Art Laski

Consider me amused. Nice job!

I started to get some of the decals on. which are starting to bring this thing to life.

Sometimes things don't go according to plan when building a model, but I think it's how you can recover that matters. I've done a lot of recovering the last few years!!! I got the black on, but I had one really crisp mask line on one side of the cowl, and a not so crisp line on the other. Here's the good side: ...and the not so good side: In the pics, the good side looks just OK, and the bad side doesn't look that bad, but in person there was a noticeable difference. So I masked it off and reshot the edge: ...and got a much crisper line. Since the were base coats of color, it's not real glossy and is a little flat. Although it wasn't as rough as it looked in the pics, it still wouldn't make a good surface for decals, so I wanted to lay down a thin clear coat before putting on the decals. That's when things went really sideways! I'm not sure what happened, but the clear just wasn't flowing out. So what did I do? Laid more on! So much for a thin coat! (It really wasn't too thick...) But it never flowed out and left orange peel over the whole surface. To make matters worse, the wheels really came off the bus when the bottle fell off the airbrush while shooting the cowl, and I panicked and dropped the part right onto a cloth in the booth. > > > If you look close, you can see the junk on the side here: so needless to say, I spent the next day watching races with a bowl of water and my polishing cloths in hand instead of cutting decals. :-[ There was a little burn-through on the thin spots where the clear hit the cloth, but nothing I can't touch up and bury under the final clear coat. Here it is polished back up: That line between the black and white is straight as an arrow, so I'm not sure why it looks crooked in the pic. Thanks for looking. More to come...

Great work, Alyn! I'm learning a lot from you here. Seeing your builds at the GSL last year, and seeing the WIPS you've got going, you can certainly call me a fan! Thanks for sharing. -Art

Alyn, Terrific build. I wish I had seen the WIP earlier so I could follow along, but somehow I missed it. You can bet I'm going to go back through it! -Art

Looks great, Clay!!

Wow, John, looking at the stock Willys I have in the queue (thanks to you!), you really created a killer dash. It's nothing like the kit. Awesome work!!!!

That's the Teresi tire treatment in practice right there. Learned it from the best.

and... he's... on... it!!!!!! It's all downhill from here, isn't it? Looks great, Buddy!

The color is subtle, yet sweet. Nice job on the paint!

Looks great! Nice use of AMT Penske Indy car wheels.

Got the white base coat on. Finished tires. Thanks for looking!

Here's a shot of the cockpit and a quarter to give it some perspective. Masked off the tub for primer and paint. Thanks to Bob Downie for publishing articles extolling the benefits of using Silly Putty for masking. Not sure how I would have done this without it.

Looks great, Mark! you may have said it, but I didn't catch what that interior was for you had with you Friday night, but now I know!

Thanks, John!

The tires are pretty good for a snap kit, but they were a little concave, so I stuck them on my slot car tire truing machine to shape them up. This thing works great because it has a variable speed controller. I probably could have gone a little father, but I knew if I messed this up, recovery would be a pain. The trued front tire is on the left, the stock one on the right. Here's the rear. Here's the machine. Then I threw a little acrylic paint on them. Thanks for looking!

Thanks for the comments, guys! I got a little more done this weekend. Actually, I spent a lot of time on it, but there's not a whole lot to show. I thought I would have had paint on it by now, but it's close! Got the cockpit done. I added some carbon fiber decal to the side and the back of the tub and the bottom of the engine bay. I also got some carbon fiber decal on the chassis pan and did a quick mock up. ...and made a decal for the Chevy heads. It's so small, I can't believe it's legible.

I love the photos, John! The black contrasting background looks great. Oh, and the work is good too, Buddy...

Very nice work, Dave!

Your skills with these types of builds is incredible, Ira!

As expected, it came out real nice, John!!

So when you said "small-scale" you meant it! Looks great, as usual.

I also didn't like the way the center of the wheels looked with the axle pins the way they were. It lacked realism to accommodate the snap fit, but since I am going to glue the wheels on anyway, I made some simple wheel nuts using aluminum tubing and hex rod. Not pretty by themselves, but they'll look good painted with the wheels on.

Thanks for the comments, guys! Just a small update on this one. I decided to cut out the molded in drive shafts and replace them with aluminum tubing. I'll paint the tubing to match the color of the real ones, but the challenge is how to fit it in there. It seems like the only way was to drill out the axle pins molded to the car so I can slide the tubing in. I also drilled out the boot on the gearbox a little for the tube to connect to.

Awesome work, John. I'm taking notes!!!!