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I bought a model Cord 812 and I have a whatsit question.


Guest Szarek

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While at regional NNL model car show I bought this Cord 812. It's not complete and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it.

What is really bugging though is that assembly with the three thin bars on the bottom of the chassis. Somebody here must know whyat they are! :confused::cool:

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radio antenna. kinda shocked they'd show that detail on a model......

Really, now that you mention that I do have a dim memory of hearing that a long time ago. Thanks for your reply!

That does seem like a wierd place for the antenna but that is a really big antenna. It would look pretty dumb on the fender :cool:

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  • 4 months later...
Guest Art Anderson

It appears you are building up the excellent (if extremely fiddly!) AMT 1/12 scale '37 Cord 812 Convertible Coupe (Sportsman). As others have noted, that "paper clip-looking" part is the radio antenna, which mounting was actually rather common in the early days of car radios. It's interesting to note that EVERY plastic scale model kit of the 36-37 Cord has that same detail part (the AMT kit, Monogram Models 1/24 scale Convertible Phaeton and the very rare--in the US at least--Bandai Convertible Phaeton out of Japan.

AMT's Cord kit, as well as the Monogram kit, was first produced in 1966, at the height of US plastic model kit companies producing 1/24 and 1/25 scale plastic model kits of antique and classic cars. They are still considered very nearly "state of the art" model car kits even with the fantastic model car kits being designed even today.

While of course, the hobby of building plastic scale model kits began, here in the US, in 1951, with a series of 1/32 scale model kits of antique cars designed by a pair of British brothers (the Gowland brothers) and molded by a then-new and fairly small toy company called Revell, it was Monogram who pioneered the concept of 1/24 scale (with its close companion 1/25 scale pretty much the standard scale range for model car kits to this very day) with the first of their 1930 Model A Ford kits, a phaeton, in 1961. That Model A was followed, in 1962 by a model kit of a 1934 Duesenberg Supercharged Weymann Torpedo Phaeton, also by Monogram. Over the next 4 years, Monogram introduced two more 1930 Model A kits, the first being a kit with the option of building either the '30 Coupe or the Cabriolet, the second being a '30 Station Wagon, this one having only street rod parts (it can be readily combined with the Phaeton or Coupe/Cabriolet to make a stock Woodie wagon though--and later this had extra panels included to do the VERY RARE '30 Model A Deluxe Delivery, which was based on the Station Wagon). Monogram also produced a very accurately done '34 Ford Coupe/Cabriolet (you could build one or the other from the kit), a '36 Ford coupe with the option of doing a roadster), the Cord 812 I mentioned, a Duesenberg Murphy Town Car (based on the chassis etc. from the Weymann Torpedo Phaeton) and a Bugatti Type 35B. In the mid-70's, Monogram issued a 1935 Rollston Convertible Coupe and a couple of years later, the ex-George Whittell long wheelbase Murphy Disappearing Top Convertible Coupe (boattail), both also using the supercharged chassis from the '34 Weymann.

While not on the ACD topic for this particular forum, Monogram added three Packards to the equation in the 70's, a pair of 734 Speedsters, and a '31 Series 840 Dual Cowl Phaeton.

Bandai also produced, in 1/12 scale, Whittell's Weymann Fishtail Speedster and a somewhat inaccurately done model of the Figoni Berline, but the real prize, if you can find one (expect to lay out some serious dollars!), Ideal Toy Corporation produced, about 1960, a circa 1929-30 short wheelbase Murphy Roadster in the odd scale of 1/10th.

There are many other Classic Cars that have been done in 1/24 scale, both by Heller (French company) and Italeri (Italian company) as plastic model kits, but they really aren't germaine to this topic area.

As an aside to the Cord, in 1995, I produced, under the All American Models brand name, three hand-cast polyurethane resin Cord kits, as conversions or "transkits" for the Monogram Convertible: Flat back supercharged sedan, trunkback supercharged sedan, and the Convertible coupe (these are long out of production, show up on eBay every so often though). Here's a pic of my built up sedan:

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Art Anderson

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