The X-Clinic: Two italian ladies - Ferrari 330 P4

First, disassembling both models is rather simple. The undercarriage is only clip-on and only underneath this plastic cover you will find the bolts that hold the 2 half shells together. Already I can tell the plastic parts will be hard to work with cause they are too bendy, which after painted will cause cracks and dificult drilling wholes or cutting bits cleanly:



The quality (and not cheap at all) decals I had custom madefrom Légende Miniatures:



I wasn't very happy with the headlights to begin with and was always going to be one of my focal points (no pun intended). The low and high beams were moulded in one single clear plastic part so I separated each lamp, adjusted the shape of the high beams (which I wraped the rear part in aluminium duct tape to mimick the reflective background) and replaced the low beams with a set of Légende chrome-ringed headlights. Of course, first I resprayed the headlight cluster matt black before gluing all back in:





The original taillights were just completely clear. apparently they thought that, since the body panel underneath was red, it wouldn't make much of a difference... but it does. Sunce I intend to add a reflector behind the lenses, I painted them half orange and half red and added the chrome frame (also made with aluminium duct tape):



Painted the wheels golden and the friction plates for the knock-offs (aluminium for the 0858 and black for the 0856) and added valve stems that I did from 1 mm steel wire. The threads of the 4 "rolling" tyres were sanded down but left the spare tyre intact:









Covered the faces of the brake discs with aluminium duct tape and sanded them lightly so they look used. Brake callipers will be scratchbuilt later:



The rear brake discs I simply sanded the paint all the way untill the metal:





The floor of the cabin was just black plastic, the car has a tub made of aluminium plates riveted on the steel tubular spaceframe so I painted everything in aluminum and took the opportunity to highlight the seats in satin red and the dashboards in matte black. I then highlighted the knobs and buttons on each but nothing all that in depth:





a bit more colour to the radiators, added a mesh on the front part, the water hoses and hose clamps:





Work on the engines has barely begun. Drilled the holes for the twin spark ignition setup and the hole in the wheel arches where the brake cooling ducts will pass.The most complicated thing is yet to come which, in addition to going through all the cabling and piping, is the throttle linkage and the 2 distributors with 12 ignition cables each...



Part of the rear sub-frame has aluminum sheet guards, which in the model was just black plastic. It is now "aluminated" and with the spare tire mounts highlighted in black. It just needs a bit more detail on the 4 coils and connect them to the distributors



The exhaust pipes of the original model have the classic white ceramic coatingm which after removing the mold marks I replicated with matte white paint. A bit of dry fitting to see how they look on the chassis:

Painted black the bonnet rubber seals at the rear:



The roof's inside has also been painted matt black an, a few hours and a lot of Tamiya masking tape later, managed to respray the remainder panels silver:





Just to see how it looks like now:







Here's the engine bonnet painted silver on the inside and the touched-up taillights fitted:







The 330 P4's undercarriage is also covered with a belly pan made out of aluminium sheet, which meant that the black plastic the models originally had needed to suffer the same fate as the other insides of the bodywork panels. I just left out the chassis tube elements as they were and painted the sump with Tamiya aluminium:



A few work done on the font bonnet. In addition to retouching the air intakes to the cabin ventilation (which are the 2 oval intakes at the centre of the bonnet's leading edge), I fiddled a bit with the headlights, of which only the frame and the main beams were used from the original. The turn signals and dipped beam are Légende and the fastening screws are cut-out pin heads:

Wow, quite some soldering work you did there, Peter! I like to see the craftmanship some guys put into their works, I still can't go that far but we learn every day!

Well, a few more updates. The headlights are done and I added the plexiglas fixation bolts (which I did out of pinheads) and painted a small strip red from the inside, which should be a small strip that was part of the front clamshell):



On the inner side, in addition to the aluminium silver painting, I deleted the horizontal bar that joined the two headlight frames together and then added the housings for the main beams, which I made of two shirt buttons:





The coupe's complete bodyshell:





Did the same hing to the spyder's body panels and painted the windshield frame matt black:



A bit of a dry fit on the spyder's interior:



Engine bonnet:



And the spyder's (almost) complete bodywork:



Painted the inside of the door panels matt black and touched up the window frames:





The 4-litre V12 that pulled the 330 P4 had dual ignition and mechanical injection. Thus, each engine carries 2 distributors, 24 ignition cables and 12 fuel injection lines. The ignition wires should ideally be a little thinner but these were the thinnest I got. The distributors are made out of used electronic capacitors (to the electronics guys, please correct me if I'm wrong):



The exhaust heat shields had to be scratchbuilt (the original ones were one piece together with the rear sub-frame), nothing but a little thin plastic, some aluminium tape, a pin and some patience can't solve:



The exhaust manifolds and pipes, of course, were painted matte white to mimic the typical ceramic coating of classic racing Ferraris:



The injection lines came from the cable of an old mobile phone charger (thank you Nokia). It is still necessary to drill the openings of the intake trumpets, to give them a little more depth:



The valve covers and intake manifolds mounted here on the block and the cables and piping put in place:





The coils are already painted red. Only when everything is in its final place do I place the cables that power the distributors:



Engine and gearbox lined up, to see how the complete set looks:

The engine is mostly complete. I bored the intake trumpets and painted the inside matt black and added the alternator on the upper front left-hand side of the engine like on the original car. All cables and pipes ar in place although there are some bits and pieces that can only be added after the engine is asembled on the rear sub-frame. When it's in place, in goes the gearbox and differential and only afterwards I can add the rear anti-roll bar, trailing arms and rear coil-over dampers:



Time to strap in the spare tyre to the rear subframe. Did the bungee ropes from a pouple of strings and bent a few pint into hooks:







Did the "headrests" from a dit of plasticard and added the 5 point safety harness from a Tremonia kit. And yeah, the bolts are just pinheads:





Pretty much all that's missing is the geardhift lever:





Scratchbuilt the front coilover damper units from a couple of old ball pen springs and bits from a destroied computer mouse:





I also scratchbuilt the brake callipers from plasticard and filling putty, sanded all to shape, painted and added the hydraulic lines and flexible hoses. To make the discs metalic surface I used aluminium duct tape and sanded the faces bac a little so that it looses its shine and looks a bit worn:





The front brake and suspension assembly:



The front assembly dry fitted to the chassis. I think I'll use the tip @P A D gave me for the radiator on another future project:



Chassis #0858's rear bonnet had a few elements added like the rear window frame and inner face painted red and blacked-out the 2 air intakes at the trailling edge and side "gills" (for now, I don't have the skills nor the tools to drill them out like Peter did so I'm happy with it as is. It's still missing the small rear adjustable vertical lip spoiler that I'll be fabricating from a fit of plasticard too, it's already polished out and soo will be placing the decals in place:







Chassis #0856's bonnet is also almost finished. Tried to open up the air louvres at the centre but the plastic is so darn maleable I couldn't cut them as precisely as I'd like so... I just resprayed it and it is what it is! All it needs now are the decals:

In the #0858 I added the rearview mirrors from a bit of mirrored plastic (not sure if the miniature originally had them or not but the shrouds are specific to the Le Mans car so I had to add them):




Started to work on the rear axle. Scratchbuilt the brake callipers like at the front axle, added the hydraulic lines and, after spraying the gearbox casing with Tamiya Aluminium Silver, added the oil lines for the gearbox and differential lubrication. All it needs is to at the coilovers and the anti-roll bars once bolted in place:



A detail on the rear brake hydraulic lines, shich are slightly different than at the front. Did at the rear same as with the front disc faces:




The rear setup dry fitted and ready to assemble:




More updates soon. Stay tuned!

Wow, it's been 2 months... darn... Well, they're pretty much finished. Here the steering wheel with the prancing horse decal and added the indicator stack and a few buttons on the dash:



The photoetched pedal box I got from Tremonia, adapted so they could fit underneath the steering column. The throttle pedal is separated and fixed on the ground like on the original car:



0858's interior is finished:









Inside rearview mirror installed, donated by a Maisto Jaguar Mk 2:



I managed to figure out from one or two photos from the car at the 1967 24h of Le Mans that 0858 har, other than the rubber bonnet latches, a leather strap to keep the bonnet shell closed. So, I cut one off and added the photoetched buckles (left over from another Tremonia kit):



Ready to assemble:



After applying a set of custom decals (the first larger decals I ever put on a model), they're pretty much finished:











The rear spoiler made out of plasticard with the adjusting screws made of small pins. I actually redid the strap with synthetic leather cause the natural I had was too degraded and it just tore apart::











The number lighting on the door sides. In all the photos I've seen from the race, the #0858 only really has lighting on the left-hand side, whereas in the May test it had both the doors and the rear hood. I don't know exactly the reason for the difference but I chose to keep it exactly as it was in the race (in this aspect, even the Amalgam is incorrect):



Painted the inner axle peg solver to try and disguise the whole on the knock-offs. Not the ideal solution and I'm still thinking of plugging the hole completely:

I simulated the rivets with which the rearview mirrors were attached to the bonnet on #0858. I will be buying some sticker chrome rivets for a better look:



I removed the rubber latches the model originally (and incorretly) had to close the front clamshell. Originally, the car uses flat head bolts to keep the clamshell in place. Therefore, I covered the holes with small pin heads that I think look OK. Also added the tyre callibration weights with a bit of aluminium tape:



On the reference photos i found of #0858 at the 1967 24h of Le Mans, I noticed the fixation of the plexiglass headlight covers was made with a kind of metal clamps bolted to the covers so I did those with a bit of aluminium tape and the smallest pin heads I could find (which aren't all that small). Maybe will be swapping them later:



I replaced the windshield wiper blades with ptohoetched ones that I got from Tremonia. Also painted chrome the base of the wiper stem on the #0856 as seen on the original car:



Removing the front clamshells one can see the revised radiator (I did the core with plastic mesh sprayed matt black but I just found a nice photoetched radiator-pattern mesh that I'll be replacing these with) and the cockpit ventilation and brake coling ducts:



#0856' sfront clamshell. I applied 3 layers of clear coat over the Ferrari badge so that it has a glossy finish and protrudes over the number decal:


The cockpit ventilation ducts (upper, thiner and smooth ones) were done of 4 mm electrical wire insulation tube with the core bored out so that the walls are thiner. The brake ducts were made of thin copper wire wrapped tightly around a thick tube and afer removing this, moulded into position and then painted with a thick layer of matt black Tamiya paint. For me this is the solution that I found to produce the best results on reproducing braided hose:





The finished engines:



#0856. The rear brake cooling ducts were made with the same technique I used for the front units. I also added the rear suspension trailing arms, the coil-over damper units, anti-roll bars and respective control arms. Only after the entire rear sub-frame and drivetrain are in place I connected the coils to their respective distributors:



#0858's engine. Same thing:



#0856's cockpit. I'm soon receiving a donour central rearview mirror but I can close the car since access is easy. I replaced the gearshift lever with a thinner one, made from a pin and the original knob:







#0858's cockpit. Pretty much the same work done in #0856 but since it's easier to access the cockpit before closing the car up, I attached the rearview mirror I had on this:





The finished undercarriage. It surelly won't look remotely as good as @P A D's but Still I think it looks way better than before. On this view one can see the coi-overs better an the added oil filter on the engine's right-hand side:



I will be making a complete photoshoot on these two real soon.

Hi Peter!

Thank you for your words. I guess there's still some room for improvements but that's what modelling (or, in this case, more like a hybrid modelling-detailing) is all about: constantly improving. There are some things that I wish I got better (like the look on the seats or the intake trumpets) and probably some things I might redo in the future. For example, I've got an old 312 P from the old Shell Collezione (the shape of the mould is terrible but I'd have to sell a kidney or two to buy the magnificent GMP) that I decided to work on back in 2013. Detailed the engine, did my first reupholstering on the interior and I was pleased... but not for long. Since then I think I might've reopened the car at least 3 times do tweak this and that and I'm as pleased as I could be with it (mould shape incorrection not withstanding) but that doesn't mean I won't be opening it again!

Regarding the switch on the dashboard, indeed it's not presentt on pretty much none of the 330 P4's photos but I got this photo of 0858 on the 1967 24h of Le Mans where that switch is clearly present:

It's function? That's a very good question. It does have a function (cause in some photos of the 0856 I've found that toggle switch has a label, could be a secondary oil pump switch or something.



I know the scale on the air valves isn't accurate but I decied to use this for a number of reasons: first, cause it's a detail that adds a better look of detail but I was limited to what I had to work with; besides that, looking at the wheels, they don't seem to be all that off-scale so I'm happy with those. Also, 1 mm was the thinner drill bit I had so it fits snug in the rim. I saw those valves you said and I just might try ones of those some time on future projects. As for the rivets, I was going to get some from Spot Model but they were out of stock and the foresight for having them back in stock was like late december so I'll get them later on.

Don't be modest, your's won't be "remotely as good" it will be "much, much better" than any effort I could make. Looking forward to see the finished job!

Here are the outside photos. Greetings from sunny southern Portugal! First, the factory 330 P4, chassis #0858 with which Ludovico Scarfiotti and Mike Parkes managed to take the absolutely gorgeous berlinetta to 2nd place at the 1967 24h of Le Mans, which was won by A.J. Foyt and Dan Gurney with the latest Ford GT40 Mk IV... 4 laps ahead!

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And here is chassis #0856 as it ran the 6h of Brands Hatch (which with Ludovico Scarfiotti and Peter Sutcliffe behind the wheel finished 5th) and nowadays is owned by Lawrence Stroll:

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