Jump to content
Model Cars Magazine Forum

Josie

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    46

  • Joined

  • Last visited

 Content Type 

Everything posted by Josie

  1. Josie
    Since I had painted the side gearbox covers fluorescent red from Tamiya, I decided to just go ahead and paint the engine cover rear wing and rear wing end plates. Basically I sanded away all mound lines and putty all the injector dimples on the underside of the engine cover. Once I was happy with the sanding, I washed it with detergent and rinsed it. I sprayed a couple of coats of Tamiya white primer and checked for results. I then sprayed several coats of Tamiya white all over the cover. I then masked what areas needed to be masked and carefully sprayed several coats of Tamiya fluorescent red. I let it dry for a week then removed the tape. I wet sanded the whole engine cover with #3000 grit sandpaper careful not to cut to deep but just enough to get rid of the hump from where the colors join. I then rinsed it complete and dried it off. Next will be applying the decals but that will later.
  2. Josie
    Continued over the weekend working on the front bulkhead of the tub by adding the TS upgrades which includes the steering rack which was painted in the same color as the gearbox as it’s magnesium. The master cylinders are a big improvement to Tamiya’s. I added banjo fittings for the brake lines and clutch lines to the master cylinders. Also added hardware from some company can’t recall the manufacturer but it’s studs with nuts and I used those for the mounting of the master cylinders to the bulkhead. Also added hardware to the resoivers. Pretty nice upgrades and it adds nice details. At the top of the tub I added the front toll bar cross plate (don’t know what you really call it but it’s used at high speed tracks to stiffen even more the front roll bar) from Thunder Valley upgrades. I added tiny hardware were the plate connects to the rollbar but doubt you can see it. Tiny hardware I’m working with but it adds to the detail. Also added the aluminum spacers from a Thunder Valley were the front bell cranks will bolt too. Here are a couple of pics. Sorry for the lousy pics but it’s from an old iPhone.
  3. Josie
    I forgot to mention that I flattened the whole area where the shocks mount smooth removing the stems and texture as that area from the real car was smooth. I also sanded the sides of the tub smooth and that’s how the real car was. Hercules used a male molding technique to do their carbon fiber tubs. Some places were smooth other areas it had texture.
  4. Josie
    Moving on to the tub I needed to cut off the front crash box to add details from TS upgrades. Filed away the front end till I got it where I wanted it. Also filed away the Tamiya mounts flush at the rear where the computers rest to replace them with upgraded mounts from TS. Also drilled holes on the tub at the appropriate places for the rear engine mounts and lower suspension mounts. I decided after careful thought that I would CF decal the whole tub in 1/24 scale #1024 from Scale Motorsport as I believe that was the correct color for the tub. For the rear of the tub I used a more copper looking CF decal also 1/24 scale.
  5. Josie
    Finished doing the rear uprights and brakes using the Top Studio upgrades. Bolted the upper wishbones and assembled to gearbox with hardware from RB Motion. The brake ducts were covered in 1/24 scale CF decals and sprayed with dull coat from Testors. Added details to brake ducts from TS.
  6. Josie
    Here is some more progress on the gearbox. I added a clutch line on the right side of the gearbox using a banjo fitting from RB Motion. I also started working on the side gearbox covers. What I did with those was first to thin them down to scale as they were too thick. Once I got the right thickness I drilled .3mm holes where the dzus fasteners go through from the engine cover. I primed them then painted them with Tamiya fluorescent red. On the other side of the covers I added CF decals of 1/24 scale. I finished it off with a slight coat of black smoke paint. Here are pics of that stage of the build. Thanks to the lockdown I’m making fast progress. I will work on the rest uprights and brakes using the Top Studio brake upgrades which look promising
  7. Josie
    Favorite tracks were Monza Monaco and Spa and I also like Montreal but never saw Senna race there because we only participated at the European rounds. I’m currently now living in San Francisco
  8. Josie
    Thanks Ranchero. I’ll post more photos and details on the weekend. If you guys have questions I’ll be happy to answer them
  9. Josie
    I was a race mechanic in F3000 GP2 late 80’s-90’s so I saw Senna race quiet a lot. The mix of color for the gearbox was 3:1 dark copper to black
  10. Josie
    More progress on the gearbox. Concentrated on the rear with putting together the TS rear jack mounts. I’m pretty impressed with the Top Studio upgrades as it adds more accuracy to the model and makes my job a bit easier. The mount comes in several pieces but it’s pretty straightforward if you have ever dealt with PE stuff. I modified the oil coolers cause I wasn’t happy where the oil lines mount to the cooler. The Tamiya coolers weren’t very realistic. The oil lines were covered witha heat sleeve I scratch build myself instead of the tape Tamiya recommends which again not very realistic. The rest was pretty straightforward. Here are some pics.
  11. Josie
    More updates. I thinned down the wishbones as the Tamiya metal pieces were too thin and not true to scale so thinned about 30% off.
  12. Josie
    Making more progress with the gearbox. Here are some more pics and the color is more realistic in this pics meaning the gearbox casing is more a darker brown. I added the shocks, bell cranks and pushrods to the gearbox. I put stiffer looking springs than what the kit offered and it didn’t look right. Springs were much stiffer on the real race car. I also added Aeon rubbers and painted them orange. I also scratch build the bump knob and glued it to the shock body. The bell Cranks were also modified to look more the real ones. I filed a bigger arc to resemble the real ones. As for the pushrods I added rod-ends from RB Motion and glued them to the pushrods. I also thinned them to make it more to scale as the ones in the kit where a bit on the thick side and not true to scale.
  13. Josie
    I found the correct paint mix for the gearbox to my liking which was completely different to the instructions. I’ve worked with hundreds of race gearboxes made of magnesium but unfortunately the color on the pictures is distorted. It’s a lot darker. I’ll try to get better pictures later. I’ve added the CV joints from the Top Studio upgrades. I must admit the quality of the upgrades is outstanding for the price. Very reasonable. I did a press fit onto the bearings and turn freely like proper CV joints . As you can see I also added studs with nuts to the holes I drilled previously. I added these to the side covers end cover and where the gearbox attaches to the engine. In the Tamiya instructions the top suspension bracket comes in one piece but I cut the bracket from Top Studio in two separate pieces and glued it to the sides of the gearbox and added the stud with nuts like a real gearbox would look like. I thinned the walls of the bracket to make it more to scale. I also scratch build the brace to the bracket as the Tamiya one didn’t look realistic enough. I glued the oil tank to the top of the gearbox and added aluminum bolts. I also scratch build the gear linkage u-joint from brass tubing and glued it to the side cover. I had to do quite a bit of work on this side plate cover to make it look more realistic. I was happy with the results and it’s a big improvement from the original Tamiya part.
  14. Josie
    I thought I would show you the model kit I’m building. I believe it came out around 1994 or so. It’s a big scale with over 200 parts but that will be a lot more after I get done with it since I will be adding upgrades and scratch building some parts. I’ve had it for two years but now with Covid I have plenty of time on my hands to dedicate my full attention to it so hopefully I will finish it by September.
  15. Josie
    Forgot to add that I also drilled .4mm holes on both sideplates and end cover where I will add studs with nuts in the future.
  16. Josie
    Here are pics of the gearbox. For now I will paint the gearbox a dark brown till I experiment with the correct color that comes close to a magnesium casing. For now I want to make sure the separation lines are gone. There are like 6 separate parts that are glued to make one piece. In a real gearbox only the end cover and two side plates should be removable. In the Tamiya instructions it would tell you you have to insert the top suspension pick up brackets but I will add those on later.
  17. Josie
    Its 1/12 scale from Tamiya. I will send more pics hopefully by by end of week as I progress. So basically with these 1/12 scale models you can have a lot of freedom to detail them. I will use the Top Studio upgrades to improve on that and also will you my experience to detail them even further. Purchasing a book on the Mp4/6 showing close-ups comes in handy and I have to of those.
  18. Josie
  19. Josie
    So a little bit of background for you guys about me. I’ve been building model cars since I was in my teens thanks to my mom who bought my first kit thinking it was already built but surprise surprise it was in bits so guess what? Yep I had to build it myself. Back then I must have just used glue, a knife and maybe some paint and that was the extend of my modeling tools. I then concentrated on building war planes but then my passion for race cars increased so I started building Tamiya 1/12 scale models. I then took a long long break from modeling because of my profession which was bring a race car mechanic and later engineer. So anyways back to the model. I’m a fan of Senna and saw him race numerous times when I was a mechanic so I decided to build his championship winning McLaren. I bought the kit and also the Top Studio upgrade bits to make a more realistic model. I try to aim for realism as much as I can. Being a mechanic I know how and where those parts go but more importantly what they should look like. Now my methods are a bit unorthodox as I don’t build the car according to the instructions because to me it doesn’t make sense. So for example I started with the gearbox but I separated the gearbox from the engine. I’m basically building it like I would a real race car. Hopefully you modelers will like the build and feel free to comment as I go along.
  20. Josie
    We never transported the F1 cars with race shocks always with used shocks. Once the cars are in the garage we swap them for the race shocks with correct spring rates to be used for that particular circuit.
×
×
  • Create New...