Who has their Trump GT40?

[Chuck Kourouklis]

I think it's still worthwhile - just remember, it's toylike by Scale Motorsport standards - come to think of it, there are more than a few full-scale vehicles toylike by that measure. Toylike by Palmer or Pyro standards would be a bit more of an issue. Biggest problem I've noticed, living with it for a while, is that various suspension joints are pretty out-of-scale and unconvincing.

Gotta say, that chrome's a bit bitchy. Gave some a 12-hour soak in cheap bleach, and 'tweren't much of it removed...

[CrateCruncher]

Have you tried spray oven cleaner? I like Easy Off. It takes most chrome off in a few seconds but won't harm the plastic.

[CrateCruncher]

Here is the official blurb from the Scale Motorsport Website:

Many automotive model builders have been waiting years for a manufacturer to release a 1:12th scale builder's kit of the infamous Ford GT40 MKII. So when Trumpeter stepped up to the plate and announced they would be 'the' manufacturer builders around the world took note.
Hundreds of customers placed reservations for our GT40 MKII Super Detail Kit and we have kept everyone up to date on our activities. About two weeks ago we received our Trumpeter sample kit and immediately jumped into evaluating every detail. You can imagine how excited we were to have such an early opportunity and to report back to all the customers that placed reservations over our web site.
Our first impressions were good, the only negatives we could see was the extensive use of chrome parts and the incorrect molding of seat details. The body appears to be perfect and the wheels excellent but the tires too balloon like and out of proportion. All in all not too bad for Trumpeter's first effort into the field. We felt the problems identified could easily be corrected with our super detail kit.
But in order to fully evaluate the Trumpeter kit we needed to get further into understanding it, the same way we did by visiting the Holman/Moody Garage in North Carolina last January and spending a day with Lee Holman studying the original engineering drawings taking thousands of detailed photos and hours of video. Holman/Moody was the garage chosen by Henry Ford back in the early 60's to build a team of GT40 MKII's along with the Shelby team to beat Ferrari at Le Mans.
Scale Motorsport spent a great deal of time and expense on research we felt it was the only way we could move ahead with confidence and speed knowing our details would be right on. After assembling the engine, suspension components, mounting the wheels and body we have come to the conclusion that we will not be investing our development time into a super detail kit for the Trumpeter GT40 MKII.
Our view is the kit is too 'toy-like' and regardless of the amount or degree of detail we could create it wouldn't be enough to make economical sense for Scale Motorsport, nor our customers to spend the time and money it would take to build the kit into what it should have been.
We applaud Trumpeter's efforts for their first attempt at a large scale automotive builder's kit it is a good effort, unfortunately the result is not where Scale Motorsport believes it needs to be in order for us to bring to market the type of product our reputation has been built on and our customers expect.
The 1:12th scale GT40 MKII is the Holly Grail of builder's kits, and as Scale Motorsport is all about building, we encourage you to grab one of the Trumpeter kits for yourself before they are sold out. Since 1:12th scale subjects are so rare these days you will be amazed at how different it feels to hold parts of this size in your hands. And speaking of parts, the parts in the Trumpeter kit do fit extremely well, practically snapping together with little to no modification. Also make sure to get yourself a gallon of bleach, you will need it to remove all the chrome from all the parts!
We greatly appreciate everyone's interest in a Scale Motorsport GT40 MKII Super Detail Kit. The volume of reservations we received tells us there are enough interested customers out there to make our development commitment worth it, but only for the right 1:12th scale kit. Unfortunately the Trumpeter GT40 MKII is just not that kit.

[Chuck Kourouklis]

Originally Posted by CrateCruncher

Have you tried spray oven cleaner? I like Easy Off. It takes most chrome off in a few seconds but won't harm the plastic.

Funny, I was just thinkin' 'bout that - maybe even right about the time you were posting -

Think I'll try that next...

[zitzit]

Hello!

I was disapointed to read that decision from SMS...

I'm still hesitating to buy this kit.

Would any of you post some good shots of this mysterious kit.

Is it worth the money asked?

THanks a lot

Olivier.

[lumpulus]

It seems that Paul at Thunder Valley F1 has taken up the torch for a GT40 Aftermarket set.

http://www.f1m.com/main/forum/viewto...p?f=17&t=11332

[MarcoSaupe]

a fellow German modeler has some kit shots on his site: http://www.scaleautofactory.com/gt40/index.html

I got mine today, paid 125EUR, from a quick look I'd think, if you remove the chome you can get a very nice looking model.

[Enilder]

sorry but what's so special about this kit? i am new to AF and i saw this model on other site as well. i couldnt afford to mess it up (and expensive) so i passed on that one but the quality seems to be much better than what i bought! haha

[gionc]

Originally Posted by MarcoSaupe

a fellow German modeler has some kit shots on his site: http://www.scaleautofactory.com/gt40/index.html

I got mine today, paid 125EUR, from a quick look I'd think, if you remove the chome you can get a very nice looking model.

MS: may I know where you purchased inside EU for such price? Thanks a lot.

[MarcoSaupe]

Well, one shop made a mistake and advertised it for 67EUR and everyone who had ordered for the wrong price was offered it for 125 - the cheapest normal offer I've seen so far was nimpex.de for 139.90

[gionc]

Originally Posted by MarcoSaupe

Well, one shop made a mistake and advertised it for 67EUR and everyone who had ordered for the wrong price was offered it for 125 - the cheapest normal offer I've seen so far was nimpex.de for 139.90

Still good: it's listed at 199 here in Italy.....

[Emilio Lizardo]

I have mine. I am waiting to see what comes out in the aftermarket. I am hoping that someone will do decals for the Miles/Hulme #1 car.

My initial concerns were the motor & gearbox case, the tires (tyres), the shape of the footwell and that massive roll cage. On the last item, per the Trevor Legate book on the GT-40, the roll cage was added to all of the Fords in 1967 after Ken Miles was killed in the J Car and Walt Hansgen died from injuries suffered in the MkII during 1966 LeMans trials. So, this item should probably be omitted on a 66 race car.

I hear the at the folks at Scale Motorsport judge the body to be correct. It appears from photos.

I am hoping that SMS would share their comments on the kit, but as they have not done so yet, I don't expect them to.

[CrateCruncher]

From what I've seen thus far, this GT40 kit would benefit most from a small pile of aftermarket resin and white metal parts - not 5 or 6 A4 sized sheets of photo-etch. Someone like RMoM, HRM, or Thunder Valley might step up. RMoM did some nice aftermarket stuff for the 1/12 Caterham kit years ago and sold the parts a la carte. That kit was so good it really didn't need much though.

One thing that might work is a "transkit". The idea is to offer an engine sub-kit, a suspension sub-kit, an interior sub-kit, and a tire/wheel sub-kit..with each being in the $40 to $99 range. People could make a new outlay as their project progressed. Autograph did this for the 1/12 Revel GTO and even published the instructions on their website. The only reason I haven't bought any is that each sub-kit is priced at $300-400 and the project is based on a rare $300 die-cast that must be disassembled, stripped, cut, ground down - in other words, lotsa make-work.

Here's a link to the GTO stuff if anyone is interested: http://www.autographmodel.com/Englis...12/E_M1-12.htm