This was a request for a replica of a special man's car. A 1939 Plymouth Coupe.I thought for this one I'd photograph some of the steps so you can see how it comes together.
I started with a 12x18 sheet cake. I cut the cake into rectangles and stacked it with filling layers. It got a crumb coating, and I put it in the refrigerator to get nice and chilled before carving. I usually use 1" layers of cake and 3 layers of filling. But, because of all of the intricate carving, I decided to make thicker cake (and a thicker filling layer). I hoped that this would make it more stable. Notice that the board under the cake has cut outs for the wheels.
I printed out photos of the front and side of the car to the scale that I wanted the finished cake to be. When carving the cake, I held them up to the cake to help locate the cutting points. Notice that I cut out the wheel wells too.
It got a 'dirty icing' and went back into the refrigerator to chill before covering in fondant. I often use a thicker layer of buttercream, but I went thinner because I didn't want to loose the shape.
Here it is with the fondant. Covering it was easier than I expected. I think that covering a ball in fondant is much harder. After another chilling, I placed the cake on the board, with foamcore blocks under it. This suspended the cake, allowing me to put the wheels on the side. (The wheels were just thick pieces of fondant.)
Finally, I added all the detail. I used my clay extruder to make fine fondant ropes for the stripes. I wasn't sure that I'd be able to pipe a perfectly straight line on the side of the cake. The fondant turned out to be a little tricky to handle too. Since it was so thin, it kept breaking! The 'sticker' on the side of the car (that said "1939 Classic") and the bumpers were gumpaste. I cheated a little and used toothpicks to help hold up the bumper. I also used the toothpick boxes to hold the bumpers close to the cake as the royal icing dried.
