- BODY: Auto World Unfinished Kit
- WHEELS: Vincent
- TIRES: Road Race Replicas
By 1968 when the breathtaking C3 Corvette was introduced, the golden age of muscle cars was in full song but the glory days of sports car racing were beginning to wane. The C2 Corvette “Stingray” was a common sight on road courses and even some long distance races in its heyday, but the C3 didn’t seem to find as much favor with sports car racers as its predecessor. This seems odd in some ways; the car was as powerful as ever and its brakes were significantly improved over the C2. However, it was also longer and heavier, and allegedly didn’t handle quite as well on bendy roads. As a result the C3 is often seen as more of a muscle car today. This one wound up in my racing fleet as the result of an experiment that ended successfully.
To date, this is the only unfinished Auto World body I’ve bought. I’m not sure how the vendors I buy these from obtain them, since I see them for sale from time to time online but as far I know AW does not sell these to the general public. I could be wrong about that of course, but it seems like a few people are getting “dibs” on a special product somehow. I have 2 factory-finished copies of this car-one in Daytona Yellow and the other bright red-in the Muscle Car fleet, but I picked this one up simply to see what one of these unfinished body-only purchases would look like and what I could do with it. The unfinished bodies are always delivered in pure white, and on this particular car the roof-which is usually painted black or sometimes body color on the finished ones-is a single piece of clear plastic forming the roof and the windows. This meant I had to paint the roof and the extremely thin A-pillars in a way that looked convincing.
I had originally planned to paint it Fathom Green and add it to the muscle car fleet, so I started with painting that roof and those A-pillars in matte black just to see if I could do it, using a paint pen rather than a brush. Looking at the white body with the black roof, I thought it looked so good that way that maybe I wouldn’t paint it at all, but just leave it in its stark white, which was when it occurred to me to do it up as a racing car.
I wound up doing all the detail work only with pens rather than with brushes; it was a combination of paint pens and Sharpies, and a few touches with the “real chome” marker. I picked a racing number with a good looking roundel in appropriate black and white and added some sponsor logos. All of this was more experimental than anything; I didn’t even think it would come out well, I just wanted to see if I could make a presentable car with nothing more than pens. When I was finished I mounted it on a chassis and fitted it with Chevy Rallye-style wheels from Vincent and…durned if it didn’t look good enough for me to add it to the racing fleet right then and there!
Since these pictures were taken at Drag City Mk II, I have changed the wheels to the Vincent “Hurricane” style to give it more of a “track” and less of a “street” look, but even though I’m happy with that choice, it looked good with the Rallyes as you see it here. Other than the wheel change the car still races today as pictured. As good as it looks, this body was just a bit too long and heavy to be a good performer, as it tends to display a “barbell effect” in the turns, but with the recent addition of a “Max Force” Gold Level traction magnet it is now a hot runner. Dubbed “Intimidator” and driven by Phil “PRODIGY” Philips, it recently came in 3rd in a full sports car tournament.
The “egg crate”-style wing vents identify this as a 1970-’72 model, as opposed to the vertical “gills” used on the ’68-’69, and this happens to me my all-time favorite Corvette ever made. The C3 may not have had as successful a race career as its older brother, but its such a great looking car that more should have been seen on the track, so I was happy to add one to my racing fleet…and it made the cut without ever being touched by a brush!