2/23/00
"America" Emblem

The next set of phone calls involved the missing "America" emblem for my car. According to some Ferrari experts, not all 50 Americas came with this badging.  I don't know if my car came with a badge, but considering it is the only exterior indicator of my car's rarity, I would like to have an "America" script gracing the trunk lid of my car.

The editor of "Sportscar Market" magazine, Keith Martin, also owns a 330 America. He e-mailed me recently to tell me he had accurate pictures of this elusive script, and wanted to know if I was interested in having a couple made up. I asked François to recommend a shop that was familiar with doing this kind of work. When I called the recommended chrome shop, and explained what I wanted to do, the owner of the shop explained his process. Ideally he would like to start with an actual emblem to copy, where his machinist would re-create a copy in solid brass. This would then be buffed, and chromed to a finished product. He could make one using a picture as a guide, but its accuracy would be limited by the interpretation of the picture. When I asked him for a approximate price for this labor intensive process, he said that a recent job involving Rolls Royce emblems ran about $500 bucks! Considering I haven't even begun working on my engine, spending $500 dollars on a chrome emblem seems a bit much.

I still have another problem to deal with on this badge thing! The best way to make a new badge is to find a real one, but who has one, and how do I get it to copy? François Sicard restored a 330 America several years ago for Peter Kalikow. Mr. Kalikow has an extensive collection of Ferraris, all of which are beautifully restored. Knowing of this car, and the existence of an America badge, I could just imaging the conversation of me asking to borrow the rare emblem off of Mr. Kalikow's car! "Hello? Mr. Kalikow? You don't know me but, I own the same car as you...I was wondering if you could be a dear, and lend me your badge so I could get it copied? I'll get it back to you in a couple of months!...Mr.Kalikow? Hello?...

If Peter Kalikow ends up being the only person I can find with an emblem to copy, I need to find an alternative to taking his badge off his car. I've seen mold making materials that can be used to make impressions, and if I can find one that won't risk ruining paint and chrome, I will try learning the technique where I can spend five minutes with Mr. kalikow's car to make an impression, and be done. The next step after that is to create a positive of this negative mold out of a resin so I can send it out ot be copied. A pretty complicated process, but another adventure in learning!

2/24/00
Mold Making

While my radio is at the Maintenance Shop, I stopped by the Scenic Shop with my Pininfarina badge. I showed the Head Scenic Artist, Barbara Taylor my emblem, and explained my dilemma with the America script. She told me my timing was perfect because she was just about to start experimenting with some new mold making kits, and was looking for a piece to copy. She had several different materials for making molds from liquid type resins that you pour over the item you want to copy, to putty-like substances that you form over the piece. We decided that the best material would be the latter. The putty Barbara has comes in two forms, fifteen minute, and two hour curing. These putties are two part mixes that work very much like auto body filler, but instead of curing to a hard material, it sets up in a flexible rubber state.

When I was in Art School, we made plaster molds in a three-dimensional study class, so I was familiar with release agents and surface preparation when taking impressions of 3-D objects. I cleaned the dirt and residue off the test badge, and Barbara brushed on a latex coating. The putty was mixed, and pressed on to the badge as if it were still attached to a car to see if we would encounter any problems. This would help me prepare for when I wanted to copy a badge from a car without removing it.

After sufficient time for drying, we pulled the badge out and inspected our work. So far so good, there was hardly any residue on the original, and any remains were easily removed with a fingernail. The next step was to pour a resin into the new mold to make a positive. Barbara chose a cream colored resin that she's familiar with, but she had a couple to choose from in her shop. Once the positive was removed from the mold, we began removing the "casting flash" and any other extraneous material. Upon inspection of our finished product we were very happy with the results. We want to modify some of the steps to yield an even better result on our next try, but I definitely think we have a proven process for copying emblems! After we perfect this technique, Barbara will put together a kit to make a copy of an emblem. When I find a willing owner to let me copy the "America" badge, I can offer to copy the badge without removing it, or risk damaging it, and be done in a matter of minutes!

As I'm learning this new technique, I can't help but feel like I'm a spy trying to copy a secret pattern. I will gain access to this emblem, but will only have a few minutes before I'm detected, so I'll have to act fast! I've rehearsed this procedure dozens of times, so I can practically do it with my eyes closed. The time to sweat will be the necessary time it will take for the putty to set. Fifteen minutes can't come quickly enough ...DONE! Remove the mold, and clean all evidence of me being there. Put the mold in my pocket, and calmly walk out of the garage, and slip undetected into the crowd.... O.K., James Bond I'm not!

2/28/00
Badges and Grilles

I spent some time at the Scenic Shop perfecting our mold making technique. Barbara and I decided to try the 15 minute mold formula because this would better suit my needs when I find an "America" badge I want to copy. The putty remains the same, but the catalyst is what makes the it harden faster or slower. I shot a sequence of pictures so you can see most of the process. (By The way, Barbara was a "hand model" in a former life, hence the perfectly displayed hands!)


When the mold was made, and released from the original, we waited for it to harden, and poured some resin to create a positive. We ran into a problem when the clear resin did not want to harden. Barbara thinks the proportions were wrong, so she managed to remove the un-set resin, and pour another one with the tried-and-true cream colored resin. The new cast came out great! This time we decided not to use any release agent to see how compatible the materials were. With no release agent, we will have better detail in the final product. The cast released without problems, and the details were very precise. You can see that the copy needs to have all the excess casting flash removed and this was done with small hand files Barbara had in her shop. The experiment worked great, so I think I'm ready to copy an emblem. Now all I have to do is find an actual "America" badge!

7/1/00
330 America Badge

For a few months I've been trying to get access to a 330 America badge. Being that there were only 50 cars made with this designation, and many were void of the actual badge, finding one was not so easy. Luckily I belong to Len Miller's 250 GTE Registry, and received my annual update of all GTE and America owners. There weren't a lot of confirmed owners of Americas on the list, but one owner was located in California.

I decided to drop him a friendly letter explaining my desires to re-create the 330 America Script for my car. A week later, I received a response from Henry, the America owner, telling me he would take some pictures of his badge as soon as he got a chance. I waited patiently for a few weeks, and soon found out he was also sending me molds of his badge with a model making putty. This made me even more excited in getting mail from California!

Today in the mail, all the photos and molds arrived safely, and I can now go to the next step. I'm not sure if I will be able to make direct casts off of these molds because on close inspection, I think the mold making material has shrunk! Look at the photograph taken by Henry of his badge. The length of the badge looks to be 7-1/2 inches, but with ruler next to the molds I got, they measure at least a half an inch shorter.Nonetheless, these molds certainly give me a better idea how thick the original badge was, and the profile shape of the lettering, so it's a great help to have made them. I'm also glad I asked Henry to photograph his badge with ruler for reference, or else I would have never known of the mold shrinkage!

I've contacted the person who owns a foundry that can help me cast this badge and am waiting to see how to proceed. He can have his company create a badge from the photograph and molds for reference, so I'll keep you informed!

7/10/00
Badge Work

My fears were confirmed that the molds made from the Californian 330 America will not be directly usable in making new badges. Mike, from Seaport Mold, told me over the weekend that due to the shrinkage, an accurate cast is not possible, but the photgraphs should help in creating a good copy. He told me of a process where a rubber stamp could be made from "camera ready" artwork, and a cast can be made from the rubber stamp.

I decided to try and create the artwork necessary in making this stamp, or any other method that would need a good graphical picture of the 330 America badge. I decided to use Photoshop since it is the program I'm most familiar with. I first sized the photograph of the badge Henry took off his car to life size by lining up the ruler in the picture with the rulers in Photoshop, then I began creating a clipping path of the badge. After getting a good clipping path of the the lettering, I selected the path and filled the selection with black. After many tweeks to the lettering, I finally came up with a pretty good stencil. If only creating 3-D objects were as easy to make!


7/18/00
Messing with Molds

I got the molds back from Seaport Mold in the mail the other day. Mike sent them back because he felt that they were unusable for making a quality cast. Since I had some time at work, I decided to try and give it a shot at making a cast from these molds. I had two molds made from the 330 America badge in California, one of them being better than the other, so I decided to experiment with the worse of the two.

Barbara, the head scenic artist at work, helped mix a two part epoxy casting material to pour into the mold. Our concerns were whether the slightly porous mold would react to the epoxy casting material without the use of a separator. We decided to only pour the epoxy in a couple of letters just in case...


Well, our fears were right. The epoxy managed to fuse very well to the mold material. The chemical compounds must be very similar to fuse together so well. The next test was to use some kind of release agent.

Release agents keep two materials from sticking when making a cast, and can be a number of substances depending on what you're casting. You want to keep the agent as thin as possible so the details of the original cast won't be harmed. The first release agent we chose was spray shellac.

I sprayed a few thin layers on the mold and waited for it to soak into the mold, and dry. The more epoxy was poured. No luck, the epoxy fused to the shellac and the mold as if there was no release agent at all. The next choice was latex.

A thin layer of latex was brushed on another pair of letters, and casting material was poured. This time, the cast released, but not too cleanly. Still not satisfied with our results, Barbara and I decided to try a final alternative of using latex and spray lubricant (PAM) as our release agent, and casting the remaining mold in plaster. After much work building a "dam" to contain the plaster, we found the plaster to work best at making a cast from these molds, but a lot of work will be required to clean these casts before a good badge will come of it.

After all this work, I think I'm going to abandon the idea of obtaining a good cast from these molds. The material is just too porous to work with. Let's hope Seaport Mold has better luck going with the flat art I created of this badge from the photographs.

8/28/00
The First Try at the Badge


After some shipping problems, I finally received a cast created by Mike at Seaport Mold. It wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it was a good start. There seems to be a sizing problem, where the cast has come out too large. The overall length has grown by about 3/4", and the the letters have also gotten thicker. They look a little like what happens when you make chocolate chip cookies. Mike and I will have to work on the process from "camera ready art" to final zinc casting to find out what needs to be adjusted. I may have to adjust my artwork to allow this process to work well.

Whenever I hit another stumbling block, I always tell myself, "persistence and dedication will see me through this restoration!"
 
 7/9/01


In the mail today I received a 330 America Badge in excellent condition! I've been sweating it ever since I paid the money for this thing last week to arrive safetly, but today, I am very happy!

Fans of this site know that my car was missing the 330 America Badge found on the trunk lid of these cars. It was rumored that not all 330 Americas came from the factory with these badges, but having one would be the only way someone could outwardly tell the difference between a 330 America, and a Series III 250 GTE. I started the process over a year ago to try and fabricate a 330 America Badge because I felt the chances of finding a badge that exisisted on less than the fifty 330 Americas were pretty slim. A fellow 330 America owner in California offered to take pictures, and molds off his original badge, and the rest of those steps can be followed on previous posts...long story short, I still hadn't gotten a accurate cast nor a successful positive, and decided to put the project on hold until a better/cheaper method could be found.

Fast forward to three weeks ago...A fellow Ferrari owner called me from Washinton D.C. while there on business, and he said, "Tom, I think I found your badge!!! Call Chuck Wray at Grand Touring in Maryland first thing Monday morning!" Paul told me that he stopped by Grand Touring for a visit, and got onto the topic of my 330 America restoration. Chuck knew about my car, and was impressed with my work, and had actually contacted me through my site. When they were talking about my missing trunk badge, Chuck said that one of his customers parted out a 330 America several years ago, and he could see if the badge was still on hand!

I didn't get in touch with Chuck until Wednesday, all the while feeling this was just a dream. When Chuck and I finally spoke, he told me he was holding the badge in his hand, and it was in great shape. We talked price, and he told me what the owner wanted for the piece, I made my offer, and Chuck said he would get back to me. I knew that it could cost me quite a bit of money to go through the process of manufacturing a badge, but any money I could save at this point of the restoration will be a help. I waited five days for an answer, and the owner of the badge made me a counter offer, and I accepted at $175 bucks!

Today, in the mail, I got my 330 America badge, and another piece of the puzzle has been completed!

Thanks Paul, Chuck, and the former owner of this 330 America badge. My car will wear it proudly!

6/20/04


One of the cool things I got was another 330 America badge! This one was missing a mounting post, and needs to be replated, but it was still a great to have. Considering there were only 50 of these cars made, I may now be the only person in the world with two 330 America Badges!

5/22/05


A few years ago, I was trying my best to find a 330 America Badge for my car. Not all 50 330 Americas had these badges, but since the larger engine and this badge were the only differences between it, and her older sister, the 250 GTE, I wanted one! Since that time, I not only found one for my car, but also found a second one to use for copies! Black Bart now has reproductions available from an original badge (pictured in the foreground). If you are a 330 America owner, and need a badge, call Bart to secure one of the 9 left. Don't forget to tell him you heard about them from me, so if we ever want to make something else, I can show him we have the interest.

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