Wednesday 18 January 2017

Bits and pieces: an Austin A60


I think I have finally found a decent 255 Austin A60 in Left Hand Drive form and this should appear here in a while. As it happens, a very poor 236 A60 arrived this morning along with some others I had bought. Often the best buys are when you have a bundle of models - one jewel among the wrecks. Well, this A60 was one of the wrecks and so it needs to be re-built and will eventually re-appear in my Black List.

While the body is sizzling in some caustic soda I thought I would have a look at the components and, remarkably, this one has survived well. The screen cleaned up really well and the suspension arms on the red plastic unit are still pliable and not bent up like so many become. When that happens the car, which already has a very low ground clearance due to its tiny wheels, loses almost all its suspension and scrapes along the ground and cannot handle anything other than the smoothest of surfaces.

So I should be able to make something nice out of this one after all. The mechanism for the steering has the same two posts as the Bentley and Mercedes-Benz where the front wheels are mounted but without the coil springs. The control is quite a sensible and strong post that slides a metal plate from side to side, providing realistic steering.

It is a pity that the external control is such an ugly ashtray affair on the roof. 



Apart from the small wheels, the Corgi model was a great representation of the real car.



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