DocRob

I achieved some important progress today, marrying the engine and the frame. Luckily casting precision and design is very good and I had only a little wiggling to do, while join the numerous connection points of the engine bearing plates to the engine.
The frame itself needed some bending, to accept the engine, which I did before painting. The cast material is durable but easy to bend an very good to work with, luckily. 






 

Cheers Rob

12 hours ago, Egilman said:

Here is a pic of the left side of Crocker engine # 36 61 8, a 61ci with hemi heads built in 1936 and recently restored... it is the eighth engine manufactured by Crocker... Point/coil ignition it clearly shows where the original coil is located and where the shielded coil wire runs on the original bike...

Clearly it is mounted as far away from the plugs as it can get... to the rear of the seat post below the seat, in front and above the battery... You can even see the ignition wire that runs down from the tank mounted switch....

I have a few more pics of this bike, it is a small tank early version but the engine is the same...

There was only 33 of these engines built before they changed the design to something visibly different...

 

MFH probably ran that wire to the closest point to make it disappear rather than to it's correct point... Or what they modeled is a different engine than the 61....

 

the only thing I can think of...

 

Hope it helps..

 

UPDATE: I started a search on this kit and the various examples of it being built, unfortunately the stock builds of the kit do not show an ignition coil in the kit.... there were two versions of the coil used on the Crocker ignition bikes,,, the early small tank versions, 2 gal gas tank) show a sideways coil like the above pic and the later large tank versions, (3 gal tank) show a coil that is shorter and fatter facing fore and aft in orientation... All mounted to the seat post above the battery....

 

I guess  MFH missed it....

Oops, I missed the start of a new page and the even more detailed information, Egilman, thanks for that. I studied a lot of pictures from various Crockers and all seem to be different in details, specially the ignition system. I cannot tell, which of them are original or have been modified later. The condenser coil seemed to have been all over the place, in front of the engine, under the tank and like on your pic behind the engine, which I haven´t seen before on my pictures.
When I look for the MFH pictures of the ´Small tank´ model, there are lots of differences to the later ´Big tank´ version. Like on your pic, the coil is mounted behind the seat post. The later big tank allowed to hide the coil under said tank.

Cheers Rob

17 hours ago, CDW said:

If there is a distributor there must be a coil and a coil wire to the distributor.

15 hours ago, Egilman said:

It's a Crocker 60cc engine, late model, it carried a point/condenser ignition, the center wire is a coil wire.... The coils of that era were usually a box mounted somewhere on the frame usually above the spark plugs....

 

Up under the wings of the gas tank was a common spot... 

 

And yes the Crocker had a mechanical spark advance on the magneto mounted engines... It was controlled by the left handgrip and needed constant adjustment, ie. there was no "zero" point you kick started it in full retard and adjusted it on the fly... It took some skill to ride a Crocker... But they were the fastest thing on two wheels of that era...

 

Crocker had an open offer to pay anyone that was beat by a Harley or Indian on the race track, he never had to make any payments to anyone....

Muchas gracias amigos, you solved the mystery to a classic bike noob like me. The Crockers were hand built and all a bit different in the end. Some examples show said coil mounted onto the frame visibly in front of the engine, with others it´s hidden under the tank.

I think Egilman is referring to the 61 cubic inches or about 1000 ccm leading to about 65 hp.

27 minutes ago, CDW said:

Maybe the wire 7 lead to the coil under the tank and out of view?

Does the bike have a battery?

That´s a possibility Craig and yes the Crocker has a battery.

Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig, 

I think, the wire you refer to is shown in the manual in green It ends at the handlebar. The yellow one with the section 7 reference on the lower pic is the one in question, it´s the same like the yellow one in the upper drawing, labeled section 4.

Cheers Rob

I have one question for the classic bike experts. Which function has the marked wire, which leads from the distributor to the area of the tank. The other two are the ignition wires, but the third cable, I have no idea of the function. The MFH manual doesn´t show either. The cable just ends under/in the tank area.



Cheers Rob

After airbrushing the frame with Tamiya LP-1 gloss black, I continued with the engine. I added the carburetor and some fuel lines, which are hard to reach later. The engine is more or less finished now and will be mounted into the frame next.


 

Cheers Rob

I built up the frame from it´s various parts, which again included lots of drilling and leafing through the manual, to see, which diameter is needed for a hole and what´s going in. Luckily the precision of the casting is fantastic and there are only minimal irritations in the parts.

Here is a mock up with the engine mounted into the frame. Meanwhile said frame is primed and the missing carburetor parts got airbrushed.





Cheers Rob

The bike looks absolutely fantastic, Tim. I really like, how you nailed the materials appearance of everything. The paint has the right shine as have the different metals and dullness is where it belongs. Hard to achieve, but great to look at, congratulations.

Cheers Rob

Impressive work Egilman, I hope your CAD development will be put to reality, when ready. Like you, I learned pen and paper construction in my early days as an engineer, but I never converted to CAD other than producing early day 3D-animations.
Your re-engineering is fascinating to follow, I only recently learned, that Model Factory Hiro designs their kits only from pictures very often as well.

Cheers Rob

On 5/28/2024 at 12:10 AM, gsdpic said:

Any interest out there in a build log for another Tamiya 1/12th scale F1 car?

Absolutely Gary, these veneer Tamiya kits are a bit of a mixed bag, quality wise, like I encountered with my recent Renault RE20 Turbo build. With a bit of extra work, they will look very good in the end. I also changed a lot of the Tamiya tubing with finer tubes from MFH and braided lines, which looked more realistic. For my future Brabham BT44 build, I added some MFH funnels and other details to the highly visible engine.
These decals must be pretty old, I would test them before applying them to the model.

Cheers Rob

The last building sequence was a bit fiddly, with wiring the spark plugs with tiny etched parts and micro rivets, followed by the distributor, which consists of about 20 parts, a lot need to be pre drilled for various installments. There are two variants and I chose the more complicated. The magneto has a fewer parts count, but looks odd and the pictures I have of the real bike always have the distributor installed. I prepared the wires, but add them later, when the engine meets the frame.

 



And that´s how tiny the distributor is, you find it on the left side of the engine, lower middle.



Cheers Rob

I added more details to the engine and also prepared the distributor. Drilling the tiny oil tube connectors proved tricky. They need to be drilled to accept the oil tubing made from solder wire.
Most of the screws shown on the casings are separate parts and also need to be pre drilled and then inserted. The manual suggests to add the oil tubes next, but I will do it later, because handling the still not finished engine would be a nightmare with the soft wiring on. Luckily the places for the tubing should be reachable later.
I also added some dots of black panel wash here and there to enhance contrasts.




 

Cheers Rob

1 hour ago, CDW said:

Did the tumbler come with two sizes of pins, or are those purchased separately? In the ads I've seen for the unit, did not see the options for pin size selection/purchase. it simply says it comes with pins, not stating size.

Exactly Craig, most of the polishing tumblers include a bag of non specified steel pins. Mine, the only one which could be shipped to my place after a lot of effort included none and  had to purchase them separately.

Cheers Rob

3 hours ago, Canute said:

What is the media used in the tumbler. I have an ultrasonic cleaner and a tumbler I use for cleaning cartridge brasses. The ultrasonic uses several liquids depending on the task. The media tumbler uses a variety of cleaning/polishing media, like corncobs and walnut hulls.

I use only the 0,3 mm steel pins, water and a drop of detergent. There are polishing fluids around, but I haven´t tested these. The non magnetic white metal parts are relatively unmoved in the magnetic tumbler, which helps avoiding scratches due to impact of the parts. Only the steel pins swirl around and do their polishing job.
I tried a simple rotating tumbler as well, filled with water and tiny steel balls. The surfaces were shinier with that treatment, but you loose sharpness of details and the steel balls don´t reach in all the tiny crevices.

Cheers Rob

4 hours ago, CDW said:

I love your choice of subject here, a MFH kit in particular. I've had my eye on that same tumbler for a while now but never decided to purchase it. Your show of how well it works has helped me clearly see its value. Trying to clean up all those tiny parts by hand would be a monstrous task. I first got the idea of the tumbler by watching a fellow who builds MFH kits on YouTube. He suggested it in his builds. 

What will you use as a cement for the metal parts of the kit?

 

PS: one other question about that tumbler...how long does it take for the parts to clean up?

Thank you Craig, the tumbler indeed helped a lot, specially for a kit like the Crocker, where many parts will be left without painting or even be polished later for a realistic chrome effect. 
You can toy a bit with the diameter of the steel pins, I bought some with 0,6mm and 0,3 mm diameter and used 200 gram of the latter. The tumbling process needs to be supervised. I tumbled about an hour, but you have to find a balance, between nice surfaces as a result and not losing sharpness in tiny details like boltheads on the other side.
I recommend wearing rubber gloves, while handling the parts after tumbling, you will be astonished, how black the water will be, and I guess, it´s not too healthy either.
I also got the magnetic tumbler suggestion through videos and build logs too.

Cheers Rob

The engine is on it´s way and it is a bit fiddly, but due to great engineering and tight tolerances manageable. Adding all the V-shaped cylinder parts proved tricky, when the rocker came into play and the connecting tube (carburetor) needed to be added at the same time. Unfortunately, I mis-orientated this part and had to pry it loose later, which was no fun at all and caused some spots for later touch ups.





Cheers Rob

Well, first building steps are prepared. Note to myself, test fit often and understand the manual, specially where parts need to be drilled. I don´t know about the MFH car kits, but with the Crocker engine parts there are dozens of holes to be drilled and some are hard to reach in later stages.

The foot pedal and drill stand for my Proxxon mini drill help a lot to make the job faster. The good thing with drilling white metal, there is nearly no burr to be removed.

The engine block, with one cylinder mostly mounted, showing the parts of the other:



Mock assembly for test fitting of one cylinder. The ribs and heads are actually removed and primed and will be sprayed semi matte black later.





Cheers Rob

3 hours ago, Canute said:

This reminds me of a TV show I used to watch, Orange County Choppers. They did custom build theme bikes. I'll be following along, too, Rob.

Well, I´m not much into the chopper thing, Ken. Personally, I prefer European bikes for European roads, they just perform better. My last one was a KTM 950 SM, the last one with carburetors. This thing drove like a sharp blade, but with the handling of a bicycle. Perfect for ultra fast city commuting, alpine roads, just everything below 200 km/h, because there was no windshield. Even week trips were no problem with the furious KTM. I loved that beast, but left it in Berlin, when I went to my island and promised my wife not to drive motorcycles anymore. Well, now it´s mountainbiking .
 

Cheers Rob

Your Dino came out fantastic, Gary. Somehow, I missed your log, but read it now. These veneer Fujimi kits seam to be a very good base. I´m in the middle of their 1/20 McLaren MP4/6 and found the kit lacking in many aspects, very disappointing, but not unfixable.

Cheers Rob

Today, I spent some exhausting hours to sort the parts, mainly the white metal cast ones, as they are the most numerous.

I made it a two step affair, first using the parts layout prints from the MFH homepage, to check if everything is there. These photos of the parts are especially helpful, as they are scaled and this helps to identify the parts.

In the second step, I sorted the parts into a plastic box with different sized trays, ordered after the steps in the manual. The tiny parts, like screws and bolts, I left out, as they are easier identified separately. Tomorrow, I will add resin and rubber parts along with screws, nuts and bolts.
 

Cheers Rob

7 hours ago, yvesvidal said:

Great kit and great subject. I will follow, if you don't mind.

Good to have you along, Yves. I´m sure, sooner or later, I will have a lot of questions about how to work with this kind of kits, so be prepared .

Cheers Rob

13 hours ago, gsdpic said:

Thanks for doing this build log.  I've been curious about the MFH kits but never really looked into them, so will be interesting to see how it goes together.   I am tempted by some of their 1/12th scale F1 cars.

Same with me for a long time, Gary. I often looked for the MFH kits, watched build logs with fascination and then there was the Crocker, hitting all my buttons.
The F1 cars in large scale are really tempting. I had the luck two weeks ago, to lay my hand on one of the 200 limited Williams FW16 ´Senna ´Edition, which hopefully will arrive next week. They started to sell at 7:00 pm JST on the seventh of May and a quarter of an hour later, there was a message, all have been sold, so I´m overly happy to have scored one.

Cheers Rob

13 hours ago, Egilman said:

Gorgeous Kit, MFH has been at the top of the kit engineering world for a couple of years now, the only problem for me is the price... Ordering even one tends to deplete the bank account for quite a while....

 

I'm down for this, we seldom see the classic american stuff even scratchbuilt, to have someone actually producing kits... This has to be modeling heaven....

Good to have you along, Egilman. I am absolutely no expert when it comes to classic American bikes, except, that I rode some, I borrowed from friends. 
The price tag is daunting, indeed, but you receive a lot of quality for it. I will see, how this build turns out, to figure out, how many of the MFH kits will find their way into my stash. So far it´s three and one in the mail.
Like you said, MFH can´t be praised enough for their portfolio of rare subjects produced as kits. You sure got the feeling, there is a lot of passion involved.

Cheers Rob

Great progress with the big cat, Craig. The engineering of the AMK jet kits is fantastic and the fit of their MIG-31 kit was perfect, even on the most complicated parts, like the intakes. The only issue, I had with the kit, were the bang seats, which were horribly out of scale. I hope this is not the case with yours.

The pic shows the kit seat on the right, to the left is a seat from a Brassin refined SU-27 kit and in the middle is the seat with pilot, I used, I guess it was made by Aerobonus.



Cheers Rob