style of the Jeep - 45 degree up, horizontal top and a short 45 degree front lip, with the original headlamp perched on top. My cousin and myself were given paintbrushes and a tin of Dulux blue paint, and left to get on with it. No masking tape or paper,  just don't get paint on the glass or chrome!

 I had thought about re-creating that car myself, but just can't "like" the Oxford Pop enough, it looks more like a hot-rod - the John Day version is far better in my opinion.

 By the way, Uncles' Pop had many other problems, such as regularly overheating and very poor brakes. He came out to the East Coast the following year to take us home from our holidays, but declared that he didn't think it would make the return journey. We called at an auction in Bridlington where he bought a 1946 Ford Prefect for £8, put his Popular in as a late entry, and sold it for £12, less commission!   Happy days..........

[Fat Controller]

It used to be common to see cars with different coloured doors, bonnets, boots etc; rather less so these days. I remember my uncle used to drive down from Surrey to Llanelli for his summer holidays, back in the very late 1950s/ early 1960s (no motorways or Severn Bridge) He managed this, seemingly without problems, but every time he took us out for a run, we'd end up push-starting it. 

[PhilJ W]

It was not unusual for Ford Pops to leave the factory with wings/bonnets/grills painted a slightly different shade to the rest of the car. This is because the body shell was painted, trimmed and then attached to the chassis before those components were attached to the car. The reason being it could be an older or different batch of paint. Beige and pale green seemed to suffer most from this problem.

 

Edited July 20, 2019 by PhilJ W

[quicksilvercoaches]

I'm continuing to build up a small collection of cars owned by family and friends so here's a couple of recent additions.

 

When I was born my dad had a Valencia Blue Triumph Vitesse convertible. I only have vague memories of this as a complete car and mostly remember bits of it spread all over the garage, attic, shed, next door's garage etc. as it failed an MOT when I was 2 years old and he decided to strip it down for a complete restoration. After several years he got fed up of tripping over it and sold it in bits to someone who intended to restore it but it hasn't been taxed since 1987 so it never made it back onto the road. The model is an EFE repainted in a mixed-up Humbrol approximation of Valencia Blue, and the silver trim looks much better in real life than the photo that's much larger than actual size.

 

 

 

After the Vitesse had gone, for many years we had this mongrel Morris Minor, which had started life as a 1952 803cc Tourer but at some point had been fitted with all the mechanical bits of a Minor 1000 saloon and had also been re-registered. It supposedly ended up in Germany, having been sold to the boss of a German transport company in a rather strange deal that basically involved him instructing the manager of his UK depot to buy him a Minor sight unseen and put it on the next truck bound for Germany. Both Classix and Oxford make maroon Morris Minor convertibles and I chose the Classix as it's a better representation (but still not great) and Oxford's colour looked too brown.

 

   

Edited August 30, 2019 by quicksilvercoaches

[BLK4Y]

Reference the earlier discussions re Rambler cars, in the early 60's Dinky produced a fire brigade set. This included a Bedford turntable ladder, a Commer pump escape and a Nash Rambler fire chief's estate car. My Mum gave the set away to a young lad in the flat opposite ours ! 

[quicksilvercoaches]

Some kit builds this time as I recently acquired a few of the metal kits from John Day and R. Parker. I like these kits as they're very simple and easy to put together but well detailed and realistic. The first to be finished are a pair of Parker Humbers: the black one is a four-cylinder Hawk and the grey one a six-cylinder Super Snipe.

 

 

 

 

And with Oxford Diecast's Snipe estate

[divibandit]

I love your cars Quicksilver, the Humbers remind me of my dad's. 

He had 2 Hawks, as in your pics, and a Super Snipe estate, all in navy blue with a pale blue roof.

I hadn't seen the R.Parker one in the flesh as it were, looks good, but our Hawks had HUMBER in chrome letters across the bonnet just like your Super Snipes. 

He also had a Sceptre, but in green with a lighter green roof. Be nice to get a model of that too...

Great work!

 

Steve

[Poor Old Bruce]

On 08/06/2019 at 14:58, RLWP said:

My Father-in-law had a twin carb Maxi HLS. A much underrated car.

 

Despite it's dowdy looks it had an excellent turn of speed and pretty good handling. You could also carry an eight foot plank inside with the tailgate shut

 

Richard

 

I once managed to shut the doors on my Mini Clubman Estate with an eight foot venetian blind inside it. I think Mrs. had to sit on the back seat though.

[Enterprisingwestern]

10 hours ago, Poor Old Bruce said:

 

I once managed to shut the doors on my Mini Clubman Estate with an eight foot venetian blind inside it. I think Mrs. had to sit on the back seat though.

 

I know somebody who managed to shut the tailgate on BMW estate with a fridge freezer in the back, there was glass everywhere!

 

Mike.

[Merfyn Jones]

Adam, you made me look through my to-do drawers.  Found a few old Parker kits, including a Super Snipe.  I must get a Hawk to go with it when they are available again. 

[Covkid]

On 08/06/2019 at 14:22, quicksilvercoaches said:

Earlier in this thread I mentioned my idea of trying to convert a Minix Landcrab into a Maxi. That got knocked on the head when Oxford announced their Maxi and now inevitably I've repainted one to match my real car. Yes the Oxford Maxi has its faults but I think it's better than anything I could have made and replacing the oversized wheels has really helped. My car is a standard 1750 rather than the posh HLS so I had to grind off the bumper underriders too.

 

Incidentally, I don't know if anyone here follows Ian Seabrook aka HubNut on YouTube, but you'll find a video of him road testing this very car on his channel.

 

Good work on the Maxi.

 

Yes, I have been following Ian's activities for a few months now, even though I am not a "petrolhead".  I thibnk it was his haircut in Aberystwyth that started my intrigue. Ian comes across as a very knowledgeable nerd on motor vehicles, and his tour of New Zealand at the moment is showing that off well.  His recent tour of the Packard museum showed amazing recognition of motors. 

 

The Fiat 131 mentioned earlier probably is very rare now but there used to be loads around.  My mum had a friend who took her out for driving lessons in his - was it a Mirafiori ?  Sadly, ne Friday afternoon they were on their way home from Machynlleth when a rep driving the other way, and overtaking, hit them head on.  Fortunately my mum wasn't driving on that occasion so it was her friend who received pretty bad injuries which he never really recovered from, and the car was totalled of course. 

[quicksilvercoaches]

Having acquired a cheap second-hand Oxford Zephyr as a wheel donor for another project, I decided to have some fun and do something completely different with it. Straight out of Custom Car magazine from the 1980s with a V8, big wheels, drainpipe exhausts and fancy paint.

 

 

[ianmacc]

On 07/03/2020 at 10:58, quicksilvercoaches said:

Having acquired a cheap second-hand Oxford Zephyr as a wheel donor for another project, I decided to have some fun and do something completely different with it. Straight out of Custom Car magazine from the 1980s with a V8, big wheels, drainpipe exhausts and fancy paint.

 

 

I did something similar with a EKO model back in the 90s but no picture or even the model! Always loved mark three and four Z cars and have owned two. 

[steve1]

Dug these out as I might use them on the layout.

 

The forklift is a Matchbox with new wheels, mudguards and driver. The Tranny is just weathered, added interior detail and new plates. The Fiat 1500 is an old Matchbox again but with a bare metal respray, plus wheels and interior from a Carama Merc A Class. The patch on the roof is where the 'roof rack' was ground away and a masking tape 'sunroof' added. The Fiat is probably slightly out of scale but placed correctly it doesn't look too bad.

 

steve

 

 

 

[BernardTPM]

The Fiat is about S scale, but is a nice casting.

[PhilJ W]

I seem to remember an article in Railway Modeller a few years ago about upgrading Minix models and painting and weathering them.

[steve1]

On 23/03/2020 at 22:08, BernardTPM said:

The Fiat is about S scale, but is a nice casting.

 

If anybody wants it for an S scale layout, then all they have to do is drop me a PM and it's theirs.

 

steve

[divibandit]

On 24/03/2020 at 10:48, PhilJ W said:

I seem to remember an article in Railway Modeller a few years ago about upgrading Minix models and painting and weathering them.

Hi Phil,

I have that article, is it ok to post here?

Steve

[PhilJ W]

Perfectly OK.

[acourtrail]

On 02/07/2018 at 11:45, PhilJ W said:

The Victor 101 is also quite rare. I found one at a toy fair once with some of the more common models and the Triang car carrier for the princely sum of £10. I replaced it with one of the more common models and sold the car carrier on for £12.

I didn't know the Victor 101 was rare, thank you for telling me.  I managed to find a set of five unboxed Minix cars (including two Victors) in my local antique shop for £6.  While the red Victor was missing it's wheels, it was otherwise in very good condition.  The blue Victor was complete and in very good condition.  One of the other three cars (a Triumph 2000) was in poor condition apart from it's wheels, so I salvaged the wheels and used them in the red Victor.