1/16 Scale Army Vega Funny Car - Finished 10/14/2018

[Dogfish_7]

Thanks for the link. Been wanting to try it out.

[Jbishop9709]

i have the same kit but im not that detailed

[GoatGuy]

Chris - the fire bottle and lower panel updates are great !!! I love it. Can't wait to see what you do next.

[Mooneyzs]

Bob... Thank you. That glue has worked great for me. I actually want to place an order for another newer type of glue from him. I wouldn't say its different but he's labeled that one as a Thinned Blend which he mentions would be good for photo-etch. My guess is that it is the same glue only a thinner mix. which may not be bad because you could get a piece of photoetch laid down and maybe you can wick the glue underneath it with it being thinner.

Bruce.... You are welcome. I would recommend giving it a try. and if don't get something in the right spot you can pop it off really easy right away. Wipe the area with water to clean it and start again. I did that a few times with the Dzus fasteners.

Justin... It's a fun kit to build. Now I know I have taken this kit farther in detail that most would but I wanted to challenge myself to see if could build a highly detailed build and this build has kept pushing my limits. Honestly I am burnt out on it but I need to get it done...lol

Dave... Thank you my friend. I have a real quick update that I am going to post here in a minute and hopefully this weekend I will get some great bench time and possibly some good updates. One of the things I want to accomplish this weekend should be a pretty big update hopefully...lol

[Mooneyzs]

Good Morning Guys.... It's time for an early morning teaser on what I worked on for what felt like hours last night because I was trying to get it right. But I was able to get a little work done to the body. I had gone thru and drilled all of the holes out due to the paint build up in them. Then I decided to get the black painted in on the grille and front window ledge. Which means that I am a step closer to being able to get the decals on. It's a really good feeling to know that I am so close to getting the decals on because I am Anxious to see what the body will look like with them on. 

I started out by painting the front window tray:

 

Then it was time work on the front grille. I think it turned out ok. Honestly it could be better but it was a pain in the Butt, still thinking about touching a few spots up but don't want to mess anything up...lol:

 

Here is the spot that I am not 100% happy with things. I am thinking if I could lay some tape down across the grille to get that straight line I am looking for:

 

Here are a couple of angled shots of the front end:

[Dragline]

Chris, what I would do for a truly sharp line that is also easy is this.

 Overfill the grill with Acrylic paint and then wipe away with a tightly balled rag with a 50/50 solution of water/ammonia.

 

 

It'll be straight and perfect.

[gasser59]

Another solution would be use a Micron fine point black marker using the edge f the above louver for the marker to rest against as you make your line.

 

[Mooneyzs]

Bob... Thank you.  I never thought about a 50/50 mix of water and ammonia. I did do the tight wrapped towel with water but the problem I had was the since the grille vents are stepped that I didn't get as good of a result as I wanted maybe with this mix of water and ammonia I would get better results. I wil have the try it on one to see how it goes.

Brad.... Thanks brother. I had never thought of that Idea. I just may need to try this. My one thought was to take some fine line tape and paint and use it as a border. But the micron fine point black marker may work better since I am afraid of having paint bleed thru the tape.

you know I will show you guys the results when I am done with it.

[Mooneyzs]

Alright Fellas... I messed with the grill some more and I am thinking about calling this good. but I still see room for improvement in my own eyes. Anyway here is what the grill looks like now.

 

 

 

 

[Dragline]

How did you do it Chris? It looks good.

[Mooneyzs]

Bob... Thanks. I used both  both your's and Brads ideas combined.  Mixing the water and ammonia together worked pretty good.  Thank you for the suggestion. Never thought about doing that before.

[Dragline]

My pleasure. I use that technique quite a bit to clean up lines. I did the headlight buckets on my Reher Morrison car the first time I realized that ammonia removes Acrylic paint. i got super tight separation and those buckets look good. I use it for panel lines as well. I also used this technique for the blue/white seats in my Malco Gasser mustang. By using Duplicolor enamel for the white base i was able to use Tamiya metallic blue for the blue tuck and roll for a very clean appearance.

 

 

Go with what works, find new ways of doing things. Keep on truckin.

[Mooneyzs]

Bob... Its much appreciated. That is one thing that I love about this board is that we all are here to share and learn from one another. It's totally cool to try new things and find out that there may be an easier way to do some things. I am going to have to try it for panel lines.

[Mooneyzs]

 It's time for another quick short teaser on a few items that I got painted up last night and just done doing a little weathering to them. Slowly but surely I am getting there. Now I can't wait to get these items detailed out. Here are the Distributor cap and the Mallory Ignition box.....

Here is the Mallory Ignition box. I would like to make a gasket that goes in between the body and the top cover, then I will add the 4 screws to the top. I also need to add the studs for the positive and negative terminals on the top cover.  As well as the ignition wire and I can't forget the Mallory logo:

 

And here is the Mallory Super Mag II Distributor cap painted and weathers just ever so slighting to add some character to it:

 

Upclose shot of the cap:

[Dragline]

Totally killer.......

[BrentFoster]

The cap looks awesome. Amazing what weathering can do. Grille looks great too chris, nice work

[Metalmad]

Chris nice updates on the details that you have been adding to this build which I have been watching so that I might try on my Mongoose Funny Car build.

 

[futurattraction]

Gracious, sakes alive...  Small but killer update, brother!

[Mooneyzs]

Bob... Thank you.

Brent... Thanks. I wanted to give it that slight used look. But wish i was better at weathering. I guess I just need to practice some more...lol

Seth... Thank you. Feel free to try anything you have seen me post here.

Scott.... Thanks my friend.... I was wanting to get more done yesterday but I had a BBQ/Pool Party at a friends yesterday. But today I have off and other than a few house chores today, I am going to try and spend as much time at the bench as I can. Hopefully I will have some sort of updates later tonight.

[gasser59]

Don't kid yourself Chris, every small little update is a milestone. They all look sooo good.

[AZ Boy]

I agree with Brad.  That weathering looks great, Chris.

[cook_dw]

[Mooneyzs]

Brad... Thank you... I guess I need to look at the updates like that...lol

Aaron... Thank you. I am super glad I decided to weather it. I think it turned out better that way.

Darrell... Thanks.

 

[Mooneyzs]

Well guys I got some more work done today. I worked more on the Mallory Ignition box and started to make the details for it. I pushed my soldering techniques to see if I could try something new. Anyway here are a few shots of what I have gotten done so far today....

Here I have taken some Detail master .0125" dia wire including the sleeve and I had used some Detail Master 1/25 scale battery terminals that I used as ring terminals. I decided to try and see if I could solder the two together. My first test subject was pretty tough to do. it was hard to get the little tabs bent over the wire to solder. So I decided to Anneal the Photo etch while it was on the tree by heating it up over a lighter and letting it turn bright red and allowed to cool to room temperature that way It would make the photo-etch easy to bend. I broke out my trusty Weller Soldering Iron and got the pieces soldered:

 

I then hooked the wired up to the studs on the Ignition box cap as well as I got my Mallory decal put on the base and threaded the nuts on to hold the wire in place.. I was thinking about redoing the decal since some of it chipped away from handling it after putting it on but I remembered some of my reference pics that the decals were a little beat up in them any way so I though maybe it would give it a little more character. I am also thinking about putting a little dirty wash over the decal to make it not look so new:

 

Here is a Top View of the Ignition box:

 

Then I did this one for fun to get a feel of the overall size of everything:

[gasser59]

Outstanding...another milestone accomplished. Really nice with the chipped decal and a light wash should tone it down a bit.