Fleischman Alfa Romeo T33/2 conversion

My parents got me into HO T-Jets as a child.  A few years into my fascination with them, I acquired an Alfa Romeo T33/2 “Periscopica” Spyder, as it is known, from a neighbor that was throwing out old “slot car junk”.  I lucked out and was able to rescue several cars at the time.  Not all of them were in decent shape, but the Alfa was, and I loved the shape of that car!

My T-Jet Alfa

The Alfa T33/2 ran against the likes of GT-40s, Chaparral 2D and 2Fs, Porsche 906s, and Ferrari 365 P2/3 cars in places like Sebring, Targa Florio, Monza, and Nürburgring.  

I had been looking for a Fleischman version of this car, as I was sure they had made the only 1/32 version of it.  When they do appear on eBay, they usually run between $50-100 for nice ones.  Well, my ship finally came in, and I nailed one for $55 on eBay from Switzerland.  The car looked to be in great shape, and it was.  My intent was to make the car drivable with my GT-40, P4, and Chaparral cars, not to keep it stock, even if it was semi-rare.

eBay pictures of the auction 

Upon getting the car, I found it to be in nice shape.  I’m not sure it was run very much in its lifetime.  The tires were dirty and gummed up, but were nice and flexible. I disassembled the body and gave it a thorough washing.  I used a small amount of Novis polish in a few areas to buff a few minor scratches out and set the body to the side. 

I realized the stock guide would never work on my Scalextric Sport track, as it was too deep and too wide.  I used a small hobby saw to cut about 2mm off the guide before filing the guide blade to be thinner.  That problem solved, I soon found the stock motor to be a complete dog.  There was no way this thing would run with the group of cars I wanted it to.  The great news is that this is a sidewinder setup, similar to the Scalextric GT-40.  Having a few spare motors from those, I test-fit the new motor, noticing that the front of the motor pod needed only a minor trim to have the motor set right into place.  The Dremel sanding drum that I had is the EXACT diameter of the Scalextric bell, so I gently and carefully sanded away a very small amount of material from the pod.  That done, I placed the motor into place and added a small amount of hot glue to keep it in place.

 Back to the guide, I decided to use new braids and installed new ones from a Carrera package.  I simply bent the tips of the braid up and over to install the wires from the Scalextric motor. 

Turning to the tires, I cleaned them, lightly sanded them, and ran them over tape.  I did clean them with WD-40 as this usually works well in removing stubborn build up.  The tires look brand new!  I then added a bar magnet in the middle inside of the chassis, simply to make it competitive with the GT-40s and Ferraris on my track and hot glued that into place as well.  I reassembled the body, put her on the track and away we went! 

So, how does it drive?  Wonderful.  Very much like the cars I want it to run with.  Total time invested; about 2 hours.  I was very careful with this, and as I did some extra cleaning, it was worth it.