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Some of you might have seen the sketches I made of my Trezetta and with the help of some members here I now have a final design. I’m sure you already got it but the name Trezetta is Z3 backwards in Italian, with an extra T :-)
I actually started building a while ago but haven’t had the time to write about it. Right now the car looks like this:
And this is the final design I went for:
But before I made the sketch above I had to figure out if it was possible to build a car like this based on a Z3. As you can see, the back of the car is extended quite a lot but the front is about the same size. The critical part was to make the headlights work without interfering with any structural parts.
As you can see, it all looks doable, but shaping something in real life is totally different than sketching two-dimensional. My plan has been to use as much of the original car's lines as possible and try to make them work together with my lines. I always thought the Z3 had something despite it’s hideous front and chopped off back.
Cleaner lines than the Bertini, and if you use Gary's Formosa as a benchmark for alignment and finish you should do well with it. Give people the option to drive it with a good gellcoat finish until they can afford a decent paint job.
I really like what you have done. The overall effect is Italian inspired, and I can see MGB and Spitfire Mk3 (which is pretty good as far as I am concerned). A really tasteful and subtle modern-day take on a classic. The "less is more" school of thought has worked. Congratulations.
Thank you all for the comments – always nice to hear what people with knowledge on the subject says! I liked the “modern-day take on a classic” a lot – that is exactly what I want to achieve!
I don’t have any plans for more than one car. But of course, if it turns out to be a good looking one I wouldn’t mind seeing more of them on the streets. Any producers out there looking for an extra model on their assembly line? :-)
Building a car without a proper garage is a bit challenging, but I managed to find a solution that turned out to be just as good – or even better. To start with I needed a place to put the car while I dismantle it. Luckily I found someone renting out a tiny garage close by my place. There was no way I could build it there, since it wasn’t much bigger than the car. But it was big enough to pull off body panels. And I have plenty of space back home. So I started with the bonnet and bumper and found out that the Z3 is a simple and cleverly engineered car – a perfect foundation for my project. Back home I took an old table and built a wood frame on top of it to support the panels.
Time to start creating!
This turned out to be a better solution than expected. I now had the perfect working height, good light and temperature and plenty of space to take a step back and look at my sculpture … I also found that my computer projector was very useful. Being able to project my drawings in full scale on cardboard helps a lot. It also guarantees the car to be symmetrical, since I in most cases can make a template for one side and just turn it upside-down for the other.