Toy cars

A toy race-car, viewed from the right-rear - the body of the car is white oak, the fender piece is russian olive, and the wheels are oak stained black with India ink. A toy race-car, viewed from the left - the body of the car is walnut, the fender piece is white oak, and the wheels are oak stained black with India ink.

We've got a couple kids in the neighborhood now. They were both born in December 2025, and I gave them both rattles. For Christmas 2026, I decided to make a couple toy cars for them, based on ones I saw that Crowie had made a few years ago.

There are a lot more details in the various pages making up the build, but after four cars, I think I've zeroed in on a pretty solid, playable toy, so I documented the build along with things I learned not to do along the way.

Making the individual parts:

  1. Axles
  2. Wheels
  3. Body
  4. Fenders
  5. Assembly

The parts are all finished on their show surfaces before assembly. Ring-porous woods (oak and russian olive, mostly) get a coat of shellac, followed by sanding with progressively finer sandpaper. I typically work up the grits going 60, 120, 220, then 400. Then I finish using three to five coats of RMP Half & Half with a quick buff with 0000 steel wool after each coat cures. This leaves a pretty dang good matte surface.

And then Assembly, followed by touch-up to remove any glue squeeze-out and either a final coat or three of shellac, or a quick buff with carnauba wax.

Thanks for looking!

#ToyCars #contents

Discuss... Or contact me in the fediverse @davepolaschek@writing.exchange