Accurate Miniatures Corvette Grand Sport

[MarkJ]

8 hours ago, Pierre Rivard said:

Thanks Mark for info on polishing compounds.

Low viscosity and thin coats is what works best for me brush painting the color. I work it in with the brush barely touching the surface and the low viscounts allows time to work the paint in multiple times. Think opposite of how we need to handle Future.

As for Future. I plan to follow what I did on my Porsche 917K project. Polishing the acrylic clear, decals and only one coat of Future in the end to seal decals.

Totally agree with the one coat of future at the end to seal the decals. I'm really going to try harder to get thinner coats and less viscosity on my next build. 

[Pierre Rivard]

I had doubts in the back of my mind that I missed the color target for the body. As I was working on interior parts with a variety of blue and gray tones (on purpose) I started wondering if I should repaint the body the color I achieved on the interior door panels & IP. At this stage the body is cleared but unpolished. I took a picture of all these parts in better light to assess the next step.

Attaching my hip photo as well as 2 color reference photos showing how that color moved dependent on lighting and photo setup

I don't think the color is spot on but not massively off so right now I don't think I will strip & repaint.

Comments / advice welcome

 

[65slotcar]

[65slotcar]

nice work on the Grand Sport  . i went  with  zero paint  Nassau  Blue   and was lazy, just  shot  from bottle.     you  could tint  with white or silver to get it closer.

[MarkJ]

 

Pierre, if that 1:1 Grand Sport in the ref pictures is your target then you have it right. I would go ahead and complete this baby. It's going to be awesome.

[Pierre Rivard]

20 hours ago, 65slotcar said:

nice work on the Grand Sport  . i went  with  zero paint  Nassau  Blue   and was lazy, just  shot  from bottle.     you  could tint  with white or silver to get it closer.

Thanks William. This is an impressive set of GS Corvettes. Are these AM 1/24 or 1/32 slot cars?

I love the Nassau blue you used for 004. Maybe just a touch dark but it's beautiful.

[Pierre Rivard]

12 hours ago, MarkJ said:

 

Pierre, if that 1:1 Grand Sport in the ref pictures is your target then you have it right. I would go ahead and complete this baby. It's going to be awesome.

Thanks Mark. I wanted more pop and I know where I slipped on my color formula but I will leave it as is. I want to finish this build and start on my summer break (I usually pause building from May to October).

[David G.]

I think the color is about as close as anyone can get.

It looks great.

David G.

[MarkJ]

1 hour ago, Pierre Rivard said:

Thanks Mark. I wanted more pop and I know where I slipped on my color formula but I will leave it as is. I want to finish this build and start on my summer break (I usually pause building from May to October).

Whoa, that's a long time. But I bet the weather is spectacular up there right now and you want to take advantage of it. I'd be doing the same thing if I were you. The weather down here is the worst we get all year . Thats why we have retractable roof stadiums. It's for the heat and mainly the humidity, which makes the heat unlivable. Our Fall, winter and springs are pretty good though, usually.

[65slotcar]

3 hours ago, Pierre Rivard said:

Thanks William. This is an impressive set of GS Corvettes. Are these AM 1/24 or 1/32 slot cars?

I love the Nassau blue you used for 004. Maybe just a touch dark but it's beautiful.

thanks Pierre,  yes they are all  AM  1/24  kits  except  the roadsters  are transkits by HRM  and  available  from Randy  at  modelbuilderswh.com      the Zero  Paint  can be hard to get sometimes, but you can tint colors  and end up with some good results.   this cobra  was  just plain silver and  tinted  with some blue. a little  more blue and it would be close to the color your going for.       what you have now looks very close  and striping  is a lot of work.  Looking forward   to seeing your completed  Grand Sport.

[Pierre Rivard]

Interior work very straightforward.

I used the gauge decals from the VRM sheet

Added seat belts with lever style Detail Master PE. Very detailed instructions but I took a few shortcuts considering this is not open cockpit.

The only other add is a fire extinguisher.

 

[Pierre Rivard]

The body has been polished with 6000-8000-12000 cloths and then Tamiya fine and finish compounds.

Ready for decals

 

[MarkJ]

Pierre, My gosh, that body turned out amazingly. No one would ever guess in a million years that you brush painted this baby.  It looks better than most spray-painted models I've seen. The interior looks great too. I just can't get over the results you got with the body. Its through the roof impressive.

[Pierre Rivard]

23 hours ago, MarkJ said:

Pierre, My gosh, that body turned out amazingly. No one would ever guess in a million years that you brush painted this baby.  It looks better than most spray-painted models I've seen. The interior looks great too. I just can't get over the results you got with the body. Its through the roof impressive.

Thanks Mark. Funny thing, when I looked at the posted picture I thought I had to go back and do more polishing on the front end but I can't see it with my own eyes. Possibly the same phenomenon as the camera adding 10 pounds to the actress...lol.

I'm not touching it for fear of doing more bad than good. Moving on to decal day. Yippee!

[MarkJ]

1 hour ago, Pierre Rivard said:

Thanks Mark. Funny thing, when I looked at the posted picture I thought I had to go back and do more polishing on the front end but I can't see it with my own eyes. Possibly the same phenomenon as the camera adding 10 pounds to the actress...lol.

I'm not touching it for fear of doing more bad than good. Moving on to decal day. Yippee!

Good plan. You don't need to touch it. Just get those decals on, and the future, and that baby is really going to be through the roof Awesome looking. Cant wait. 

[James2]

Absolutely enjoying this build, your is coming along nicely. 

I had a great time building two of these. Here's a link if you'd like to see it. http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/topic/132727-gs-corvette-003/

[Ace-Garageguy]

Remarkable finish for being brush-painted. Nice job.

[Pierre Rivard]

12 hours ago, James2 said:

Absolutely enjoying this build, your is coming along nicely. 

I had a great time building two of these. Here's a link if you'd like to see it. http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/topic/132727-gs-corvette-003/

Thank you for sharing this. I reviewed your build process with great interest. The kit has it's quirks and a few dimensional misses but I still think it's great. 

[Pierre Rivard]

10 hours ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Remarkable finish for being brush-painted. Nice job.

Thanks Bill. I moved to the city in a condo, no work shop so airbrush or rattle can is not an option for me. Brush painting has required some technique development but I'm happy with the results I am now getting.

[Pierre Rivard]

Decals done. Simple design yet the center stripe was a bit tricky to do.

I still have a dozen items on my list to complete this build. Most of them easy but 2 requiring some thinking. The clear headlamp covers and the wipers will need some work to look good.

 

[Bainford]

Beautiful work. Brilliant work on the finish. Things are looking great.

[absmiami]

Yup 

those carbs are really big - this is the display engine at the Simeone Collection …

[Pierre Rivard]

58 mm. I measured them and they are to scale. Makes for bad ass engine for sure!

Edited July 8, 2022 by Pierre Rivard

[papajohn97]

Just walked into the theater on this WIP and so glad I did. I built one of these a few years back and I recall it being a humbling scale modeling experience. I remember multiple fit struggles particularly in the front end, engine mounting, exhausts/ chassis interference and getting that hood to close all the way!  Lots of “unconstrained design ambiguity” in this AM kit! This very well documented WIP that you have been posting will be tremendously helpful to me if I ever tackle the second one of these GS’s I have in my stash - thank you Pierre!

A side note on the subject of “clear-coat” sealing of decals. Future should work great and I only wanted to throw out a second option that I recently had a good experience with. My CC of choice has always been Tamiya TS-13 rattle can but it tends to attack decals when the final wet coat is applied. I read on another modeling forum about “Mr. Color UV Cut GX Super Clear Coat” lacquer-based bottle paint being decal-friendly (I believe it’s tolulene-free). I tried it thinned 1:1 with Mr. Color Leveling Thinner and airbrushed over some very thin/fragile IndyCals (applied over a TS-13CC) and it worked fantastic even with heavy wet coats. 

Edited July 9, 2022 by papajohn97
Spelling

[Pierre Rivard]

Final items done on this build. Glass, exterior trim etc.

I tried something different on the clear headlamp covers: Painting a small edge and the mating surface prior to bonding to hide the glue joint.

I tried to twist the wipers to improve the orientation on the glass with limited success. I might eventually replace them with PE parts.

So she is finally done. I will get the photo setup installed and post pictures in the Under Glass Other Racing section later today.