Tuesday, September 27, 2016

Tamiya BMW 635CSi Gr.A Racing

I have realised that there are a few things missing on the Gurney GT40, like a windscreen wiper and the small fins on the hood. However, I will leave those for now and get on with the next kit while I am in the mood. This time, I am doing a racing saloon car. - a BMW 635CSi Gr.A Racing from Tamiya.


This is the one where the decals on the outside show what is behind the panels. Looks like a fun car to decal.

First off, I sprayed all of the main colours; i.e. white, black and aluminium.That done, I spent this afternoon and evening putting the chassis together. A little bit of touch up on the detail makes all of the difference.

One forgets how good Tamiya kits are until a new kit is started. This one has gone together without any effort, filler or sanding. It is a dream of a kit (and I have a second one in Jaegermeister colours so that is good!). the best way to show you the progress is with a few images.









My next step is to build the interior. I am enjoying this. It is much more fun than a short run aircraft!

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Le Mans 1966 Gurney #3 finished

Why, of why, do I always mess things up? Mind you, this time I got out of it.

I explained that I had messed about with the colours. Well, I resprayed the car with white primer and then gave it a few coats of the Zero Paints Alan Mann Ford Red. I am told that this might not be absolutely accurate but as the car was run under Alan Mann's name, I think it is a fairly good guess at the colour.

I fixed the problems with the brake discs. I had broken off or cut off the mounting parts to one of the discs and both of the springs. This made complications in fitting the steering together. In the end, I drilled out all four items and replaced the bits broken off with brass rod. A bit of tweaking and bending and everything fitted into place. Not that it really matters so long as the car sits right because, once finished, I put it in a cabinet and "forget about it"!

The decals went on with too much trouble and I, finally, got the logos on the wheels to fix on the tyres. It seems like they are normal rub down but, in fact, they need to be soaked to free them from their backing paper. I didn't get them exactly in place but this is a huge step forward.

I gave the car about 5 coats of Johnson's Klear (or at least the new replacement for it) and then gave it a polish. I wanted to give it some coats of Zero Paints 2 Pack but I couldn't find the box so I had to use Klear.

As usual, I messed up on one thing that was a stand out problem. On fitting the rear view mirror, I first off used Gators Grip but I managed to dislodge it so I put a dab of Mr. Colour Mr. Cement S and that pooled out onto the glass leaving a mark. This time, instead of panicking, I decided to do something about it. I have a Micro-Mesh Craft Kit which contains sanding pads from grade 1,500 up to 12,000 along with some polish and a flannel cloth. I waited 24 hours so that the glue was dry, scraped off the offending residue and worked my was up the pads finishing off with the polish. It isn't perfect but it works for me - in any case it is better than buying a 2nd kit, which I have done before.

So here it is in all its "glory". The photos, just for interest, were taken in sets of 6 using the live view on my canon 80D. I set the focus differently on every image and then used Helicon Focus to patch all six together into one image where all points are in focus. I also take the images in natural light using the manual setting on the camera which, in this case, was set at 1/13th sec, ISO800 and F8.0.



I am pleased with this one. I now have the cars that came 1st and 3rd. I now have the Fujimi kit for the Denny Hulme/Ken Miles car that came 2nd so I will be able to reproduce the end of the race.

I have now sold all of my kits except for the cars - oh, and two tank kits that are partway through but I think I might just bin them as they are both way too complicated - why make one part when you can make four? I am thinking that I might make either one of my Accurate Miniatures Can/Am or maybe a Tamiya BMW635CSi next. Or maybe not - smile.

BTW, if you click on either of the images, you will get a slide show with larger copies.

Sunday, September 18, 2016

Gurney 1966 Ford GT40

I love these GT40s and now have the third 1966 car - Denny Hulme and Ken Miles - on order and expected next week.

Dab Gurney's car was painted red and, after a few problems came third but a few laps down. The three of them went over the line almost together, which was great advertising.

I am in the process of finishing off the chassis but have caused myself a few problems. I broke the fitting on the end of both springs for the front suspension and I cut the pins off the one front brake discs so that there is no way to fit it into the wishbones. This means that I have to do some very exact drilling to fit some wire pins into the components. The seat belts went on very nicely and I appreciated getting the fabric effect belts (that needed cutting out but that was easy)



The body was another question altogether. Dan Gurney was racing for Alan Mann and I have a bottle of Zero Paints Alan Mann red so this should have been easy. I forgot that Zero paints are airbrush ready and thinned the first shot. This resulted in a terrible finish so I wiped it off, gave the body a bit of a clean up and re-primed it. As I hadn't realised what I had done with the paint, I shot a coat of Vallejo Model Air Italian Red, which went on very well. I then realised what I had done with the Zero paint so I shot another coat of the Alan Mann red and everything ended up OK. I just have to touch up the bottom of the sills and the body will be ready for decalling.



Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Can really be that long?

I seems that the last time I posted on this blog was back in April. Hmmm. I will have to do a bit of a catchup entry next.

I have been busy working on my Open University degree and that takes up a lot of my time. I posted the last assignment a few days ago and I am FREE until 1st October when it all starts again. You can see what I am doing by checking out my OU blog HERE.

I have started work on a Dark Star Miniatures figure called Gobzuki - a "ninja" goblin by the looks of it. This is a large figure that is extremely well moulded. 100mm high and 120mm wide! So far, I have washed it, prepped it and glued most of it together. I then gave it a prime of Mig White Primer (my favourite).


This is the box art. However, there is no historical precedent, for a change, so I can paint it how I want. As you can see, I have left the swords off for now. One is bent so I will have to straighten that as well.


As we have (once again) got rid of the television, this will be my project for the evenings - when I am not maxing out on our Stargate box set.

As I now have 17 days before the next course starts, I also have time to build a scale model as well. Having hummed and hawed - and even starting two models - I decided that I would do something that I know so I have chosen to build the 1966 Ford GT40 driven by Dan Gurney that came 3rd at Le Mans that year, and was part of the famous three car run across the line. This car was a few laps down but it looked great. I have already built the Chris Amon/Bruce McLaren car that came first. I am pleased to see that Hiroboy has just announced that they have the Fujimi kit in stock for the Denny Hulme/Ken Miles car that came second. That is a must have so I can put all three in place. I listened to the actual race on the radio back then and was rooting for Ford against Ferrari.


I won't leave it so long in future and keep your eyes open for my catch up entry in a few days.