BMW 320 E21 (Revell) WIP

[eugene78]

Hello folks, merry Christmas to everyone!

I finally found the time to take some pictures of a model I started about a week ago.



Box contents:











The kit, obviously, has no real prototype. It includes a fuel injected M10 engine with a turbo, along with a rollbar and some strange-looking bucket seats for the interior:



My build is going to be different. I will convert the engine to a naturally aspirated one with twin Webers. The seats will probably be replaced with stock Recaros – I'll have to make them myself, using the seats from a Revell 635 as a starting point. Here you can see some other goods I have prepared for this build:



The wheels come from an Academy 635 (with different tyres), the brakes – from a Tamiya Celica, and the battery – from a Fujimi 635 (which had 2 batteries in the kit).

Here's what has been done so far:



I cut off the rear part of the underbody, including the spare wheel well. The underbody behind the rear axle must be flat, not lowering. The spare wheel well was undersized and had a completely wrong shape. The main wheel wells also had little resemblance to the real ones, so I replaced them with appropriate pieces of a Revell 635 underbody. The molded-in exhaust had to go, too, along with the front longitudinal members, which didn't match the new front body. Oh yes, the new front body – the kit was not only incorrect in this part, but it also had the tanks, wiring, coil and fuse box molded-in, so rather than removing all these pieces one by one, I chose to replace the wheelhouses and the firewall altogether, using the Academy 635 as a donor.



Considering the scale difference and the fact that the E24 is much larger than the E21, I had to trim the new front end a lot before I got it to fit inside the body.



Now I would say the front is about 60 percent complete. The white areas are made of sheet styrene and epoxy putty.



That's it for now!

[andybmw7272]

This looks like it has been well thought out.
It looks like you are a technical thinker about things too.
I like it so far!
Andy

[eugene78]

A little update - a picture of the model body (green silhouette) overlaid on a photo of a real car:

As you can see, there are some inaccuracies, but they are mostly impossible to notice without the help of Photoshop. The only thing I'm going to correct is shown with a red line.

(Source of the original photo)

[Tompidom]

I really like these aera BMW,s Ill be watching this one closely!

[eugene78]

The progress has been very slow, but the project is not dead!

In the meantime I have almost completed the underbody and the engine compartment, only some small details to add.





Had to make a new front panel – the old one did not look like the real thing at all, and you can see it well when the hood is open.





I have only kept the radiator from the old part – it seems a bit small, but may still be usable.



On the underside I have added an imitation of fuel tanks, a new spare wheel well and a central tunnel. Not everything looks as good as I would like: some lines lack parallelity, some proportions had to be sacrificed in favor of compatibility with kit parts. A more accurate reproduction would have required building the complete underbody from scratch, and I'm not up to that challenge yet.







The model also got new wheels. I was unable to obtain tyres with sufficiently low profile for the rims I had intended to use, but Roman (Romik505) kindly offered me to use the rims they made for the Lada VFTS. I've seen very similar wheels on an E21, so these look like a good fit, and I also have suitable tyres for them (sourced from the same Celica that gave the brakes). The Lada wheels were cast directly from a 3D printed piece, so they needed some sanding on the inside.



Couldn't resist chopping the engine apart. I'm going to make separate pieces for the oil filter and the starter, that won't take much time compared to the other modifications I'm doing and will improve the look of the engine greatly.



Next step: the suspension.

[BVC500]

impressive!

[nugundam93]

nice details you've added on

[FraFi]

Hi,

great built so far! take a look at: http://www.scaleproduction.de/index....lgen-1-24.html
they have many good wheels for the e21

Frank

[eugene78]

Thank you Frank! I was unaware that Scaleproduction also makes smaller (13-15") wheels, I'll have to check them out. The rims I have now are quite good, but I could use some lower profile tyres - and they are really hard to find in this diameter!

[eugene78]

The main suspension components are ready. I still have to make anti-roll bars, steering rack and diff mount, but that can wait until later.





Now we can see how the car looks on wheels:









What would you say? Are the tyres too thick? I wish the sidewalls were a bit lower (these are about 225/55/15 in scale), but can't find any better options. How about the stance – haven't I lowered the front too much?

[rallymaster]

Very nice work, and great pics !
IMHO, I don't think you lowered too much the front but not enough the rear !
Car seems a bit high to me...

[eugene78]

Thank you Phil!

I can't lower the rear any more without cutting out the arches, and I would rather keep them intact. If I find thinner tyres, there will be more room for adjustment, of course, but probably I'll have to be happy with this. 80s cars were pretty high, after all.

[zak78]

This is high-quality work! Did you buy the springs, or did you make them yourself out of wire? Regardless, excellent job making something lifelike from this kit. I have two of it and had planned to give them away before seeing your inspirational thread.

[eugene78]

Thank you Zak!

The springs are made from wire, it does not take much time. This particular wire came from an Ethernet cable.

[maj212]

Great work. As you've already pointed out, 80's cars were fairly high so I think the stance is perfectly fine.