Another RW model, but movable..........

[PR19_Kit]

Some of you will recall I do a bit of slot racing now and then, and somehow I got talked into entering the Rockingham Club's 'American Pie' event next Sunday.

I've had a 1/32 1966/7 scale Ford Fairlane body shell knocking about for ages, and like most slotters I have more than a few spare motors, guides etc.to hand, but what I didn't have was a chassis long enough to fit the fairly large Fairlane, it's about  6.25" long, so I ordered a chassis kit and started looking for suitable candidates to model for the NASCAR race a week tomorrow............

OK, so it's not actually a Fairlane, but most of it is..............



I loved the colour scheme of this Bud Moore Engineering Mercury Comet, and the only difference between this and the Fairlane is the taillights and a slightly different grille, so I've changed the backstory to say it's an early prototype Fairlane gifted to Bud before Comet production got properly started. (Kit's 2nd Rule applies...)

I managed to get a reasonable paint mix for the main red colour and sprayed that all over, after the regulation Halfords Grey Primer of course, and then masked it up for the black bits.



After checking my holding of Tamiya shares I pressed on with the masking for the white roof etc.



And the result looks like this...........



Of course NASCAR cars are COVERED in sponsor decals and I've been drawing these up since Wednesday, and have finally got good images of all of them, and the decal sheet is a MONSTER.



Rather than cutting out all those tiny decals one by one and sticking them on, I'm going to try and print up whole panels with them already in place, and I've started doing that with the doors and the bonnet (hood....) designs. Time will tell if it works, and I may be doing the first experimental applications later today.

The chassis is bent up and assembled, and the bearings and wheels loosely screwed in place, but lots more to do on it yet.



Only a week to go before the race...............

[zenrat]

 

[PR19_Kit]

Amazingly I finished building the chassis today and it's been running in on my test track for a couple of hours. It's not slow either, so I'm quite pleased. 

Some test decals will go on during Monday, and I'll decide if to do them by panel or individually after that.

[Wardukw]

Looking good and going fast doing it  .the prefect combination 😍 😋

[PR19_Kit]

I just wrote a whole screed on how the decalling of the Comet went, with a couple of pics, and the whole lot just vanished.     

If I EVER meet anyone from Microsoft they will NOT survive the encounter! 

I'm not doing it again, got too much to do.

[McColm]

So that's how the professionals build car kits 

[PR19_Kit]

There was no 'building' involved in the body, it's a one piece moulding apart from the chrome grille and bumpers etc.

I had to ned up and assemble the chassis of course, and I'll be putting the body on it on Friday I expect.

[PR19_Kit]

Right, 2nd attempt at writing this up.

The most difficult bit about trying to make large panels of decals to fit such a car is matching the paint colour, it's always a bit of a guessing game, and I never get it exactly right, not EVER! I wasn't too bad this time, and in some light it matches quite well.

Anyway, I drew up all the teeny-weeny decals and placed them on 5 different panels per side and applied them in the usual fashion. As most of them had to be on white decal paper the edges always tend to show a bit, and after they're dried and varnished I try and paint over any white edges that show with some decanted paint from the original can.

Amazingly it worked quite well this time, at least on the RH side. I'm waiting for the varnish to dry on the LH side decal sheet before I apply them later today.

Here's the 'before' view of the LH side.



And here's the 'after' view of the RH side.



You can just see the decal red is a tad pinker than the body colour, but it's good enough to race anyway. 

The only part of the side of the car that ISN'T covered by decals is the lower part of the rear wing. I'm not quite sure why I bothered to paint the rest of it anyway.................

[Wardukw]

Damn that is looking great mate 👍 😀 😉
All that effort had been well worth it ☺️

[Old Wombat]

 

[zenrat]

 

Good job Kit.

[perttime]

What is left to do? An interior might be required?

[PR19_Kit]

What is left to do? An interior might be required?

No sooner the word..........

Here's Darel in his office, waving to the crowd as he heads for the Winner's Circle. 



The real car's driver was Darel Dieringer (yes, really......) and he had just his first name on the window sills of the car. In 1/32 scale the name decals are about 1.5 mm high, but I managed to print some for the car. 

The LH side is decalled and fully trim painted, and I'm sorting out the body mounts right now. The wheel inserts I ordered didn't show up so I'm 'scratchbodging' some others for it.

All WAS going well till I tested some different gear ratios last night and the motor smoked!   

I have a few spares, but none of them fitted this chassis, so I've dismantled an earlier car, my BA Racing Team Jaguar XJR11 that I posted about on here before, and I've used its motor and rear axle, both well run-in by now, and it goes a lot better.

I can just about see the light at the end of the tunnel for this one, it HAS to be finished by midnight tonight.

[perttime]

Somebody should really sell "magic smoke", so that you could put new smoke into the electrics, to make it work again 

[scooter]

Somebody should really sell "magic smoke", so that you could put new smoke into the electrics, to make it work again 

That'd be a big hit for the IT community