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NWarty

Sometimes it's just dumb luck. Martini Porsche 935 content inside

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Hey guys,

It's been almost 10 years since I last posted here at TC. I still have my Midnight Pumpkin and she's still running strong after many years, but something happened this past weekend that was just pure, dumb luck.

Walking into the Hobby Shop, I needed a new battery for the Pumpkin and some foam-safe CA for my Parkzone Mosquito. In the corner of the shop was a cardboard box with a post-it note taped to it that said "Free donation to whoever wants it". I peeked inside. Inside in pieces was a 1/12 Tamiya Martini Porsche 935 Turbo. I asked the guy at the counter "Are you serious? Nobody's wanted this thing?". He says "Well, a lady dropped it off and we have one guy who said he'd pick it up next week if no one claimed it". I jumped on it like stink on you-know-what

I gasped...I couldn't believe what I was looking at. The body was in shambles, but it had a Futaba two-stick radio from 1979 as confirmed by the serial number, all servos, but no battery. I took it home and began to tear apart the body and repair it. The right A-pillar was completely destroyed, there was no glass. Nose, body, tail, doors were all broken, but it was all fixable. I plopped in eight AA batteries into the transmitter and it fired right up. Put four batteries in the BEC at the rear of the car. Turned the radio on (it powered right up) and hit the off/on switch at the rear of the car. IT'S ALIVE!!!!! Steering servo and speed controller servo both work properly! There's no power to the motor yet, since I'll have to have CheapBatteryPacks.com build me a custom pack with a male connector.

The entire body has been put back together and epoxied at the seams. Right A-pillar has been rebuilt with styrene sheet, rod and strip (I'm a scale model builder so this was easy). May have to scratch build a passenger mirror and windshield wiper. The front fog light cover on the right side is cracked, no biggie, but I'll coat them in Future floorwax to really bring them back to life. In all honesty, I can't believe the front tow hook has actually survived after 30+ years.

The wheels have been painted, body primed. Puttied the A-pillar and got it looking fantastic. Honestly, you can't tell it was every broken. Front wheels done in chrome with gold mesh. Doing some final sanding tonight, then shooting the first coat of color. Spent three hours last night sanding and polishing the aluminum chassis. Turned out gorgeous smile.gif Also zip-tied all the wires together neatly and tucked away. Repaired the antenna wire and heat-shrank the splice.

Gotta source some new decals or make my own. Also, finding glass will be impossible some I'm going to go the polycarbonate/thermoforming route. My custom battery is en route from CheapBatteryPacks.com, so she should be moving under her own power by this weekend. Super excited to get this 34-year old vintage pan car back to life and on the road!

Some photos from what she looked like when I bought her home to last night.

Thanks for looking guys and any advice is greatly appreciated!

- Blake

Sorry for the crummy iphone photos

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Thanks Mark!

Still trying to figure out the glass pieces. Looking into bashing a lexan body and using templates to get the shapes correct. Shouldn't be too difficult.

Also, need to find the graphics for the decals in order to print my own.

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Thanks Percy,

I was just able to source a Tamtech GT-01 Martini Body set 40164. Woohoo! This will give me the fiddly bits I'm missing like the passenger mirror, driver and most importantly, the decal sheet. I can also chop out the lexan windows to retrofit onto the original styrene shell.

Another thing to point out is the roof antenna. I know a lot of 58002's here don't have them. It was mounted this way when I took her home. To me, it doesn't detract from the look much as I plan to run her and not let her grace the shelf too much :)

I'll take some better photos tonight of the cleaned up and polished chassis with my good digital camera.

-Blake

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What an excellent find, and your model-building skills really brought it back to life!

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That's just amazing, and the car is lucky for finding it's way into your hands. Nice work on the restoration.

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Thank you much guys and I'm incredibly humbled to be able to even take care of this car.

Some better shots of the chassis and body after three coats of gloss white. Missing a couple of chassis screws and nuts and will need to source those too. But REALLY happy with how this is turning out.

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What a fantastic story and a great resto job! Thank you for sharing this. I love this car. I'm not lucky enough to own an original but I do have the Tamiya 1/12th plastic kit (original) that is partly built.

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What a score! I'm not jealous at all... <_<

Lovely job on bringing it back to life...

One mans rubbish is another mans treasure as they say...

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What a find, congrats!!! That looks like the same shell as Tamiya's 1/12 static model. The glass is easy to find as well as decals. I might have spare "glass" Ill check tonight.

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GTodd,

That would be absolutely fantastic! Thank you sir ;)

No worries on the decals as the TamTech body is en route from Japan and Myles (Tamiyoman) is looking too if I need an extra set.

-Blake

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Reading and reading and reading around the forums has really stirred up the nostalgia in me. Although I really didn't make a proper introduction, I thought I'd do so.

I come from a family of modelers. My grandfather started his first kits (aircraft) in the 1930's, my Dad in the 1950's and me in the 1980's.

My first Tamiya car was a Wild One given to me at Christmas in 1986. It was equipped with a Futaba Magnum Jr. and OEM hump pack. I spent the next two days, huddled in my Dad's workshop, building the kit, painting the body and installing everything myself. I was 11 years old at the time and had already built a ton of models at this point. I ran the bejesus out of that car for two years.

In 1987, I upgraded to an AE RC10 and ran it with a Parma Eagle body. I built that one too at 12 years old. That then turned into a Kyosho Optima. My Dad bought an AE RC12 later that year and started to get into road racing. I too was immediately hooked. We moved onto MRP 10's and then to Bolink Eliminator 10's in 1988 and raced competitively in Cahokia, Illinois for a couple of years. The last car my Dad and I worked on was an AE RC8. It was an incredibly exciting time in R/C Racing. Motor/ESC/Radio technology was growing leaps and bounds. Tire goop and a heat gun, those were fun times :)

I moved to Atlanta, GA. in 1988 and fell out of racing. It had gotten too expensive and road racing was non-existent (oval track racing was king, bleh...). We sold all of our old stuff off.

Fast forward to my first deployment to the middle east in 2003. There was a Lieutenant Colonel on the post that had put together a R/C racing club. Tower Hobbies generously donated the equipment. 10 Midnight Pumpkins, batteries, radios, chargers and spare parts for all 10 of them. Each truck was done up in NASCAR colors so that the LTC could easily pick them out (well, plus he was from Tennessee). I decided to buy my own Pumpkin and did it up in Terry Labonte "Tony the Tiger" colors. Slapped an ESC and oil dampers on it and proceeded to whip my fellow soldiers a new one :D

A buddy had shown me his Losi Mini-T and I instantly fell in love with it too. Bought one, tore it apart dozens of times and slapped every graphite and aluminum upgrade I could find for it. Outfitted in a Baja Beetle body painted like the beloved Sand Scorcher and dropped a Castle Creations brushless motor in it. And once again, returning home after my trip to the sandbox, I fell out of R/C again. Only this time, I kept the Pumpkin as I knew they had stopped making them.

Fast forward to last week and you get the rest of the saga with my Martini 935.

So that's my story, my name is Blake and I live in Washington State and I'm an scale modeler/airplane/heli guy too ;) Currently working on a Trumpeter 1/350 CVN-68 Nimitz which is nearing completion.

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Great reading so far Blake, the 935 was actually my first experience of a Tamiya alas it wasn't mine, it belonged to a much older kid whose mum used to look after me during the holidays. I used to watch him drive it up and down the road and from that moment on I knew I had fallen for all things RC. Can't wait to see your completed car, loving your work so far mate!

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For nostalgia sakes and because they were cool, I present you the Midnight Pumpkin racing crew, my Pumpkin and my Mini-T. Photos from 2004 :)

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Im soryy, th enight got away from me last night and I forgot to check for the "glass" I will tonight! Promise!

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Im soryy, th enight got away from me last night and I forgot to check for the "glass" I will tonight! Promise!

No worries GTodd;)

And thanks Nick, good to see ya over here ;)

Nothing much to report other than spraying the red strip on the front valance last night and cleaning up the fog lights a bit. Also cleaned up the 3-speed MSC by repainting the spring and outer metal ring in Satin Black.

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Really cool to hear it went to an enthusiast and not some punk kid that would try to take it off some sweet jumps lol!

Always good to hear someone elses RC history too. I hope you realise that you are back in for good now, one little vintage 935 isn't going to whet your appetite :lol:;)

( I now envision a rere wild one, midnight pumpkin..... *ahem* )

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Really cool to hear it went to an enthusiast and not some punk kid that would try to take it off some sweet jumps lol!

Always good to hear someone elses RC history too. I hope you realise that you are back in for good now, one little vintage 935 isn't going to whet your appetite :lol:;)

( I now envision a rere wild one, midnight pumpkin..... *ahem* )

berman,

Yep, I've been eye-ballin' a rere WO and have a bid in on an original Grasshopper (new built with an Acoms). :D The Grasshopper for now as my school friend had one when I lived in southern Florida when I was 10 years old, which really ignited the R/C bug in me several months before I got the Wild One.

The Pumpkin was cleaned up this past week before I got the 935 and all the scratches and dings in the paint were filled. It's stil running on its original MSC but it's a runner so I should at some point upgrade to an ESC. And since I could never afford an original Avante as a kid, I have a Takara/Tomy/Spinmaster Q-Steer Avante and Hornet too :P

Maybe you guys can point me in the right direction, but I'm missing two (2) 2mm x 4mm round head screws and two (2) nuts. Does anyone know what parts bag may be compatible?

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Ive got: front and rear glass, light buckets, the cover for the light buckets, left window, left rear 1/4 window and the rear glass. It is yours just pay shipping. Its from the first model i built as a kid, I dont need it.

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Sorry for the crummy pics guys. My wife took our good digital camera to her classroom for a project.

Anyways, decided to do lettering on one tire. The front left. It's worn pretty good, so it was a challenge. Going to use pastel chalk and some Dullcoat to break up the pattern. Also, I used the extra, NIB rear wheels to put on the car. The box was trashed, but the wheels perfect. So at the end of this build, I'm hoping to send the older set (which are still great) to a good home. They were primed with a Matte Black and then an additional two coats of DullCoat were applied.

The red striping was done in flat red, but I'll be shooting approximately four coats of clear once the decals are in place so it'll get a nice gloss finish. Hoping to get a video shot of her tomorrow running on her own power as the battery is arriving tomorrow.

By the way, I hate this antenna. This base is epoxy'd to the roof and can't pry the darned thing off. I don't necessarily mind the base, but need a nice straight aerial plastic tube to keep it from looking like Droopy Drooperson from Droopsville.

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She's alive!!!

Battery is for testing only. Freezing cold and dark outside, so I had to run it around the house. When first connected, there was no power to the motor. After trouble shooting for a bit, I tore apart the 3-speed MSC and rebuilt it. The top disc, containing the contacts, was not pressing hard enough on the contact board due to a loose bolt and nut. Cleaned with alcohol and put back together and voila! She fired right up. The motor has seen better days and I need to tear apart all the running gear and re-grease EVERYTHING. This sucker is loud!

Going to take a lot to get used to running a 3-speed as this is my first.

I've also got to tweak the right A-pillar as the remaining piece of glass, the right window, doesn't fit correctly. So it's more chopping, more filling, more sanding and more dryfitting....sigh. Will wait until the replacement static kit glass comes in to work on the B-pillars.

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