Robert Todaro’s Batmobile under construction

The grill and headlights are drilled out and the area where the yellow lights will go is shaped. The right side shows the difference from before to after. A pencil line thick lip is left to support the grill.

The compass dome was made with a drop of clear epoxy on a custom made decal of a compass rose. The white metal dashboard was drilled out and clear green plastic was cut to fit with an LED to light it.

The Turbine Engine and air-ducts are test fitted.

To hold the windscreen frames in place, holes were drilled with a #80 bit through the frames and into the body. Guitar string was then soldered into the holes in the frames. The horn button-Speedometer was made with the same technique as the compass dome.

The coiled cord on the Bat-Phone was made by winding 30 gauge magnet wire around the lead of a 3 watt resistor.

1/8 brass tubes were fitted in the chasses for the front and rear axles. When exact location was determined they were epoxy glued in place.

The clear red light was drilled out and a flashing LED was inserted before it was placed on the roll-bar. 1/16 thick plastic sheet was glued to the bottom of the roll-bar to cover the wires and correct the thickness of the roll-bar.

The Emergency-Bat-Turn lever and turbine thruster lever were replaced with copper wire soldered into a T shape.

I did not care for the wheels And tires from Magnetic Models so I replaced them with Keystone Klassics and Firestone wide ovals from MRC. I also replaced the aluminum photo-etched Bat-hubcaps spinners with brass ones from Millennia Models. This was done so a brass wire could be soldered to the spinners.

For the rocket launching tubes I once again found the white metal parts unrealistic. I got a section of a telescoping radio antenna and cut three lengths. I drilled three holes in a flat brass rod and soldered the antenna sections to it. The balsa wood spacer is there to correct length and angel with the body of the car. Grommets for the rocket tubes are made from 26 gauge magnet wire soldered together and painted black.

The hood hinge was made with brass wire and plastic sheet. A hood prop was fabricated from guitar string and a prop rod hold down from a thin sheet of brass.

The telescoping antenna was fabricated with a section from a glue applicator and a guitar string. I cut a very thin section from a 10 gauge aluminum wire and drilled a hole in it for the base and a small length of plastic insulation from a 22 gauge wire is used for the insulator.

The steering column was fabricated from brass tube and rod. The firewall and steering box is made of plastic sheet. I cut away the molded in sway-bar and Drilled out the sway-bar hold-down clamps. I replaced the sway-bar with 22 gauge copper wire.

I ground off some material from the back of the seats. Wrapped chrome foil around plastic sheets and glued them onto the seats as seat frames. Seatbelts are made with plastic sheet for the buckle and clasp and electrical tape cut in strips for the belts A photo-etched bat was glued to the buckle.

This is a custom decal for the hand painted fire-extinguisher. Ribs were cut into plastic sheet to simulate the panel on the center consul. Thin sections of Lucite rod was cut and polished for headlight lens.

Here is the first coat of gloss black. It will be wet sanded before three more coats. After that the stripes and six clear coats will be added with a lot more wet sanding in between.

Stripes and custom made decals now in place, the clear coats start.

The lights in the dashboard are done with fiber optics and LEDs. The LED for the monitor looks to bright because of the camera setting but looks great in person.

Robert Todaro