Reconstruction of the 1937 W30/26

[splitjunkie]

Very nice work.

What is the floor pan on the left from? It has a completely different frame horn and the spare tire mount is nothing like the W30.

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Chris

You know, a lot of these scratches will buff right out... Jerry Seinfeld

[Undis]

[Undis]

[Jack O'Neill]

One of the (many many any) things that I look forward to is how the guys will choose the colour. Also, way back then in the last thread someone (was it you, Undis?) teased that more parts survived, and I am very curious about them...

This is like watching a dinosaur coming back to life. Actually my lifelong obsession with this prototype is kinda related to Jurassic Park - that year the Beetle was also "resurrected" on the Brazilian market, and media coverage linked it (a lot) with the movie.

One particular newspaper article (I still have this clipping) presented the rear view of one W30 as the "missing link" between it and a Ford T-like vehicle. Being already a dinosaur loving kid AND a Beetle junkie, I was immediately fascinated by that - an unknown (to me) iteration of something so familiar... it was like finding that you have a secret room on your house that you never noticed, or an extra finger on your hand.

I became hell bent in building a replica - a particularly daunting task back then, since I had no way of finding how the front looked like (no internet yet!). Eventually I saw it on a news feed on the TV, and rushed to record it in VHS. I failed, of course, because you never had one handy back then - but, as luck would have it, it had a rerun later that day. I recorded it after my bootleg copy of "Herbie goes bananas" =)

I've eventually build a 1/36 model that I kept for years, but lost it in a house fire. Ten years ago I saw the other topic with the chassis, and built the 1/18 one on my profile picture. One day I hope to see the restored car in person =)

[Undis]

Thanks Jack. The colour is till a mystery to me. My bet is on a light pastel tone taken from the period Mercedes paint catalogue. I would not be surprised it was something similar to 1950ies VW Pastel Green. As for the other parts, we just have to wait and see what the team has managed to collect. Many of the non-essential parts came from various suppliers as generic parts, for example the headlights were Bosch units used on various German cars of the mid '30ties, so would be the semaphores, the tail light, windscreen wipers, switches, instruments and so on.

It's a cool story a to how you became obsessed with the W30. I can relate as back when I was about 15 I took an automotive book from the school library that had a couple of pages dedicated to the VW. The was the famous photo of five W30s parked at the side of a road seen from the rear with car 6 in the foreground. I was blown away. I thought they looked so sinister yet so beautiful.

After that I sought out every VW book I could (afford to) get and slowly built up my knowledge. I also made a model just like you. I used a cheap die-cast Beetle and modified it accordingly.

[Undis]

Early in year 2017 the body buck that was used to build the Autostadt W30 replica arrived at Hessisch Oldendorf. A lot of work has already been done here. This will surely save the team a lot of time.

[Undis]

Fast forward to June 2019. The restoration work of chassis 26 has considerably progressed so finally the plotting out of body lines can start. The main lines are to be drawn up with tape on a grid in scale one to one. The reason for this is to get those lines perfect before any physical work can start. This way any mistakes will be avoided. Note al those reference photos and drawings on the wall.

[Undis]

And some more progress on the drawing,

[finster]

fascinating to see the way you work on this project. I shall expect this one to have a more accurate look about it - the autostadt replicas fenders/wheel areas look wrong. I remember my first sight of a w30 as a boy was in the pg tips tea card 'history of the motor car' collection (I still have this album) and later I found a copy of 'small wonder' which shows the back of the car - naturally I was hooked. meantime, a couple of photos to keep you going..

looks like they fitted a couple with bumpers, dark car has mud flaps too

_________________
"we're here on Earth to fart around" kurt vonnegut

nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect...

[Jack O'Neill]

Nice to know I was not the only one doing scale models of this particular model. We should open a business!
I recently changed countries, but once I settle down, I will give my model a revamp. The epoxi broke around some aluminium parts that I used, so it is time for a tune up...

[fifty8]

This is a model of the 1937 VW30 I bought after being advertised in either Hot VW's or VW Trends magazine (I can't remember which). I'm thinking it was in the 90's?? The company that sold them was called Think Small Models.

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2000 Golf TDi
1981 Scirocco S
1980 Scirocco S (track car) project
1951 Chevy Bel Air (project 'Mom's first car')
1948 Ford F-1 (project)
searching for May 7, 1969 Karmann Ghia (149 860 0??)

[oldovaldriver]

There have been a few nice models of the VW30 in the last twenty years. I've been fascinated by this particular VW prototype since childhood (1960s) and was thrilled when I first found a model of it.

The model mentioned by the previous poster was a resin body to convert the more common Portuguese 1/43 Vitesse KdF. It was made by an American VW Model Club member named (I believe) Kager and sold under "Think Small Models" or "T.S.M." (ref number 4337/T1). The other resin model in my photo was made in France by Duvi and was a complete, ready built model. The pewter model was commissioned by VW Model Club member Bill Rauskolb who worked at Wolfsburg; the Volkswagen Museum sold a few in its gift shop. More recent and more common, but good models, are the 1/64 Greenlight (also sold by Schuco I think) and 1/87 Malibu Models.

James McLachlan of the VW Model Club told me there was also a 1/55 solid resin model by Ken in Japan, and a 1/87 resin by U.S.. Modelle of Germany.

I hope Undis' team does not rely too much on the Volkswagen Museum's wooden body buck. I was excited to see it at the museum in 2003, but was badly disappointed when I saw the finished car. None of the half dozen or so replicas built to date have truly captured the VW30's lines and proportions, and I thought the museum's was one of the worst. The original VW30 was a gorgeous car, and its true lines are subtle and elusive.

[Rome]

[Blue Baron]

My first exposure to the W30 was when my junior high school guidance counselor gave me his Introductory 1973 copy
of SMALL WORLD magazine, which was sent to owners of new Volkswagens. The magazine still has his mailing label on it.

He had just purchased a new Squareback, and he knew I was a VW nut.
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We are striving for perfection, to make our cars run forever, if possible.

Heinz Nordhoff

[Undis]

Some very interesting models there. Looking carefully some small mistakes can be spotted but cool nevertheless.

That introductory 1973 copy of SMALL WORLD magazine is surprisingly accurate for the time. Whoever wrote it must have known his stuff.

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I want one of these cars sooo bad..i don't care if it was all replica there cool looking 👍👍👍

[sweden]

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[Grant Reiling]

[obieoberstar]

I just realized that the round object is the passenger headlight pushed into the center of the bonnet opening.

do any records exist that describe the various problems these prototypes experienced?

[peter schepens]