willimo

I like to use a silver as a light blocker. In this case, I would paint a silver between the primer and the black headliner. Usually, the "metallic" pigment in the silver paint is opaque enough to block light transfer.

I had a package that was supposed to arrive today, not. Still stuck in the sorting center of the slightly bigger city I live near. This actually happens a lot to me. Guess what? No big deal. I'll get it tomorrow. I'm not going to sit here and say that the workers are lazy or incompetent though. I know they are working just as hard as I am, and in a system that they understand better than I do, just like I'm doing a job they know nothing about. I'm not saying I've never had a package lost, or sometimes they don't come later than was predicted. I'm saying I don't care. It's irrelevant. That a package goes from one point to another, and back to the first point, before getting to the final point... What's the point? It got there. Yay!

We have too much information and none of it is meaningful. If all we got was an email from the vendor that it shipped and would get to us in 3-7 days (or whatever) and then a package in our mail box 3-7 days (or whatever) later, we wouldn't be wondering "What's up with the post office?" We would just be glad it worked.

Hey y'all, I saw a video on YouTube about the Bugatti EB110 (NOT Doug Demuro) and it got me considering building one. I have two Monograms in my stash because I've always loved this perfect little weirdo car. I was excited to build one as a practice for a diorama and then do a very serious job on the second (this may be more of a commitment than I can handle right now). I found that one of my Monogram kits is incomplete! While considering replacing it, I started wondering, should I get the Heller kit instead? If I get one each, which should be the basis for the "serious" build? Basically, is the Heller Bugatti EB110 kit: 1. Any good? 2. Better than the RoG (old Monogram)? Thanks!

I don't know if they're even still around, but I started modifying my Revell '32 using Replicas and Miniatures of Maryland parts until I was using zero Revell parts. It cost a lot, but those parts are so finely molded, Tamiya could only dream of doing what they do.

Or, we could just make better kits here, in the home market? Why isn't that the dream?

As a young(er) person in this hobby (lol, nearing 40) I've spent so much time being lectured by the old guard about how stuff doesn't get made because of licensing issues, I don't even want to hear about it being a limited engine. Get over it. Cry about it. Write Revell a letter about how they should have done it instead with a weirdly chopped roofline. Oh wait, they're bankrupt from making the models y'all wanted. Also kits cost $40+ now. Not under $20. Not $5. Not a nickel. We live in the future. Act like it. Ban me lol.

The polarizing effect is from a polarizing filter on my camera. I use it to eliminate, or at least minimize, reflections and glare off of painted surfaces. On 1:1, it can make the glass clear, but it was doing wonky stuff with the Tamiya plastic. Thanks!

The GT-86 by itself: (That's my favorite picture of it) This is also all Eightyone detail parts. The full Rocket Bunny v1 kit is their resin transkit, and the wheels are their resin Enkei RS05RR. I used tires from the new-ish Aoshima VIP modular wheels to allow them to sit right flat on the ground despite significant negative camber. I made the little winglets ahead of the mirrors by just filling the holes for the boxer emblem in the kit part, and bending some strip styrene before gluing it in place. Then I just sanded the contour as I cleaned it up. Brakes are from the parts bin, using I think old SAS PE and resin cailpers, seats are Hobby Design, and the wing endplates are the detail-up PE that Eightyone offers in addition to the v1 transkit. I added turbo parts from Eightyone and my parts bin to make it go as well as show. Thanks for looking! Comments, criticisms welcome.

The BRZ by itself: The detail parts are all from Eightyone. I used their CCW classic wheels, the Rocket Bunny v2 spoiler, and their Craftsquare mirrors. I added carbon to the front valence, as well as to the trunk garnish and along the top edge of the spoiler, to simulate a carbon part that was not completely painted (though I know the 1:1 is FRP). I left the engine stock. It was a simple, shake the box build but it was fun.

I posted a while ago in an introductory thread, introducing myself and several of my builds. Well, since I build so slowly, it's only now that I finally finished one of them (plus a friend).

To prove that I'm not just making up the bits about scratching an engine bay, here is the EK4 Civic I mentioned elsewhere, that I have been working on for a decade and over four states. This is NOT the Revell kit, which A. Is the wrong scale and B. Has insane proportions. I will attach a handful of pictures showing its progress and parts I've scratch built for it, including a valve cover set on top of a resin copy of the Sakatsu F20C, upper strut tower bar, and wheels made a smaller, more Civic-appropriate diameter... And finally, the last thing sitting in a box on the shelf that I feel like sharing is this Aoshima Hilux, featuring a wooden flatbed, 2JZ from the Tamiya Supra, and a scratchbuilt keg as a fuel tank. Loads of other modifications to come on this, including a front cut for old-school hotrod flair, and a simplified version of the Civic's jig for holding it up during setting up suspension for the proper ride height. Clearly, like many of you here, I have modeler's ADD. I have a huge number of other models in various levels of completion, too, but these are the highlights. I will put some completed ones in the Under Glass section soon. Thanks for looking!

I don't have enough going on to start a workbench thread, so I'll just introduce myself here and give a brief overview of what I'm working on. I'm will, I just moved to Texas, I have lived just about everywhere. Here are some things I am working on: My current, main focus project is this pair of Midori EK4 Civics made from Fujimi kits. One built as factory stock (not box stock, new mirrors, wheels, and some detailed interior) and one as a curbside that will match my 1:1 project, featuring scratch side skirts, rear spoiler (carbon fiber underside, painted top), Hobby Design wheels, seat, the other seat from the Fujimi DC2 Integra and brake faces using the plastic parts from the same Integra kit. Waiting on mirrors, scratchbuilt fog lamps, scratch Wink mirror inside, and exhaust. These a quick builds to get back in the swing of things after moving, and part of a larger project of all Civics from 1984-2005 using the Tamiya EA, upcoming Aoshima/Beemax EF, Hasagawa EG, Fujimi EK, Fujimi EP, and a Transfomers toy modified into a model of an FA. I am also working on a pair of RAUH-welt Begriff Porsches, using C1 Models transkits on a Tamiya base kit. The green one is a model of the famous, and first stateside RWB, Pandora One, and the one in primer is going to be Bad Luck, a yet unbuilt car not too unlike the Stella Artois car. It features a modified rear end, which required a LOT of cutting of the solid resin rear bumper to make it look like a cut away 1:1 part, engine from a Fujimi Enthusiast 911, and a scratch/bashed turbo setup. I am pretty far along on this Tamiya FR-S/GT86 featuring a Rocket Bunny V1 widebody kit, from Eightyone81. It also has Eightyone81 wheels, parts bin seats, and a scratch/bashed turbo set up on an engine which I had cut out of the engine bay to detail before reinstalling it on a simple scratchbuilt cradle. Also on the work bench is a Tamiya S2000 with Spoon aero, also from a C1 Models transkit. The wheels are from Aoshima but modified to be a smaller diameter. There will be a pile of other modifications, including a Sakatsu engine and scratchbuilt engine bay and a bunch of other stuff I haven't even though about yet.

If you want to address this issue dismissively, the easiest thing to say is "those guys that are building them, are not going to shows and entering their builds." And you can further lighten your critical load by not asking why those guys are not going to shows and entering their builds. I think the last couple of pages have said what the rest of the thread has so clearly demonstrated - it's because of the attitudes toward these cars. I am right there with a few of you and am applauding the guys of Diversified Scalerz; good on them for getting together and setting up their own show. That's great! But is everyone else blind to the problem that this illustrates? Model building in general is already a small, niche hobby. How many of us go to hobby shops that keep their lights on with plastic models? None. In the last couple decades I've watched the lucrative RC market grow and the plastic model corner shrink in every hobby shop I've regularly gone to. Car modeling is even smaller and even more niche. Can we afford to divide up and have one show for primarily American cars and one for primarily imports? No way. There is just no way that this hobby can thrive if it gets more and more fragmented. [ As a kind of aside - because this touches on something else I've been seeing - it's really strange to me that companies like Revell and AMT have felt as though they have seriously courted the tuner market with their efforts. The AMT F&F Supra was a joke, and while the Revell Civics and Integra are decent, they clearly aren't aimed at adult and serious modelers with their grossly wrong wheels, engine choices, and trims. No 96-00 Civic hatches came with sunroofs, or that engine in the US. No 92-95 Coupes were trimmed as an Si, and this kit and the Eclipse did not come with factory front and rear bumpers. And, to top it off, because some of us punk kids are real, real sticklers, not only are they the wrong scale to fit on the shelf with the rest of our Japanese subjects, but they're undersized even for 1:25. Don't get me wrong, I built a pile of these before I was skilled enough to make it worthwhile cutting the hood open on my Fujimi Civic hatch and stratchbuilding a motor and engine bay (yes, really). But if they are going to say, "Well, those kits don't sell," they could have at least made a full hearted effort. Too bad. ] It would be great if model clubs would promote tuner or exotic or import classes - I have seen a few where the annual theme was somesuch and they seemed to do well - and it wouldn't take much effort. If you're afraid of budget or prizes, make it an exhibition class, and see what happens. Or, do like all the SCCA clubs I've autocrossed with do (who were faced with a very similar crisis of new kinds of cars with new kinds of modifications showing up without any class to compete in competitively). Make classes for everything and give trophies out based on attendance - less than four entries? Only one prize. More? Three. None? Leave it open for next time. Again, it's great that Diversified Scalerz are out there doing their own thing, but are we really so ambivalent to the health of the hobby that we're willing to split up and marginalize? I don't think so. Now let me take some pictures and post some stuff so I'm not solely participating here in this thread.

I lurk here and I finally had to register because of this topic. Tom is completely correct. Guys who build tuner cars get runned off. We're not just punk kids, nor is the tuner community dying. It's gotten a lot more specialized, and a lot more sophisticated, so it doesn't have the visibility that it had back when Fast and the Furious was a new thing. Keep in mind the cars in the Fast and the Furious were already out of date when the movie came out, so when print publications did print a tuner in their show coverage (it was always in the show coverage, never in features) the car was "inspired by the Fast and the Furious movies," it was insulting to us regular tuner car modelers. Things have changed a LOT in the decade and a half since that movie came out. But the tuner car hobby and movement and community is just as strong as ever. Don't believe me? That's fine. There's another, just as vibrant forum out there that only in the last few years added a subforum specifically for muscle cars and hotrods because people were complaining that they weren't represented well among the Euro cars and tuner cars. There are companies out there constantly introducing new and awesome kits, transkits, and detail parts specifically for tuner cars. Google Eightyone81. Hobby Design. C1 Models. Aoshima keeps introducing kits of older, iconic tuner cars (they are pairing with BeeMax to do an EF Civic, which will be an easily convertible motorsport subject) as well as brand new, super trendy cars like the Rocket Bunny modified FR-S that took the tuner community by storm this last spring (they did two runs of this kit and sold out within a couple weeks each time). It's ok if you don't know what Rocket Bunny is - but please keep in mind that just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there. It's really frustrating when people dismiss the little Japanese cars as a "fad" for people who can't afford anything else. I promise you, my 1:1 project Civic makes my wife as mad as anyone's. It's just a different flavor, and telling people your ice cream is the best and everyone else's is ok if that's all they can afford is pretty off-putting. I like my rocky road as much as you like your vanilla bean. I've dedicated a LOT of my energies to rocky road, thank you very much. Just like the 1:1 "tuner" community, the model tuner community is growing. It's growing in size and sophistication. It's growing in interest as us young punk kids come inside and calm down long enough to build a model. I think a lot of y'all would be shocked to see what's out there. What's available in kits and parts, and what's being built. But the attitudes in this thread are a really great example of why tuners don't show up at the model show, or meet, or on the street. We're tired of the derisive looks and the absolute lack of respect. I just moved to a new city and tomorrow I'm going to a Build-n-Bull at the local hobby shop to check out the community here. I was excited about it. Now I dread the inevitable reaction from all the "real" builders out there making muscle cars and hotrods when I pull out my Fujimi EK4 kit. Thanks a lot.