Nacho Z

Greg, UpScale Hobbies and Hobbyworld-USA are both suppliers of Zero. What they have on hand can vary. Zero Paints, generally speaking, are "hot" meaning they may craze the plastic. I have shot a number of colors and there are some that went down beautifully with no crazing and others that did. The trick, in my experience, is to shoot light coats and wait the recommended time between coats.

I did one of those "poll the audience" stunts and asked guys which wheel set looked better. I was leaning towards the one in the first picture and that was what won out in the poll. Time to lay down those big 'ol decals. I couldn't help myself and added this little guy to the back door. Pretty cool seeing him when you roll up at a stop light. After the decals dried I laid down some clear. In the following pictures it looks decent but I had some issues. I'll share that on the next update.

Yes, Steve, this one has been something else. I haven't even tried to clean up and/or fill all of the ejector marks and flash. I am mostly concentrating on the body. I have seen your work for quite a few years now and I know you will knock this one out of the park.

In between body work, priming and painting, I worked on the chassis and interior. To reiterate, this is going to be a shelf queen and I have a timeline to keep. There is a ton of raised ejector pin marks and flash. There are a number of very random "bumps" on my model. I did remove the most obvious ones. After a good bit of time spent cleaning up the parts I shot them in primer. Everything fit together just like I expected...? I did minimal detailing on the chassis, interior and engine.

Thanks, Steve! I'm not a big fan of people hijacking other's posts. This is a bigger issue on FB than here. It is a timely build for me as it is being built for a Halloween themed group build. Regarding the raised ejector pin marks, you are right, this has to be one of the worst examples. I primarily build road coarse style race cars and these tend to be from the Japanese kit manufacturers. I joked with some of my buddies, "why do I do this to myself?" meaning why do I build these old kits when I have so many quality kits...?

I agree, Kool Kat. I recently finished up a pretty detailed Tamiya Porsche 956 racecar, (posted here on MCM). I have over 200 hours in it. It is nice to knock out a couple of quick, low stress models in between these longer projects. You are absolutely spot on, Mario! I love their products. Thank you, Zippi! Yes, David, everything laid down nice and smooth. I have to be honest, I noticed some sanding marks after the primer had dried. Because of the time constraints and because this is just a shelf model, I decided not to go back and fix them.

Because I am shooting this in Tamiya rattle can gloss black I used Tamiya oxide red primer. The primer laid down nicely with just a few dust bunnies finding their way onto the body. I removed them and shot the Tamiya Gloss Black straight from the can. This stuff is amazing!

I have already apologized to Can-Con, Steve, for starting a build thread of the same kit he is building. Mine will be a quick build without much in the way of detailing. It is being built for a Halloween themed FB group. I started it around the end of Sept. and need to have it finished by Oct. 31st. It is not intended to be anything more than a shelf model. It is not intended to be a contest quality build. I have cut a lot of corners on this one...lol. It is refreshing to build a model and not sweat the little details. Here is what I am starting with. Here are the kit contents. I started with cleaning up the body. I removed most of the molded on features. This includes FORD and Econoline emblems, door locks, etc. The drip rail on my copy was horrible. It was uneven and dented. There was no way to paint and polish this area. It had to go. First step in removing the drip rail. Wanting to keep damage to a minimum in case I slipped with the chisel, I taped off the body. Progress! Check out the mold lines down the corner and the flash in the windows! I use a chisel made by Trumpeter. These things are amazing. It is easy to remove too much plastic and to gouge the surrounding area. You really have to be careful. I decided early that I was not going to detail the engine so I also decided to glue the hood on. At this point the body is pretty much ready to go. I rescribed the panel lines and I scribed around the windshield. This gives a nice little trough for the scalpel blade to follow when applying BMF.

Very cool, Steve! I'm going to apologize to you now because I am going to start a build thread of this one too. Mine is the Phantom. I'm building it for a Halloween themed FB group build. I started mine around the end of September and need to have it done by October 31st. I have no doubt that yours will be a whole lot nicer than mine. I'm looking forward to seeing your progress!

Well this explains a lot for me. Like many of you I have specific saved searches for certain model kits and some other oddball items. I get emails for all of these searches every morning. For the last few days I have been getting emails with no name, I.E. Aurora, but way, way more listings. Something for trucks I think. I will now just delete that search as it does nothing for me.

Wow, Scott, this is really nice! Someday I will build my kit and I will use yours as a reference. I am looking forward to seeing yours when it is complete. Thanks for sharing!

I would always make sure to make time to visit with Rich and his lovely wife at both yearly Pittsburg model shows. What a nice guy. And man, his models were truly great pieces. I remember one particular show, Rich cleaned up. He had a smile from ear to ear. I noticed he had not attended since his procedure. I, like many others, will miss him.

This has happened to me and my coworkers on more than one occasion. Things that were never Googled or otherwise looked at online, only discussed with my coworkers, showed up as advertisements on our Facebook pages. One of our coworkers left his phone on his workbench and stepped out of the shop for a minute. We all stood around his workbench and repeated "Viagra" in our "conversation" ???. I have no idea if anything became of it!

One of the things I use them for is cleaning the business end of my airbrush. I found that all the fuzzies were gone when doing this…lol. Lacquer thinners for sure seem to dissolve them. They are fine for other things.

Just a heads up. I read about these some time ago and ordered some from Amazon. I will say that I don’t remember the exact brand. Mine “dissolved” in some of my airbrush thinner and cleaners. I have not had that problem with the Microbrush ones posted in the first picture. They are good for other applications but be aware when using harsher solvents.

Stunning!!!

Beautiful!!

She looks great! I’m really looking forward to some glamour shots of this one!

Thanks, Bruce! I appreciate it, A.J., thanks!

Just a quick update. I took this model to an IPMS show this weekend. PennCon, hosted by the Central Pennsylvania IPMS club. I am pleased to report that she took a Gold in Automotive!

Thanks, Helmut! Considering how old they are the decals held up quite well and laid down very nicely.

Very nice bike, Albert! Very, very nice indeed!

I appreciate it, Bruce!

Although I am not 100% sure about this I thought the forum software automatically swapped out any restricted words with the “blah blah blah”. It seems like that has happened to me a long time ago.

Very, very nice Jag! You did a great job on this one, Anders!