The "The Manhattan Project" Project

[markbt73 5316]

So I'm looking around my shop at all the unfinished projects, and nothing is really jumping out at me and shouting "Work on me!". I feel like building something, but I don't feel like scratchbuilding something. So it seems like a good time to start a build that I've had sitting on the back-burner for a while now: the plutonium-smuggling Subaru Brat from that '80s gem, The Manhattan Project.

If you don't know the movie, here is the relevant scene:

 

The movie itself is silly (and I thought so as a kid as well), but it came out in the summer of 1986, right when I got my first hobby-grade RC car, a Grasshopper. Seeing a Tamiya car play such a key part in the plan was the coolest part of the movie. (That, and John Lithgow's constant jokes about the inherent silliness of the Cold War.) It has stuck with me over the years, and now, all these years later, I feel like paying homage to it.

So I have here a re-re Brat kit, bought with this project in mind, a few years ago...

 

Now, for a little analysis... looking at the scenes from the movie, I don't think that they used a Brat kit. Rather, it appears to be a Frog with a Brat body on it. It definitely has Frog wheels, and I think I see silver oil shocks under there. Perhaps the Brat's friction shocks and 380 motor weren't up to the task of hauling the "cargo."

No matter; the re-re Brat uses Frog shocks and a 540, and I greatly prefer the Brat wheel/tire package. So I will part ways from the film in that detail. (Call it a tribute rather than a replica.)

Now here's where it gets interesting. Not only does the car in the film have working headlights, but they are able to be switched on and off via the radio. Not only that, but at one point before zooming across an opening, the driver's head swivels to "look both ways," but it moves independently of the front wheels. That means that they needed a 4 channel radio to accomplish all of this. The transmitter in the film has an Acoms look to it, but I will be using my trusty Spektrum DX-5e.

 

The headlights look round, probably RAM lights glued in after the kit's square headlights were cut out. It doesn't appear to have any other functioning lights besides the headlights, so that's lucky. There will be enough wiring in this thing as it is.

Also, I'll need to find the right-sized plastic bottle, and fill it with some sort of green goo (or spray-paint it metallic green on the inside), and then have the printer at work print me up some "caution radioactive" tape (wonder what he'll think of that?).

Stay tuned, I'll be officially starting this one this evening...

[markbt73 5316]

Actually, watching it again, it does have taillights...

[markbt73 5316]

Hmm, still hasn't been approved for public consumption... but thin, I tihnk it's like 4AM in Great Britain or something like that...

Anyway, I've gotten this part done. Not much to say, because we all know how an ORV chassis goes together. I enjoyed it, because it's the first time in 30 years that I've built an ORV from all-new parts. Only took a few hours, but I enjoyed every minute of it.

 

So now it's on to starting the bodywork, and figuring out some bits like the lighting and the extra servo for the driver's head. Maybe by then the thread will be unlocked, and I won't feel so much like I'm talking to myself...

[markbt73 5316]

Well, that part was surprisiingly easy...

 

Turn to the left:

 

Turn to the right.

 

The only trouble is that my "trusty" DX-5 isn't so trusty after all; the rudder channel doesn't work. It seems to be something inside the transmitter, as all the other channels work fine, and everything works plugged into the "wrong" places. I even tried my other reveicer; no love. I'll have to dig into the transmitter, I guess; I have a suspcion that it's a bad potentiometer on that channel.

But hey, the build's just started, and I'm already turning heads...

[markbt73 5316]

Everything works!

The driver's head works off the "elevator" channel (right stick up/down) at the moment, but it all works. Lights are switched via the 5th channel, using the circuit board of an old broken servo as a controller.

Now to go see if I still have any red spray paint...

[speedy_w_beans 4272]

Neat!  I like seeing others' custom work.

[Tizer 606]

Nice work

Maybe switch the headlights to warm white LED's to get the same look as the original which most likely had regular bulbs.

[Grastens 2795]

Nice concept for a build! And some tricky driving to be done there in the film

[TurnipJF 9192]

On 5/4/2019 at 6:57 PM, markbt73 said:

 It doesn't appear to have any other functioning lights besides the headlights, so that's lucky. There will be enough wiring in this thing as it is.

At about 10 seconds into the clip that you uploaded, when he flicks the headlights off an on again, it appears that the dimly-lit taillights also turn off and on again. I am not sure if they are turned off elsewhere in the clip, or are simply too dimly-lit to be discerned from the ambient lighting.

 

[mike in pa 64]

Well any updates? LOL

 

I just bought a Brat and need the plastic bottle for the Manhattan Project look. Find any matches?

[InsaneJim69 1584]

Holy thread revival batman !!! 😂😂 

James.

[markbt73 5316]

Oh jeez... I botched the paint job on the body and it has been shuffled around my workshop for like 2 years now, badly painted. Maybe eventually I'll redo it and finish it up, but it's down near the bottom of the list...