The new Fly Ferrari 250 GTO is one of their best, with fine detail, smooth finish, and great lines. There are delicate grilles beneath the transparent hood scoops, true to the actual cars. Hood latches are photo etched. Yellow discs were placed on the doors of this car at Le Mans, 1962, to alert rescue crews to the aluminum bodywork.
The Fly GTO compares well to the old standard Revell GTO, grandfather to the Pink Kar version. Fly model is better detailed, shows better curves, but has minor errors.
From the rear, the Fly car shows more curvaceous lines, in keeping with the timeless Ferrari design. Old Revell tail lights look better when painted, though. Fly tail lights resemble LEDs poking through the body.
From the side, Fly scores again with full body lines and deeper side panels, but nose-high attitude of Fly is evident.
To drop the nose of the body, nearly 1/16" is trimmed from the two front (red plastic) body posts, and the same amount is removed from the headlight crossbar mounts (black plastic). Without lowering the headlight crossbar, the nose cannot drop. A clearance hole for the rear drive shaft bearing is cut between the seats, and the floor of the interior pan is cut away. The underside of the seats are filed to allow the body and interior to settle down onto the chassis. A slab of lead is taped under the rear deck to help the 70 gram car hook up a little better on the wood track. The guide is shimmed .030" to bring it deeper into the slot. These changes make the car driveable without its magnet.
With body lowered, the Fly car compares favorably to the older car. Now the front wheels are where they belong in the arches.
Rear tires measure a full 12" wide. The actual '62 GTO's had tires no more than 9 inches wide (7.00x15 size). Even the front tires are too wide for the rear. Although this error is not apparent from the side, it is anachronistic, and just plain wrong for the car. These fat tires belong on a 1967 or later car; the markings on this Ferrari are of an actual 1962 Le Mans contestant.
Replacement wheels by BWA, custom turned with a dropped center to take Ortmann repro Monogram rear tires (correct scale size) are lined up for eventual use on the Fly car. And I should point out that the plastic Fly axle bearings are a good fit on the axle, with almost no slop.
Another Revell GTO, with rocker panels extended slightly downward, and reworked side vents fore and aft, shows off its BWA wheels, Ortmann tires, and BWA inserts. These are a better representation of the actual GTO wheels and tires than the Fly wheels and tires.
No model is perfect, but the Fly Ferrari GTO is a fine model, and can be easily corrected in minor ways to be even better.
We received a batch of muscle cars from Carrera to test out. I decided to see how they stack up on plastic and wood tracks, so I enlisted the help of my buddy Reckless Racer to put these cars through their paces. First, we ran them on his 75' Sport track. Later, the cars were raced on a 135' Ogilvie wood track with copper braid. We were interested to see how the cars ran with and without magnatraction.
The fastest on Sport tracke was the Fast and Furious Mustang. This car lapped our Sport test track in 7.35s. This Mustang features a new chassis which is different from the yellow Mustang in this test. It would be a good challenger against a Scalextric Mustang or Camaro. It lapped the Ogilvie wood track in 10.4s, or fourth fastest. The Mustang also features working headlights and taillights. The headlights are of the blueish "xenon" LED variety. There's some spill through the bodywork of this car, but the lights are certainly bright enough to drive the car in the dark with.
The second fastest-car on Sport was this black Dodge Charger with pimpin' spinner wheels. I have to admit that this car kinda grew on me. The red stripe across the rear flank of the car is a nice touch. This Charger lapped the Sport test track in 7.43s and was second-fastest on the Ogilvie at 9.9s. The long wheelbase made for a controllable car on the wood track.
Third fastest on the Sport track was the old-school Dodge Charger street car. I love the look of the wheels on this car as they're not too shiny. The yellow Charger lapped our mag track in 7.63s and was a respectable third on the Ogilvie track, lapping it in 10.0s.
Fourth fastest car on the mag track was the Plymouth Superbird, lapping it at 7.65 seconds. On the Ogilvie, this car was slowest with a lap time of 10.5 s. The top-heavy nature of the Carrera muscle cars made them difficult to push too hard in the curves. The rear wing is easily detachable on this model so it's not likely to get damaged if the car is raced.
Fifth fastest on the Sport track, but quickest around the Ogilvie was this Shelby Mustang. It lapped the mag track in 7.82s, almost half a second slower than the Fast and Furious Mustang. On the wood track it was half a second clear of the field lapping at 9.4s.
Slowest on the Sport, and second slowest on the Ogilvie, the pimpin' Pontiac GTO brought up the rear. The Goat managed 8.08s on the mag track and 10.4s on the wood. The metallic red paint on this car was beautiful and really set off the chrome.
Recently I've been on the lookout for cars to populate my track, the San Francisco Grand Prix, over the past year I've found a selection of cars that fit that motif very well.
I picked this one up at a car show in Norwalk Conn. for only $5.00! Since then I've seen this for sale on eBay for over $10.00..guess I got a deal, well sort of anyway. It's a really pretty nice Grumman mail truck, it's sort of on the large side but that's fine. It sits at one end of the track as a kind of space filler anyway.
The lowrider I've shown before. I bought this one at WalMart for $12.00...which is an personal high-water mark for diecast purchases until recently. The name of the company that produced this escapes me now. I had the box for a while, which had the website of the company on it. But I checked the URL listed and it didn't work. I guess they went out of business, which is a shame this is a really cool car IMO.
1. Is the construction "bullet proof". Meaning do you see any obvious flaws in your construction? If you see something that needs work, then that's probably the first thing that will break.
