13 replies to this topic

[Jairus]

Jens sent me two very tarnished chassis for restoration with painted bodies added for a set of RTRs. The first one shown below was obviously a kit of some sort which explains why they are in this section of the forum. Although originally well constructed, the solder joints were globby and showed that too cool an iron was used, along with not cleaning the joint correctly. End result was a fairly weak chassis. I will be the first to admit that I am not the best solderer, but I HAVE learned a lot during the past 5 years so I think I have the right to critique... No?

I popped it onto my R-Geo jig after removing the tongue and pans and proceeded to go over all the joints, replacing what brass rods needed replacing, in order to line everything up.
Looks much better now and way stronger! Cleaned up pans were added and the whole thing went for an 8 hour dry tumble.

After adding the mechanical bits it looks like this:



The A-can Mura featured a newer set of B-can brush hardware that suggest a later 1969 issue. After a bit of checking showed very little use on the com and bearings. Plus a short stint on the test bench proved that it sounded great just as it was!

Rear tires are early 1968 Riggen blues that seemed oversized for this chassis. Once turned down to 7/8" suddenly revealed soft rubber underneath! Whoo-hoo, we were in business! So with a liberal application of Zip Grip the tires now seem as soft as a fresh set of orange rubber (which was the plan) so they are done! But... the supplied Parma fronts really didn't go so:


Rick Thigpen supplied me a set of his re-popped early Riggen fronts a while back... so now we're set!

Onto the body.

Since Jens wanted the paint to reflect one of his fav local brewers of adult beverages I picked a nice later '60s Dynamic Porsche 908 coupe to shoot.
The colors and logos come directly from the brewery's web site. Since I don't speak German, I might have gotten that front statement wrong but I am pretty sure it means brewery.


Additional pictures here.


Under the skirts nothing but simple, clean, late '60s technology!


Onto the second car.

[TSR]

Jairus, the chassis is a 1971 production model made by Phaze III, a division of Cobra. Nice job you did on restoration and the Dynamic 908.

I believe that Jens will be racing with us at BP in October...

[Old pink can guy]

Too sweet for words. Wow, very sweet. Nice job!!!

Ken.

[Jairus]

1971 huh?
Be quite obsolete by then would it not?

Okay, Phaze III it is!
Thanks for the info.

[TSR]

Jairus,

Not really, this thing could be made to handle quite well. The difference with previous issues is lighter weight from notches in the pans and the drop arm.

Also the use of the older Mura motor was typical for RTR cars that year, they had not converted (and will shut down before doing so) to the smaller C-can motors.

[dc-65x]

Rick Thigpen supplied me a set of his re-popped early Riggen fronts a while back... so now we're set!

You're welcome, Jairus.

This "fat O-ring" wheel/tire combo is the brainchild of Steve Okeefe. His original design was a "telescope" style wheel and I adapted it to a Riggen style. We had both styles produced a year or two ago. It's amazing how closely the ground down O-rings match the original vintage Riggen and Associated tires.

[Rick]

Sooper sano, Jairus... another WTG!

[Hworth08]

Phase III frames like this became the standard for the NCC Group 12 class at our track. That frame could handle very well using the underpowered G12 motors. With the good bodies available then, a decent driver couldn't hardly deslot one of those cars!

[Old pink can guy]

Rick,

Riggen was just a few block from where I lived in Carson, CA. We had all kinds of small business complexes near by.

One day I went by Mr Riggen's place and was just lookin' in the door and Mr Riggen comes out as a lot of trash had blown all over the place. He asked me if I would like to clean it up and I said, "Yes, sir! He stuffed a brand new set of rear tires and fronts in my pocket. He was a cool guy to me even though I was only 12 or 13 years old.

Now that is class and style!

[Prof. Fate]

Hi,

Jairus, in '70-74 tracks were dying like crazy.

In '68 when we were forming the NCC, one suggestion was to recognize the reality. That is, not where P raced I am sure, most tracks had some sort of class for the multitude of twelve buck RTRs and kits that the track had. In fact, no one running a production car could make the "money many" anywhere. Where the common field was 40 racers, you didn't usually see kits/RTRs until about the D Main. But from there on, all the cars were kits/RTRs. Most of the first few mains being some Dynamic.

So, tracks decided to have races specifically for the slower main guys so that they could have a chance. But they PAID like the pros meaning some unnamed folks would go to tracks where they weren't known and "poach".

In '69, Dynamic came out with an effective RTR anglewinder specifically for "Group 12". By '71 or so, a lot of obsolete endbell drive anglewinders were re-packaged as "Group 12" cars to sell off the chassis AND the no longer used A-cans!

Until Flexi cars came out in the early '80s, tracks commonly had NOS cars like this for sale, and "open" or "Group 7" racing became hard to come by.

Fate

[Jairus]

Well, we found out that the prior chassis was actually a Phaze III, so now I have to ask... what is this one?


It came to me very tarnished with no front axle or wheels. The motor was rusted solid and the rear tires dryer than Hitler's corpse.
A lot of sanding, and repairs later along with a session on the chassis jig the poor little thing is now straight and true.
New motor by John Havlicek, wheels by Rick Thigpen, a set of Alpha wires, and it looks a lot better I think!

The Arm is a #24 I believe and the magnets are Mura white dots. This puppy turns over with .9v and simply screams at 9.0v!!! Very strong-sounding and extremely smmmmoooootttthhhhh running!


Body I picked was a Ferrari 512 coupe from the early '70s to fit with the C-can motor and the "L" floppy front axle. The paint however was chosen by the customer.





More pictures here.

Ciao.

[havlicek]

Super classy build, Jairus! I freaking love that body/paint scheme!

-john

[TSR]

Jairus,

I do not believe that this is a "production" chassis, but one built by an amateur racer, and was done between 1974 and 1978, when these "L" chassis became the standard that all copied. That the side pans are fixed instead of hinged denote that a top-notch pro did not build this.

The MAC Ferrari 512M body is a bit older, from 1972, but was sold through the 1970s after Parma purchased the company, so would be correct.

Very nice restoration, top notch.

[68Caddy]

Have to say that this one and the first one is a excellent restoration, way sweet and I'm sure the lucky guy who is receiving it will be very pleased.

Love the motor as much as the chassis, what else can you expect from Jairus and John.

Thanks for sharing this build.

Nesta