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DeAgostini 1/8 1967 Shelby GT 500....Update! 2/5/19


MrObsessive

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  • 4 months later...

Loooooong overdue update coming up! When I got a hold of Eaglemoss and the nice lady told me that they would not be shipping new parts for the Mercedes 300 SL until mid October, I figured it's simply time to dig out the parts for the Shelby that were put away from moving and get more done on that.

A bit of a task as the parts were split into several boxes as there are so many you get with this kit. Not to mention finding the ones that you need to keep things "in order".

This is the first I've worked on this since I moved out of my other house a year ago and into the new one.

The engine intake manifold for what they give you is quite sparse to my eyes, Some kind of detail is definitely needed as far as the carbs and while I won't add every nut bolt and fitting to them, some linkage is better than none at all, especially in this scale.

The carbs represent the Holley double pumpers that were in the 1:1. At first I was going to hollow out the carbs and do sort of what I did to the 1/25 '67 Mustang I built with that carb. Then it occurred to me that if I stray too far from what they give you, it might affect the fit of something else down the road and lead to more frustration.

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Some fuel line hoses added along with linkage tying the two carbs together. Trying to get things to look in scale is a bit hard for this one as it's not a scale I normally build in. I wanted everything to look "right" without being overbearing.

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I drilled a hole in the manifold (a bit tough as its solid diecast) and make a bracket for the return spring. Later on as the rest of the engine gets built, I'll add the throttle rod along with making a possible bracket on the rearmost part of the manifold to hold it per the 1:1.

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The air cleaner element was painted silver along with everything else......I wanted to change this and paint that more of a tan to represent what you'd see if the air cleaner was taken off.

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The next step in the instructions has you moving on to the driver's side door. I didn't like the bit of orange peel I was seeing in the paint's clear coat, so I got out the polishing cloths and rubbed out the surface starting with the 3200 grit all the way up to 12,000.

After that I used both Zymol and Meguiar's Car Cleaner wax to polish things out.

I had to be careful and mask off the lower stripe as it does NOT take to rubbing out well as I suspected. Pretty sure that's some sort of decal and they recommend protecting those stripes as they can chip if one is too aggressive and not careful how the parts are stored.

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Now the door glass. DeAgostini slipped a bit of a red herring when they said the model has "opening windows". I understood this to mean that the model actually had roll up windows just like the 1:1.

No.

The models windows "open" because they attach to the door via this frame and of course they're going to open along with the door.

So, instead of going through a lot of changes re-engineering the door to take a roll up setup AFTER it's all painted, I decided to let that go and build it as is.

One annoyance though is that they chromed only the one side of the frame, leaving the rest clear. No.......I got out the BMF and decided to foil ALL of those areas that would be seen especially if the doors are open.

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Now we move on to the interior door panels. As most of you detail guys know, your panels rest on the door jamb which is BODY COLOR. It's never the same color as the panel itself, so I took the time to mask the door off and primered it gray.

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Thank goodness I got the '67 Midnight Blue from my local paint guy before I moved. Last I heard he was no longer open due to a new road they're about to put right in front of his business and he decided to sell off the place and retire.

As you can see here, I painted the outside perimeter of the door with the dark blue and I put this in my dehydrator to dry.

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Here is now the finished door with glass, handle and mirror in place. There is some slight distortion with the glass, but nothing to get too crazed about and nowhere near as bad as some kits I've seen with terrible optically distorted glass.

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The kit gives you the aluminum inset, lower trim panel and handles as separate pieces. The upper trim panel was quite tricky as it snaps into place, but you have to be careful slipping it in behind the one handle and you have to make sure the door panel is attached to the outer door before putting it on.

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Got another wheel and tire done as seen here. Like the other wheel, I dunked the entire thing in a can of lacquer thinner and stripped the silver paint off. Every Magnum five star wheel I've seen on a Shelby has always been "chromed" and not painted aluminum. Looks more realistic than what's originally in the kit.

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I wanted to scuff up the tread just a bit. A big model like this to my eyes would not look right sitting there with "shiny tread".

That's it for the time being. Looks like the instructions has me moving on to the seats. I got the one seat back done and the seat bottoms are next. I'll post pics of those when the entire thing is done.

Thanks for following along!

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Great job sir!!! Looking really nice. The door jams look great. I could not leave that one alone either. Had to paint them. I know these kits are not perfect but they are very nice. I guess if you wanted to go crazy you could. But I like them just the way they are. Just a little bit more like the door jams, etc and you have a really nice build. Fantastic job !!! I’m following along with great interest. 

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Looking good Bill.  t will look great at some of the shows next year.  I was at the Simeone museum yesterday and it seemed so empty without table of models and vendors and hundreds of people.  It was a Saturday around noon and there were less than ten visitors there counting my daughter and me.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just a mini update this time around. I'm on vacation until the 12th, so hopefully I can get more done on this.

Some of the chassis and rear end done. At first, I thought about adding fuel lines and such, but my better sense told me to let that go as a lot of this chassis is hard diecast although, part of the middle is painted plastic.

Just the same, there's no way I'm going to be turning this thing over to display the underside. This will be one heavy model once it's all built!

DeAgostini cheated a bit with the rear suspension. As you can see there are leaf springs (one for the time being) per the 1:1, but the axle has "helper" coil springs if you look closely.

I believe they did this to keep the ride height level as this will be hefty, and also to take some of the stress off of the leafs as they are indeed steel, albeit very thin.

I did overspray the rear part of the chassis and once I get to the forward part, I'll overspray the sides lightly to represent the 1:1 as they would have been painted coming down the assembly line.

This also takes away the "too clean" look that the chassis has, even though I won't be displaying this roof down. ;)

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The upper side of the gas tank shown which did include the filler neck. You can see here all the attachment screws and I sure hope the kit gives you some kind of mat for the trunk. The trunk lid opens and that would look so unkempt with all those screw heads showing through each time the trunk is open. There were so many boxes, I can't remember if there was a mat or not.

I got the first binder they give you all nice and full and now onto the second binder which no doubt will get just as full as the first.

Interesting info in each mag as they cover different types of cars and history along with the instructions.

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That's it for the time being. Next on the agenda is one of the rear wheelwells which I'll paint body color and they want another wheel to go in the tire. I'm going to do like the other two and plop that wheel into lacquer thinner, strip it and then polish it up and paint the letters on the tire after the wheel is in.

Thanks for tuning in!

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Bill I have been following along with this thread.  I can appreciate all of the upgrades you are doing to this build.  I am in the process of building the DeAg Jaguar E Type, and while I have desired to do upgrades myself I just don't have the skills yet to tackle them.  So in a sense I am living vicariously through you..smile.

looking forward to your next update.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Some more progress. I gotta tell you even though this kit is mostly screw together, there are some tricky bits and one suggestion I have for anyone that's going to be building one of these is to "pre screw" the holes before putting your parts on. Doing that saves the hassle of getting the thread started and makes for a more positive location for things.

Finally down to the last wheel to strip and get mounted on the tire. I have to say this is one of the more annoying parts of this build. Thank goodness for the dehydrator as I was able to turn the wick up to high and let the tire sit for maybe 10 minutes to soften it up enough to get the wheel in.

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After a bit of a struggle (still) I got the wheel in the tire and went ahead to scuff up the tread like the other ones.

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Here it is now mounted on the rear axle.

More of the chassis now attached with some overspray, along with rearmost part of the exhaust.

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Driveshaft and "transmission" now in the car with its brace. I kinda wish they would have made an entire transmission casting....but as I've mentioned before, I'm going to be loath to turn this thing over to show the underside. Each step I go makes this that much more heavier.

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Front wheels/tires now on with front suspension and steering linkage.

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She's finally on all four tires!

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Chassis pretty much done with exhaust in place now. You can see definitely see the size of this thing as it's literally taking up all the space inside my paint booth.

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Dashboard partially done..............

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For grins, I decided to take the main body shell out of its box and rest it on the chassis to get an idea of how it'll sit. Far from the final fitting, it's looking pretty neat. ;)

This won't be the final display place. There's no room in the bookcase for a display case which this ultimately needs to be in .

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The driver's side door I have just placed there for the moment. I don't think the hinges get fastened in until pretty much at the end.

Interesting enough, there must be some sort of magnetized material in the door jambs as the door literally "grabbed" shut when I put the door in.

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Interior all done now. That was a bit tricky as everything had to be built in sections and then attached with the screws in a sequence.

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Now it's time to get the steering wheel and shaft together with its pinion gear for the steering linkage. There's wiring involved as the horn is supposed to blow after it's all said and done. :D

I forgot to take a pic, but the rear seat does flip up and down like the 1:1 and the front seats move forward, but you have to move the seatbelts first as they don't move with the seats.

Thanks for looking!

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Rex, I'm on Issue 63 with the steering wheel linkage and wiring so at least I'm more than halfway done now! :D

Yes, over the winter I should be totally done with it. The one issue that's going to take some time is rubbing out the body. Not bad, but the clear coat is a bit too orange peeled for me. I'll also need to clear out more space on the table. This thing is simply sucking up a lot of space for working on it!

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1 hour ago, MrObsessive said:

Rex, I'm on Issue 63 with the steering wheel linkage and wiring so at least I'm more than halfway done now! :D

Yes, over the winter I should be totally done with it. The one issue that's going to take some time is rubbing out the body. Not bad, but the clear coat is a bit too orange peeled for me. I'll also need to clear out more space on the table. This thing is simply sucking up a lot of space for working on it!

Great job sir!!! They do take up a lot of space. Cannot wait to see it finished. 

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  • 1 month later...

It's nice to be off for a few days over this holiday because that means I get to spend some time at the work table and get some things done with this Shelby! I don't go back to work till Sunday night, so I can get to the downside of getting this one done.

Recently, I went to our local fabric shop to see if I could find some type of vinyl material which came close to the "Burtex" pattern seen in Mustang trunks (and other Fords) of this era.

This is what I came up with and while it's not an exact match, it's better than the primer colored trunk floor which to my eyes doesn't appear right.

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Now on to detailing the engine a bit and these ignition wires are WOEFULLY incorrect.

No.

This simply will NOT do. I ended up cutting off ALL the wires on the distributor and found some wiring which to me looks better.

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I did save the ends of their wiring which I can use as "spark plugs" and I had some wiring which had large enough insulation to make the boots.

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Here's the complete engine..........I'm not going to add every nut and bolt as I didn't want to run into later interference with other assemblies down the line. This will be fine as a bit of it will get hidden in the pretty crowded engine compartment.

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Engine is now bolted on the chassis mounts and it's there to stay. ;)

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I figured it's time to take the body out of its box permanently and start test fitting it to the completed chassis and interior.

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Here's where things start to get tricky. They supply you with the circuit board and wiring diagram. I had to really take my time with this as the wires I had to make sure were NOT in the way as far as getting them smashed or pinched when it came to routing them.

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The circuit board.............

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The circuit board mounts just under the driver's side inner fender. Once the body is on, this will be pretty cleverly hidden.

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The wires just before I plugged them all in and routed them where they should be.

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Now on to the front end. After a quite long rubbing out and polishing session with both fenders, I got the front bulkhead now mounted to them.

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At this point, I'm about to mount the front end on to the main body shell. Not long ago, I got a HUGE length of chamois cloth to use for this purpose. They recommend using some soft cloth (or towel) to have underneath the body during this phase.

I like the chamois cloths as they won't leave any scratches when polishing and they'll last almost indefinitely.

I will have to spend some time and rub out/polish the body. While the paint job isn't bad, there's still a bit of orange peel to the clear coat and a model of this size to my eyes it's more than noticeable.

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One of the things I wish DeAgostini had did was to make the rear end out of solid metal and not plastic. Just before I posted the pics to Fotki, I was trying to take a pic of the bolted on front fenders to the body and had that mounted on the chassis/interior. I'll be darned if the driver's side rear wheel snapped COMPLETELY off the axle! The part that broke off I have that setting with thick super glue and shouldn't be anymore problem later on.

Just one of those things you have to keep in mind as the weight of this thing is NO JOKE.

I also highly stress that anyone attempting to build one of these, make sure you got PLENTY of room. This sucks up a LOT of space as it's being built and I literally had to clear off a quite a bit of things on my table just to get this to not be in the way and have more issues.

That's it for now..............next update I hope to have the body totally on the chassis and fully screwed on. On my issue #85 out of 100 so this is definitely nearing its end. Thank goodness! :D

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OK, got the wheel/tire fixed and took some quick pics so you can get an idea how this will look just the body test fitted for the time being.

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As I mentioned, the next chore will be rubbing out the clearcoat on the main body shell. The door is just placed there for the time being........the hinges get screwed on their supports after I get the paint polished out.

Thanks for lookin'!

Edited by MrObsessive
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  • 3 weeks later...

Just a little update today..........

I've had to spend a considerable amount of time rubbing out and polishing the body as while the paint job is not bad..........just a bit too orange peeled in spots and there's too much real estate in my eyes to just let that go.

Especially for a car of this type. Race cars, you might be able to get away with that because, well......they're race cars.

Street cars are another matter and the paint jobs should be as smooth as possible.

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You'll notice I've masked off the stripes......very early on when I got the body panels I tried to rub out the stripes in a hidden area on the nose. Very quickly the stripes began to "run" which told me that either those stripes were not clear coated, or they were some sort of decal.

I decided to let them be as I didn't want the hassle of repainting stripes and the mess that would make. You can see here I've laid down first some Parafilm, then some Tamiya tape on top of that. I also like to cover up creases and whatnot as it never fails to rub through a corner, creating yet more work to fix it.

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LOTS of rubbing out/polishing I had to do on this hood. Finally got it to the gloss I wanted......this was not the final result. Forgot to take a pic of it after.........the orange peel is gone though which bugged me a lot.

Here's where the teeth (in my case denture) gnashing came in! DeAgostini gives you the parts to do semi scissor hinges for the hood. Well, I forgot to pre drill the hole to make it easier for the screw to go in once I needed to attach the part. Sure enough, the screw head BROKE OFF leaving the bulk of the screw INSIDE the bored hole. Cursing then took place!

At first I thought about leaving the hinges off altogether, but I searched around and found a drill bit that was very close in size to the original hole that was drilled.

VERY CAREFULLY I drilled a new hole and then I was able to attach the hinge guide as seen here. It's a good thing they do give you extra screws to use. Something like this was bound to happen.

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Here's a semi-beauty shot with the body attached (not permanent) and the hood now attached with its proper hinges.

I'm not crazy about the hinge guides being plastic. I don't know how long that'll hold up. On the other hand this won't be "played with" like a toy, so they shouldn't be too bad in holding up.

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This is not the spot where it'll be displayed once it's done. I have another area in my house where it'll be in its case.

Gotta do some dusting........yet another reason why having cases for your models is a MUST.

That's all for the moment. Next step is attaching the electrics for the head and fog lights with its wiring. After that, attaching the front end to the fenders and then it's on to putting on the trunk and lower rear valance. I'm sure I'll have to get out the polishing kit again for the trunk.

Thanks for following along!

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24 minutes ago, MrObsessive said:

Thanks Anton!

And thanks fellas for the nice words! I don't get to work on this everyday, but at least this is on the downside of getting done and it's a GOOD FEELING!

Maybe, just maybe I'll get this done before years end and I can chalk this up to a 2020 finish! :D

Sounds like a good plan! I am also hoping to round up at least one of my ongoing projects during the holidays, and that also includes my sauna project;-) 

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Just a real quick update. Since I'm snowed in and no work overnight, I figured what a good time to get some done on this thing. ;)

Got pretty much the entire front end done now.............

The hood pins were a bit of a challenge as the pins themselves are plastic, but the clamps that go through them are solid metal. Well, one of the pins broke off while handling the body trying to work with it upside down, so I ended up pinning it back in with brass and some epoxy.

That should be the way ALL small parts are mounted. Drill a hole for brass rod, cut it, then epoxy the part in. Makes for a MUCH stronger part down the road.

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One nit I have here is I notice the hood stripes don't overlap the leading edge of the hood.......instead they stop right at the edge. All pics I have of '67 Shelby's including ones I've seen live and in person, the hood stripes are always overlapped.

This I'll remedy before it's all said and done.

The next steps involve the rear end with attaching the trunk with its hinges, rear valence with taillights and wiring. Looks like I got more rubbing and out polishing to do as I see orange peel on the deck lid which MUST be gone.

More later..........

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  • 1 year later...
On 2/5/2019 at 8:11 AM, MrObsessive said:

Chuck it's funny that you mention this as this is exactly what I did a few days ago as you'll see in this mini update...........

First I gotta say that whatever DeAgostini used to paint their wheels, this was some TOUGH STUFF!

I tried using Easy Off (Yellow Can) to take off the paint and it WOULD NOT TOUCH IT! Same thing with brake fluid......some success, but waaaay too slow.

Soooo, I got the idea to start sanding away at the finish and see what exactly was underneath. I was seeing nice and bright, shiny metal! I then got out the Acetone and dunked the entire wheel in a metal can.

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After much peeling away of the paint, I got out my polishing cloths starting with 1800 grit and worked all the way up to 12,000. Some constant washing of the cloths was needed as of course, this is some dirty stuff!

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I did paint the brake caliper just a bit with some Alclad Magnesium to give just a bit of contrast with the rotor. As you can see here they give you this teeny-tiny screw to fasten the caliper to the rotor.

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I did have to put the tire in my dehydrator set at 130° for roughly 15 minutes at a time. After several tries I FINALLY got the wheel inside the tire, but this was NOT without some cursing along the way! :o

Here's the wheel and tire all nice lettered up........something I haven't done in a very long time. And to think I get to do this THREE MORE TIMES!

I can hardly wait.

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I'll polish up the wheel just a tad more, but at this point I'm done with this pretty much till later this week. Just getting the wheel and tire done alone was a real workout and to me it was a real tail kicker.

It's back to the '68 Corvette for now as I can see the next instructions for the Shelby is putting the seat together and of course another wheel and tire!

I'm thinking about adding brake and fuel lines so I need to dig out my references to see just where the brake line fitting goes in the calipers for this vintage (I have a shop manual) and also to get the 'right size' so things don't appear out of scale. I have to keep reminding myself this is 1/8 scale.

Thanks for tuning in!

Hello Bill, had to look this up for a future build. Mark found me a DeAgostini gt 500 kit. So I’m going to build it. My agora supersnake is going into the Vegas shelby museum. I will be building another one soon. The DeAgostini 500 is going another color. The agora I will probably leave alone. Hope all is good with you and your family. Thank you for this , as it will make my builds easier.

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