sico24

I'd love to see that front view photo! In the old days, pit/paddock access was so easy.................................. Yes I did get the Haynes Manual. It was very useful too - especially the chapter "Anatomy of the Lotus 49". More colour photos than Michael Oliver as well although the Chassis by Chassis was maybe not as detailed. Again, it's a good idea to see if it can be bought cheaper than list price (I think I got mine on ebay) Simon

Wonderful photo Chris - were you there? I think this was Chassis 49/R5 if it was Race of Champions 1968. It was actually the first race appearance of this car on 17th March 1968 according to Michael Oliver. BUT although it was in Lotus John Player colours, it was still a Lotus 49 at this point. It retired from the race (driveshaft yoke) and then was rebuilt as prototype 49B and then scored 'an easy win' at Monaco on 26th May. I can strongly recommend Michael Oliver's book, especially if you can get it at a reasonable price. I also used internet sources and photos to help such as

Re Black badges; This is from lotuselan.net (https://lotuselan.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=36&t=23875&start=) "We spoke with Graham Arnold at Lotus Owners Gathering (something or other) where he was the main speaker for the event. May have been LOG 14 or who knows. I have been to more then 20 of those events and the numbers run into each other after a while. Anyways, I have posted before that he told me and a few others that were there, and I don;t recall who they were so i cannot contact them for verification, that one day he noticed that he was running out of badges. So he just put out a few bids for the replacement. The cheapest one that came back was for a black badge. Now, Arnolds words as I recall were something like, "so i told the old man that they were cheaper to boot, and of course he really liked that". I have told this many times and every time i do , I still get arguments that the badges were something special. Maybe we can finally put this one to rest." This completely backs up the story that I heard from Graham Arnold too (might even have been the same meeting). Simon

Thanks - it was a great project and I really enjoyed doing it. Without Michael Oliver's wonderful book I couldn't have done it, although that did encourage OCD at times!

A few more..

Some detailed views

Hi All I have put the photos from my Tamiya Lotus 49B build in the work in progress forum. So now here are the photos of the finished car!

I think that's everything, so I'll give you a taster of the finished model (more photos in the completed forum). All in all I think it took me about 9 months to do. I used Tamiya spray paints for the large areas (Red and White) and airbrushed Humbrol enamel for other parts (engine, gold stripe on body, radiator, exhausts etc). I hope you enjoyed the build - please let me know if you have any thoughts. On to the next kit...... a 1969 Tamiya Matra MS11 bought yesterday.

Finally I needed a Black Badge to go on the nose. The kit only comes with a yellow one, so once again I fouind a pitcture of the correct black one in the interweb, reduced it and then laminated it. There were also some black badges on Lotuis production cars (e.g. I had one on my 1968 Europa S2) and the myth is that these were made to commemorate the death of Jim Clark. However, I went to a Lotus show around 2000 and heard Graham Arnold (ex Lotus Sales Director) say that this was not true - they just changed the design and needed to use them up before the next order.

Interior Like on my Lotus 49, I used an old leather glove for the seat. On the 49, there were quilted padded sides to the cockpit so I hand-stitched (I don't have a sewing machine) some lines to represent the quilting lines. I also did the wires behind the dashboard as they can be seen through the 'slot' windscreen. And the gearknob had a yellow top and the yellow Lotus decal was added to the steering wheel centre

Side water pipe Again, as in the Lotus 49 I used some 5/32 inch aluminium tubing for the water pipe that runs on the side of the tub. But it also had to be fitted very carefully into the nosecone as the gaps are much smaller than the 49 (and the suspension is different). So thisis how it ended up.

Exhaust pipes The exhaust manifolds and pipes on the 49B were black instead of the white of the 49. Again you can see the water pumps and oil filter etc on the sides of the bottom of the engine

Rear of the Body Tub Just like on my Lotus 49 build I needed to put the brake lines on the back of the tub. There are no photos in the book for this in the Lotus 49B so I just replicated those for the 49 as shown in this photo; To get this You can also see the channels at the bottom of the tub in this view

Brake Discs (rotors) and Calipers The brake discs are slightly different on the 49B so again I used some parts from the 72 kit. Also, like my previous build on the Lotus 49, I had to build the other half of the calipers as the kit only comes with one half. These are available but again cost money, so I built my own from plasticard.

So that's all the major changes needed. But there are some others too; Wheels The wheels for the 49B were different to the 49. Once again the kit had the old wheels so I needed to change them. The perfect solution would have been to buy the correct ones online but they are very expensive (over £50 I think) although good quality. So I decided to modify the originals by including the inner bolt ring from the Lotus 72 wheels (the actual wheels were completely the wrong size). I carefully separated these and the g;lued them into the original wheels; Result; It's not ideal (as the inner profile hasn't changed as it should) but for the cost it's Ok and actually looks better on the model than this photo