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ShawnS

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    Shawn Shirley

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  1. Hi guys, I've dragged this thread up again to let you know that I have been working on my HQ Holden Kingswood and I have noticed that the plastic that DDA uses isn't regular styrene as I have tried to use Tamiya cement (both extra thin and regular) on some parts and there was no adhesion what so ever. The cement just dried on the surface between the parts and at no stage did it bond two parts together convincingly and there was no evidence of any solvent effect. So if you plan to modify one of these kits use CA glue to avoid any frustration. Cheers, ShawnS
  2. Thanks guys. I'm glad you like them as much as I do.
  3. Hello everyone, These are my final finished builds for this year. These first 3 are ones that raced in 1983-84 under our Group C touring car rules. Between 1960 and 1992 Australian touring car racing had always been based on production style cars, Group C started in 1973 and finished at the end of 1984. There were many different rules for Croup C but the main overview was that the cars still had to retain most production car visual and mechanical similarities. Non production wings and flares were introduced in 1980 and made the cars look meaner and allowed bigger wheels and tyres. Another aspect was that the cars had to retain a full interior with two front seats, a rear seat, factory door cards and full carpeting, although by 1984 rear seats and carpeting seemed to disappear on most RX-7s. Hasegawa's '79 IMSA GTU kit was a good place to start but it's the early version of the SA-22 RX-7 and as most Group C RX-7s were the later version I had to combine the GTU kit with the late version of the road car. The differences are the tail lights and the bumpers. Another big difference is the front air dam. The GTU air dam is too big compared to the Group C so I made my own by combining the late version front bumper and the air dam from the Monogram RX-7 and some evergreen. You can see just how deep the kits GTU airdam is compared to my modified version (the one in primer). This first one is the 1983 Australian Touring Car Championship Winner of Allan Moffat. The wheels are my own 3D designs and prints and the decals are from LB Productions. The decals are great to work with and respond beautifully to setting solutions. I rebuilt the kit roll cage, detailed the dash and added some minor detail under the hatch. I also designed and printed out a new muffler. This one is the ghostbusters car from Bathurst 1984 driven by Graham Moore and Peter McKay. They started 30th and recorded a DNF after 116 laps. The wheels are my own 3D designs and prints and the decals are from LB Productions. I rebuilt the kit roll cage, detailed the dash and added some minor detail under the hatch. I also designed and printed out the exterior mirror and a new muffler. The decal sheet has some minor inaccuracies but I was still happy to use it. This one is the Yellow Pages car of Tony Kavich and Phil Alexander also from Bathurst 1984 they started 43rd and also DNF'd. The wheels are my own 3D designs and prints, I rebuilt the kit roll cage, detailed the dash and added some minor detail under the hatch. I also designed and printed out the mirror and a new muffler. The decals were printed by Custom Hobby Decals from my artwork. This is one of my favourite liveries of Aus touring car racing so I just had to do it. and finally this one isn't a Group C but a Group A from our first full Group A Bathurst race in 1985. Driven by John Bundy and Norm Carr. They qualified 50th after battling a stubborn car that just didn't want to go and DNF'd after blowing the diff. This build was done using left over parts from the other 3 builds. It has a scratch built roll cage, 3D printed wheels, tyres, exterior mirrors and muffler. The decals are also from Custom Hobby Decals from my artwork. The build time for these 4 was around 12 months on/off, I absolutely enjoyed the Hasegawa kits and I can recommend them to anybody. Cheers ShawnS
  4. Thanks guys. I did document my progress and the extra work that went into this build so I will throw in some extra pics with explanations. The kits come with full exhaust molded in to the underbody so I had to remove the exhaust and fill in the gaps. The front suspension and cross member have a big guard molded with it and I had to remove the guard and rebuild the whole lot. I removed the fuel tank from the underbody and rebuilt the area to represent the pressed steel floor of the 1:1 AE86 I used the under bonnet bracing from ZoomOn. Unfortunately the ZoomOn PE is made for the long nosed Trueno kit so I had to trim the front to fit. I got it to work. The engine bay in the kits doesn't come with a detailed firewall so I had to make a new one. Also note in this pic the engine mount bases I added to the front cross member as the kit also doesn't come with any type of engine mounts and the steering shaft that I made as well. Engine detail in progress with the heater hoses and a water pump from a Fujimi BMW. This pic also shows the engine mounts that were scratch built too. Most of this is hidden on the finished model. The oil cooler is more hidden detail. Winged sump, dipstick, alternator with brackets, and a pulley and belt setup that is cut down from the original kit item. After the fan belt broke during assembly I replaced the pulleys with individual 3D printed items and used black tape for the fan belt. (sorry no pics). The stripped out interior in the TRD Levin kit doesn't come with door cards and the road car items weren't accurate for my model so I had to scratch build the door cards. 1. The wheels were too deep so I had to fix that too. 2 and 3. To get the correct depth I made a spacer and glued it to the side of a razor saw and pressed it down firmly on the mat. 4. I gently moved the wheel across the saw blade to get an even cut around the wheel. 5. With the wheel now separated into two pieces I sanded them down to the correct width. 6. Original wheel on the left and the modified one on the right. The tyres come from the old Fujimi BMW M3 racing kit. And finally please don't think for a second that everything went well. Just as I peeled the tape off the roof after touching up some of the red paint the white paint decided to spectacularly let go of the roof. After 20+ years of using Tamiya TS sprays I had never seen this before. I stripped the paint from the rest of the roof and repainted the whole car except for the black and managed to prevent a full strip and repaint job. I was so annoyed that I walked away from the model for over a year. There you go guys, just a little sample of the big effort I put into to this little car. Thanks for looking and thanks for your kind words and comments. Cheers ShawnS
  5. Hi Guys, Here is the Toyota Sprinter that started 63rd and finished 26th in the 1984 Bathurst 1000 driven by Australian legend Bob Holden with co-driver Alexandra Surplice. This build took parts from these 3 different kits. The GT apex kit supplied the most parts with the wheels and racing interior coming from the TRD Levin. The Trueno kit supplied the Sprinter tail lights. Those Aoshima AE86 kits were pretty good to deal with with crisp detail and great fitment but they don't all come with engine detail so do your research if you want one with an engine. This is the car in action. and this is the model. Too many changes, tweaks and additions to mention and there is a lot of hidden detail on the engine that was ultimately a waste of my time but as we all know it just has to be that way. I did the fabrication and the painting at the same time that I did this Corolla 1600 GT last year but I did the final construction just a couple of weeks ago. It was good to finally finish this one after walking away from it last year and it makes a nice addition to my shelf. Thanks for looking and if you have any questions please feel free to ask. Cheers ShawnS
  6. I have the plain Kingswood version and something that nobody seems to have mentioned yet is that the front seats are flexible vinyl. The seat back in my kit is warped. I won't be using it anyway but still... Obviously it's a throwback to the diecast history of the kit but I think that in this day and age large vinyl parts are not a great way to go about things. Another thing that has me scratching my head is that the front and rear seats have different upholstery patterns. They could tool up different parts for 4 kits but this one they couldn't be bothered with????? One question for others with this kit- Does your bonnet have massive sink marks? Mine has some savage sink marks on top and I was wondering if anyone else has this too. Cheers ShawnS
  7. Ha, completely scratchbuilt items are still a option as there are things that my basic 3D design program and 3D drawing skills aren't capable of. The printer is good for doing parts that I don't have the patience to mess around with. I definitely don't intend on printing everything. I know what you mean about the interior but happily the real car was a brand new car delivered to the team by Ford so the interior would have been brand spankin' new as well. Thanks everyone for the comments. Cheers ShawnS
  8. Hi guys, This is part 2 of a 2 Cortina build. Here is the first. This is the car that Ian Geoghegan won the 1964 Australian Touring Car Championship with. It's from the Lotus Cortina kit from The Motor Museum in miniature in the UK. Interior door panels, dashboard, seats, arm rests, window cranks, interior door handles, steering wheel, gear stick, floor mat, exterior door handles, exterior mirror, grille, tail light surrounds, leaf springs, control arms, bumpers, rear brake drums, the front brake ducts and the tach gauge are all 3D drawn and printed by me. The wheels and diff are from Tamiya's Lotus 7 kit. Paint is Tamiya TS-14 Black with Tamiya bright red for the interior and the decals are from Custom hobby decals. This car has a different interior than the 1963 4 door version as well as wider tyres, a side exhaust and big brake ducts under the front. These are two models that I have always wanted to do and I am very happy with the end result. Thanks for looking. Cheers ShawnS
  9. Hi everybody, It's time for something that doesn't pop up on too many forums, a Cortina GT 4 door. This started out as the Lotus Cortina resin kit from the Motor Museum in Miniature in the UK. It's a fairly good kit but as always I just have to do it my way. One thing that I originally needed to do was to scratchbuild the interior to GT spec as the GT Cortina interior was totally different from the Lotus, and although I did start to do that in 2020 it got too daunting so I put the model on the back burner. At the start of last year I taught myself 3d drawing with the aim to eventually get a 3D printer and in August I did just that and got a Photon mono 4k. It's a good unit and it was a fun challenge to turn my drawings into printed parts. As this build progressed I realized that I needed to print more than just the interiors and I drew and printed more and more parts as time went on. The parts that I printed were; Interior door panels, dashboard, seats, arm rests, window cranks, interior door handles, steering wheel, gear stick, floor mat, exterior door handles, exterior mirror, grille, tail light surrounds, leaf springs, control arms, bumpers, rear brake drums and the tach gauge. This is the car that Harry Firth and Bob Jane won the Bathurst 500 mile race in 1963 with. I converted the 2 door body to 4 doors and added the side trim from evergreen strips. The wheels and tyres are from Tamiya's Lotus 7 kit. I used embossing powder for the carpet and the paint is Tamiya TS-86 pure red and TS-26 white with Tamiya bright red used for the seats and door panel inserts. The decals are from Custom Hobby Decals from my own artwork. I kept the underside nice and neat without any plumbing. The diff is from Tamiya's Lotus 7 kit and the exhaust, tank and front uprights are the only unmodified kit parts in this pic. It was a mostly fun but occasionally frustrating build but definitely a rewarding end result. This is part 1 of a two car build, the other is a '64 2door GT so keep an eye out on the forum for that too. Thanks for looking. Cheers ShawnS Here is part 2
  10. Here are some wheels that have been painted with SMS chrome over SMS Jet black. SMS chrome is not similar to Molotow but AK Super Chrome is almost identical to Molotow and you can paint that over whatever you like.
  11. I've just started playing with this paint myself and I have found it to be a lot more user friendly than Alclad. I could never get a consistent finish from Alclad as it seemed to go from not quite enough coverage to too much in no time at all but with SMS I have found that not only does it get to the chrome effect quicker and easier but it allows you to over do it without losing too much of that chrome effect. It also seems to be more durable than Alclad and I was able to run my finger on the test spoon without too much loss of shine. I will try to take some pics soon.
  12. I decided earlier this year that I would buy myself a 3d printer, so I downloaded Designspark and taught myself 3d drawing whilst I waited for a good 3d printer at an entry level price and eventually prices for the Anycubic Photon Mono 4k came down so I grabbed one and a wash and cure unit as well. So after a month of printing this is what I have come up with so far. I will mostly be using it for wheels and other small parts that I require. Here are some wheels. The tyre is also printed but I haven't done a full set yet. One thing that I need lots of is fire extinguishers. Usually I scratchbuild a batch of them at a time but now I can print as many as I want. Bullet mirrors are a hard to find aftermarket item that I will also need several of. Some mufflers too. I have a Mazda RX3 in my future but the kit tail light units in the kit were the wrong ones so.... The one single part that I have always wanted on a model was Ford Australia's Snowflake wheels so I did these once I was confident in my drawing abilities. I have to say that I was losing a bit of love for the whole hobby but now having a 3d printer has opened up many more options for which models to build. The problem now is needing to spend less time printing and more time building. Speaking now as someone new to printing if I can offer some advice to others looking to start resin printing- Expect expense. 3d printing is expensive to start and also you will need to spend money on consumables. Resin, FEP sheets, your chosen cleaning fluid, paper towels, gloves etc all disappear quickly and it all adds up. Also If you are looking to do your own drawing an old slow computer won't cut it so you may need an upgrade. You need space. You will have a printer, a wash and cure station, storage for consumables and somewhere you can prep and finish your parts afterwards. You will also need a bin close at hand. Mess. Printing can be messy no matter how hard you try to keep everything clean the resin seems to find a way to get everywhere you don't want it to go. Use low odour resin. There are plenty of warnings about toxic fumes from normal resin so find a resin with low odour and you won't have to worry about that. Use water washable resin as is has almost no smell/fumes. Do your research but don't be intimidated or overwhelmed by the information overload that you will come across especially on YouTube. Figure out which printer set up you want that suits your needs and budget and once you start printing things you can figure out the small details such as slicing, exposure times etc. Have fun. Cheers ShawnS
  13. Hi again guys. This one is the Toyota that raced in the 1985 Bathurst 1000 in the hands of Drew Price and John Smith. They started 41st and finished 17th and won the 2 litre class. The model is made by combining the Fujimi Levin and the Aoshima TRD Levin kits. The body, tail lights, windows and mirror are the only Fujimi parts and the Aoshima kit supplied most of everything else. Putting the Aoshima chassis and interior into the Fujimi body wasn't a straight swap and the whole nose required quite a bit of fiddly work to get right. I made new door cards, reconfigured the roll cage and detailed the dash and added air jacks and hoses. The chassis was left alone except for a side exhaust pipe. This model was being built along side another AE86 with full engine, chassis and interior detail but that is a long way from completion. Thanks for looking. Cheers ShawnS
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