18 replies to this topic

[milmilhas]

I would like to see one 1/24 Russkit Superleggera complete (assembled) car someone have one ?

Thanks

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[milmilhas]

NOBODY HAVE A COMPLETE SUPERLEGGERA BODY ASSEMBLED??

[Prof. Fate]

Hi

So far as I know, they were "kits" for scratchbuilding. I had several and some survive. But it was an effort in scratchbuilding. I was a "pen pal" of Jim Russell at the time. The kits originally came with directions for a tube spaceframe. But my friends were midwest club racers doing chassis out of a sheet of brass. I did my cars that way(the lotus 19 and 25 were too small for the motors I had) with brass pans. I sent drawings and photos to MrRussell who started including drawings for the pans. The KITS didn't supply the brass sheet needed.

I only saw one, in the day, where a racer did the space frame. Most people just used the bodies. I don't have the equipment to do a set of photos. Although I am pretty sure that Boemker has driven one of them, a Lister at the last convention. When the 13us came out, I converted the cars for that motor, and none have a Russkit 22 today that I am aware of.

Fate

[don.siegel]

Here you go Miguel, this is one I picked up in this condition on ebay a couple years ago, the Lotus 23 in 1/24 scale. I don't have the instructions at hand, but I think this is pretty much how the chassis was supposed to be built, except for those rear body mounts! And the guy obviously never finished the car...

There's a fair amount of space on the 1/24 cars in these Russkit kits, but the 1/32 versions are very tight; a friend has built a couple of them, and they're not easy to put together it seems!

Hope this helps. A fair number of these bodies were around, but not sure how many of these kits were actually sold - or put togehter!
Don.

[TSR]

Russkit made four of the "Scratchbuilder Kits" in the 1/32 scale and four in the 1/24 scale. The earlier 1/24 scale contained colored styrene bodies (white, red, yellow or green) while the later had vacuum formed clear bodies. All the kits came late in 1963 as the new Mabuchi FT16, dubbed in this case "Russkit 22" made its apparition.

The 1/32 scale kits were:Lister Jaguar kit, Maserati Tipo 61 kit, Porsche RSK kit and Lotus 23 kit.

The 1/24 scale kits were:

1/ White styrene bodies:
Lister Jaguar kit, Maserati Tipo 61kit, Porsche RSK kit and Lotus 23 kit.

2/ Clear plastic bodies:
Lola T70 kit, Ferrari 365P2 kit, Chaparral II kit and McLaren-Elva SP1 kit.

All the bodies were of course sold separately, the styrene ones in nice little cardboard boxes with the same illustrations as on the posters, the clear ones in poly bags with a blue tag.

Thanks Don for posting a built-up chassis!

[milmilhas]

Hi
THANKS A LOT FOR YOUR HELP BUT I WAS VERY CHORIOUS TO SEE ONE OF THIS CARS COMPLETE BECAUSE I NEVER SAW ONE AND IN THE VINTAGE MAGAZINES THAT I HAVE THERE ARE NO ARTICLES ABOUT SUPERLEGGERA BODIES .

[don.siegel]

Miguel,

I'm not sure what exactly you want - these are scratchbuilders' kits, so it's up to each builder to finish the kit any way he wants. The chassis is built up pretty much as I show, and a couple tubes across is are used to mount the body - or you could use wood blocks glued inside the body, which was the more traditional way.

You didn't see any of these in the magazines, bacause there weren't any! At least not any articles or ads on the scratchbuilder kits that I could find. But there was a lot of coverage on the Superleggera body kits, which was Russkit's first major product. As Philippe says, these came out in late 1963, or probably earlier, since the first mentions were in June, then September. Here is the only ad I found for the scratch-builder kit, from a December 1964 issue of Model Car RAcing News, a California-based newspaper. It seems to say these are all new, so I think these kits came out about a year after the bodies, unless we can find some other evidence. And they were followed a couple months later by the first Spyder kits, and there was lots of coverage of those, plus ads.
Don

[milmilhas]

Hi Don

Many thanks for your help and simpaty for me the chassis is not important but the body with any chassis because i think this kits are a real chalenge to complete

[don.siegel]

Yes, and that's why I haven't tried to build any of the three I have!

If I can get in touch with my friend in Bordo who built a couple of these, I'll ask him if he's got any photos... They do look rather nice when completed, but I remember him tearing his hair out at the difficulty of putting it all together! (in 1/32, much tighter under the Birdcage body!)

Don

[Hworth08]

From Greg Holland's nice VSRN site, here are the instructions for building the space frame.

http://www.vsrnonlin...skit/index.html

Using .790 tires both front and rear, the frame is a surprisingly good handler for low-speed home tracks.

[endbelldrive]

The January or July 1964 issue of Car Model magazine also had an article on building a very simple slot car based on the Russkit Superleggera Lotus 23. The only thing I remember are the wood blocks used for mounting the body and the tab and slot method of mounting the windshield.

[Gene/ZR1]

I do not know if this is the same thing or not,but appears simular.

TSR__ Why is my motor blue?,it seems original.

[Gary Bluestone]

Is it true that some of these bodies were blow molded and if so which ones ? Blow molding is said to be a kind of vacuforming in reverse giving more detail on the outside of the finished body because it was in direct contact with the mold surface .

[Prof. Fate]

Hi

The first generation bodies were opaque styrene and blow molded. the second gen clear...I don't remember but I think they were just ordinary vacs. I could do rummage through boxes looking for survivors, but I expect that P will just REMEMBER.

Fate

[TSR]

Remember is not in the cards at my age. I have important dinner guests this Sunday and can't remember half their names...
But i will be at the Sacred Sanctum tomorrow and will check the dozens of MIB Russkit Superleggera bodies in the vault to see if any are blow molded or vac formed or both.

[Hworth08]

Philippe, please correct anything that is not correct.

I've read that Jim Russell was already making styrene bodies and that's how he got his start in the slot car industry.

Also that Jim was the team manager for a Porche racing team before he was involved with slot cars.

And last that Jim was hired by Aurora and was greatly involved in the production of the G+ 1/64th scale cars.

[TSR]

Jim began making styrene bodies but only after he released the first Russkit product that was the Russcote, a brush-on poly varnish designed for the Strombecker and Merit bodies used by early slot car racers. Then he began making bodies for the Strombecker chassis because there was a need for heavier bodies. He was not involved in slot car racing before 1962.

Jim was never a manager of a racing team but was a part sponsor of a few racing cars when slot cars were bringing good money, namely the Otto Zipper Porsche 906 of Ken Miles and "Scooter" Patrick, then the Lola T70 of Peter Revson at the 1966 LA Times GP, then the Lang Cooper driven by Charlie Hayes.

When the whole slot car bubble burst in 1967-68, Russkit went belly up as many others and Jim was hired by Aurora to design a 1/32 scale racing set using a glorified version of their HO track. This was largely unsuccessful. Jim was involved in a few more HO projects including the Magna-Traction cars. I am not so sure he had a hand in the G-Plus, I will have to verify that.
Later he purchased the tooling of the Cox HO cars when Cox went up in smoke in 1982 and created AMRAC, that effectively were the Cox cars in new colors. He never left the HO scale after that and eventually took over the Tomy HO line, that his son Steve still runs today.

[BWA]

All the Russkit Styrene bodies are indeed Semi Blow molded, or, reverse vacuum formed in female molds.

I have two very early English F1 bodies done this way, one a Porsche 718(1/32 scale), the other, I think an early 50s Alfa, which is about 1/36 scale. Both obviously done by the same manufacturer, and, both done in fairly thick buterayte.

[TSR]

Indeed all the Russkit styrene bodies are vac formed in 2-piece female molds. There is a parting line on both front and rear valances as well as on their sides.
Gene, I don;t know why the motor is blue in you Lister kit but it had to be done after Russkit sold the kit, because ALL Russkit "22" motors were gold with no exception. It could be that it is a rewind of some sort, but not a Lenz because he used a darker shade of blue. There were SOOOO many rewinders then, it is hard to tell who could have done it if indeed it is rewound. Mura used that paler blue color but the arm woudl be polished and balanced. So I really have no answer...