Matt Bacon

On the home straight now... The BMF was more of a pain than I'd have liked -- mine seems to have gone "wrinkly" and it cracks everywhere there's a wrinkle. It must be half a decade old, though, at least, so maybe it doesn't owe me anything. The side windows are acetate sheet, which gives a better view inside. I wanted to make a windscreen from acetate as well, but after several tries I just couldn't make it work. Just a few external details to add now, and then on to decals. I have to figure out what number plate and race numbers to carry, since it's a bit of a hybrid, rather than being based on any real car I have pictures of... DBA6T is springing to mind at the moment (you have to think of it in number plate font) bestest, M

Thanks, Pat... The rear lights in place. Tamiya Clear Orange and Red, with Humbrol Metalcote for the silver parts. The close-up is a bit unforgiving, but they look the part in making the DB4 visually different from the DB5 base kit. You can just about see (out of focus) the fuel filler cap. BMF work has started. The transparent headlight fairings were just too thick and badly fitting, so these are made from a clear plastic water bottle. I put a piece of Tamiya masking tape over the hole, pressed it inward slightly to dish it, then drew around the outline with a pencil. Then I stuck the tape onto an appropriately "double curved" bit of the neck of the bottle, and cut around the outline, now bulging outward instead. Glued in place with Formula 560 white canopy glue -- the silver "rivets" are still to painted on, but there are only four per light. bestest, M.

Thanks, guys! @bigphoto... Thanks to a fellow automotive modeller I now have a Monogram DB4, but I'm going to build that as a straight DB4. It's a really nice kit, and too good to chop up! With luck, when I've finished, I'll have a DB4, DB4GT, DB5 James Bond "parked" and DB5 James Bond "in action" (using the super rare Airfix kit which cost me peanuts in a charity shop, and so deserves to be built!) @volvoman... I do have a spare set of Tamiya MkII Jag wires and tyres, which ARE brilliant, but I only have the one set and they are earmarked for my "best efforts" 1/24 E-type coupe, starting from the Heller kit. For that build, I'm still trying to decide whether to use the kit engine, or cross kit with the white metal engine from the Gunze "hi-tech" E-type (and use the Heller plastic engine in that kit)... bestest, M.

Thanks, man... ..and now for some bits that don't look like much, but have taken longer than you'd think, and had me worried about how to do them. Details, details. At the top, those coloured "bullets" are actually the tail lights, which started life as a bit of perspex, which I whittled, shaped and polished. They've had the clearred and orange on, and are awaiting the chrome "frames" In the middle, two fuel filler caps, made from turned and shaped sprue. And finally, the exhaust. For some reason Doyusha decided to put the chamfered end caps on the wrong way up, and they are a bit spindly, so these are new ones from plastic tube. It's in two bits because, of course, that's ANOTHER bit that needs to be 5mm shorter... On to the bare metal foil, now... bestest, M.

The chassis is done now: The underside is very simplified, but it's out of sight and out of mind/ Just a little bit of detail painting to satisfy the "Because God can see" tendency in me... First try with the wheels on... It certainly looks different from a silver DB5 with chrome wheels, which is where it started! I replaced the two-ear knock-offs from the road car with some three-ear hubs from the spares box, which is what the race cars in my period references seem to be sporting... bestest, M.

Here's a couple of angles on the final dashboard, with wheel. The wooden wheel is painted with Vallejo "Sunny Skin Tone" overcoated with Tamiya Clear Orange. ...and here's the completed interior. Feast your eyes, 'cos this is the best view you'll get ;-P ...and finally the state of play tonight (this is just a test fit -- there's BMF and windows to do before it goes in permanently...) bestest, M.

Thanks, D... That dash painted. The reflection the clock are pretty unforgiving but the rest is clear. I cleaned the dial faces back to white plastic, painted them black with Citadel Chaos Black, and scratched the markings through with a pin. Then I varnished them and highlighted the edges in silver. It'll look fine inside the car, I reckon. The interior coming together, as I'd hoped. Still a fair bit to do, though. The seats are done using Citadel paints, base colour first, dry-brushed with Rotting Flesh, and then over coated with Thraka Green wash to give shadows and a semi-gloss look. Look carefully and you can see a real "Doh!" moment. Having sliced 5mm out of the body and the chassis, I forgot to do it on the door cards (interior sides). So immediately after this pic, off they came for a rather bodged trim (at the closing end, rather in the middle where it should be, because I figured I could fake the shut line more easily than redoing the whole painting and rescribing the door detail, which would have ensued if I'd cut it in the middle... Still, you live and learn... bestest, M.

Thanks, Fred! OK, it looks like the driver plan isn't going to work. The interior is sufficiently off-proportion that with the dash in place, the driver would have to hold the wheel right by his chest, even with the seat as far back as it will go. Hey-ho! The decal dash features a wood veneer effect which the DB4GTs I've found just don't have, so I need something else. I decided to scratch some dash detail using a hole punch and some plastic card. It won't be prototypically accurate, but it'll give the whole thing some texture, and should paint up OK. The picture's not doing these any favours! The reflection from the knock-offs means that the wires are very underexposed -- they aren't that black in real life. In fact, they are a nice Tamiya "British Green", dark, but not sooo bad... The interior parts before primer, and with the main painting under way. I've seen period DB4GT photos with the headrests, and they add a bit of interest. I'm aiming for a "period" look, rather than a current historic racer, mainly because I don't want to build a roll cage and try to fit it into the interior -- I'll leave that sort of thing to to John Teresi, it being way past my skill level...! I'd like to think the interior will be coming together tomorrow. bestest, M,

Thank you all, gentlemen... I'm really enjoying this one! The DB4GT has a different grille from the DB5. There's a vertical criss-cross version for the road cars and some GTs, but other GTs have a mesh grille, which is what this is trying to portray. It's a bit heavy, but I didn't fancy trying to build a grille with lighter mesh! This is the kit of parts. I chain drilled and removed the centre of the kit grille, then applied some masking tape to the outside and used a pencil to trace the outline of the hole. I then got some acetate, and sprayed it with matt varnish to cut down reflections, then stuck the masking tape on as a template and cut out a transparent grille. Double sided tape holds the mesh ribbon onto the transparent backing, and then I trimmed the mesh to size around the plastic. Finally the composite grille is pushed into the grille surround, and glued in place with Formula 560 white glue. The back of the recess is painted matt black, and from this angle, I can't see the transparent backing to the mesh, and it certainly made it easier to handle and fix in place! The bulkhead behind the seats is slowly coming together, and as you can see, this build will feature a driver figure, but not the Stig this time. I've had to slice some chunks out of his legs to shorten them slightly, so he fits into his seat. Arms will come later when the dash and steering wheel are available to guide the positioning. So this is where we are this evening. I'm working on the wheels at the moment - going for dark green painted wires rather than chrome... bestest, M.

Thanks, Ben... And now the clearcoat is on: The lighting makes it look more "speckly" than it appears in real life... Time to let it set for a couple of days before polishing a couple of dust inclusions. Despite appearances, though, there's no orange peel... bestest, M.

Thanks, guys... I was puzzling over how to mask the narrow yellow band around the nose, and then I hit on the idea of using the radiator grille as a starting point. I drew around the grille on masking tape, added a few mm (eighth of an inch or so) all round, and cut out a mask, with slashes at the tight radii. I then sprayed the front of the body yellow and added the mask over the grille recess, using copydex to make sure the "darts" at the corners were paint-proof... ... and here we are. Zero Paints Giallo Modena for the yellow, Aston Martin Almond Green for the body. There's no clearcoat on this, and that matt look is how it's meant to be as a base coat... bestest, M.

I think I've now done enough rounds of filling, sanding, primer, filling, etc... I realised why I couldn't get the rear light clusters in proportion -- the base actually goes down to the level of the boot lid closure, unlike those on the DB5... Now they have extensions and the hemispherical end of a cocktail stirrer as the base. The scoop is finally smooth, after several rounds of filling, including one using Milliput to get the last lot of pinholes... ... I'm vaguely wondering whether I should find someone to cast this before I build it in case anyone else wants one, but I'll probably just plunge on into paintwork... bestest, M.

Thanks, guys... I hope you enjoy it! I wanted to get some primer on to see how the modifications looked. I was expecting that there'd be at least one more bout of filling and sanding, and, yes there will be! The cut and shut part is actually pretty good, but the bonnet needs lots of work. There's a fair bit of sanding and carving to reshape the body, most particularly around the back end, to flatten the rear wings to take the "Monza" fuel filler caps. The lights are also being reshaped into "Arches" rather than the three separate units of the DB5. I've softened the slab like corners of the body as well, and the bumper mountings are also filled. I've cleaned up all the seams at the front and given the wings a more rounded look. I'm also losing the heavy "chrome" headlight surrounds. Some racing DB4GTs just have riveted perspex covers, and I think they look much more purposeful. That scoop. Lots of pinholes to fill and some more shaping to do, but it's headed in the right direction, I reckon... ...and here we are, getting ready for the second round of sanding... Metallic Aston racing green with a yellow radiator grille surround (or just possibly red...), in case you were wondering... bestest, M.

This is going to be my attempt at the brutal lightweight Aston racer designed to take on the Ferrari 250SWB. It wasn't entirely successful, but it's a great looking beast... though not as gorgeous as the Zagato bodied version, but that's beyond my conversion skills! I'm starting with an Airfix box of the Doyusha DB5, which I've already built one of in James Bond form. It's not a great kit, being kerbside and simplified, but for my purposes that's OK. The mods needed would be made much harder if you had a full engine and proper chassis to deal with! The first thing to do is to take 5 scale inches out of the wheelbase. I marked up parallel lines using Dymo tape cut to the right width, and scribed them. The roof is cut at the "flattest" section, the doors in the middle. The chassis plate is cut just behind the front seats. I managed to get it apart without cracking the roof pillars -- do the front cut on the roof first Not a great photo, but the only one I have of it going back together. There are tabs behind the doors and under the roof. I used plenty of of glue and gave it 24 hours to dry in the airing cupboard. First go at the filler. There'll need to be another session when this is sanded back, I'm sure... The DB4GT carried the spare wheel in the boot, with an extra large fuel tank in the floor, so I've filled the cut out for the spare wheel holder. Just for comparison, here's the body up against the original Airfix James Bond DB5 body shell. The additional length of the DB5 is pretty visible. The extended bonnet scoop is being built up. The intake is actually a 1/48 P-51 Mustang air scoop, salvaged from a wrecked model that's fought its last battle around the bedroom ceiling... It may not be exactly right, but it looks OK to me. Some filler to go on the bulge when I do the next round on the cut-n-shut seams... bestest, M.

Thank you very much for all the lovely messages! It was a great kit to build and I'm very proud of it. I know I'm going to make a Spitfire next, but I'm not sure which car after that. Possibly something like an Aston Martin? Kate

Please indulge a proud father! This is my daughter Kate's Heller Bentley. She's now turned 13, and this is her fourth car kit -- and although this has been on the workbench for a long while, I think she can be very proud of it! As you can see... she's pretty pleased! all the best, Matt

I do wish that Hiro guy would stop releasing all the things I'd like to build at prices I can't remotely afford... I'd like Italeri or Revell Germany to step into the breach... bestest, M.

Thanks some more guys! There's nothing better than to go modelling with your kids, though it's actually my daughter who's the car builder in the family! (She started with the Tamiya Caterham, and is now working her way through a Heller "Blower" Bentley). Just in case they ever do sort the licensing out, Revell were going to re-release the Italeri 250SWB, not this one. It's all plastic, for starters, and has a lot in common with the same company's 250 California Spider and GTO kits. italianhorses.net rates the kit pretty well, and it's certainly light years ahead of the AMT/Esci version... so here's hoping it does finally see the light of day. It ticks me off that Italeri won't release those kits again, though the California Spider is available in an Academy box (billed as a "European Classic Sports Car" to avoid licensing issues) from Korean sellers on eBay at a very reasonable price (less than £20 shipped for me), so if you actually want to build one, don't get fooled into paying collector prices for the original kit! bestest, M.

Thanks very much, guys! Since it was meant as a double build compare and contrast, here are a few thoughts on the cars, and the kits... The 458 just emphasises how much aerodynamics has come to the fore in super cars over the last few years. Sure, there have been dramatic-looking cars before now (like the Countach), but the aero has been a bit hit and miss, to say the least! The 458 and the Mclaren MP4-12C are both showing the way with aerodynamic packages that are at least as sophisticated as, if less extreme, than you get in F1 today. And the results are pretty curvaceous as well, though not to everyone's taste. One of the things that surprised me about the 458 when I saw a couple in the flesh over the last month is that although the lines are very elegant and complex, it looks a lot more chunky and powerful in real life as well. That back end is an engine room, not just a sculpted wing! In terms of proportions, it actually looks much more like a 430 than you'd expect from the lines. The 250 SWB just looks right. As you can see from the later pictures, there's a real sense of power waiting to spring in the back end, which is emphasised in many of the photos you can find of the real thing, taken as the car accelerates hard out of a corner with the nose lifting on the suspension. In the end, though, for all that Top Gear reckons the 458 is the best sports car of the last five year, the 250 is the more complete car. You really could drive it comfortably from your house in Kent to Spa, win a 1000KM race, and drive it back home again. The 458 would probably be even more fun on the journey, but the fact is that these days, it wouldn't win a top class race, eclipsed by GT3s, GT2s etc. The 250 SWB was a road legal grand tourer which was also a best in class race-winner, as I saw at Donington Historics this year when Jackie Oliver drove his lurid yellow 250 to victory over a field of E-types (lightweight and otherwise), DB4GTs... and several other 250SWBs, which were all up at the head of the pack. So I'd take the 250, myself -- though as my son pointed out, "If you have enough money to buy and race a 250 SWB, then the price of a 458 is pocket change, so you might as well have one of those as well" For the kits: The 250 SWB is a Gunze Sangyo kit from the 1980s. I think it may have come in a "high-tech" version with an engine as well (and there's always the Replicas and Miniatures masterpiece to put under the hood if you didn't get that version). I was lucky -- I got mine for a very reasonable price on US eBay because the box had been cut up slightly, so it was no longer collectable. Which was OK, because I wanted to build it. The chassis is white metal, which is surprisingly brittle, and which needs to be cut to fit the body shell, since the same chassis part is used for both the SWB and GTO. There's not a whole lot of detail parts, but the ones that there are are excellent. The etched wheels go together extremely easily, and really make to final look of the car, and the etched dials are easy to paint to look superb. There are white metal bumpers for a street version, though obviously I didn't use them. The decals for the Stirling Moss Goodwood car (it's dark blue for Rob Walker racing, BTW.... not black) came from a fellow modeller (thanks, Bernard!), though you can see that I didn't modify the car to RH drive, as I should have (It's a lot harder on this curved dash than it is on a GTO!) The fit of the chassis into the body is tricky (you really need to carve away the "parcel shelf", you need to cut it still shorter by 3mm than the instructions tell you to, and it REALLY is a one shot deal, so you need to be sure that you have it right!) The wheelbase is marginally too long -- if you look closely you can see that the front wheels would have a job turning. Ideally, the front wheels would be a couple of mm further back, and perhaps it could "ride higher" by a couple of mm as well. The white metal suspension has no really positive locations, so it's a matter of copy the diagram in the instructions as best you can. The 458 is pretty typical of today's Revell Germany state of the art. Nicely detailed (if crude in a few places -- the brake discs for example) in a relatively "soft" style, and really well engineered to fit. That's the biggest difference with the Gunze 250 kit -- everything in the 458 fits perfectly. Mine had a broken windscreen because of the way the tree is engineered, and I hate to think how much worse that's likely to be in one of your teeny-tiny Revell US boxes. There aren't too many parts, but the ones there are paint up nicely to give the impression of being more complex than they are. Wheels are still an Achilles' heel - Revell will insist on building them with both front and BACK spokes, which just aren't there on the real thing, and the tyres are too thick. These are Pegasus Michelin Pilots. I have the Fujimi kit as well, which is "finer" in terms of moulding, but some of the engine parts look distinctly "thin" compared to the real thing. With a black cockpit like this one I think the one-piece tub approach wouldn't be a problem, though I enjoyed building the more traditional Revell cockpit. There really are NO "gotchas" in this kit, which is what Revell Germany is all about these days. Roll on the 599 GTO! Apologies for the lengthy post -- just wanted to get those comparisons and contrasts down, since that was one reason for embarking on this build in the first place. What next, I wonder? bestest, M.

And last of all, a few comparison shots: ...and that's it! bestest, M.

Thanks, Craig! ...and now the 458 Italia: Now a few "people-shaped" ones: ... you can see that it's not as "voluptuous" in these shots, and definitely looks sleeker! bestest, M.

Finally... here's the 250 SWB: ... and these are what I call "people-shaped" which give a better idea of the proportions and what you'd expect to see with a real car than the close-ups above... bestest, M.

Thanks, Dan! OK... this is pretty much it for this WIP. Proper photos of the pair of them to come, when the weather lets up! Some more considered thoughts on Ferraris 50 years apart, and kits 25 years apart, to come... bestest, M.

They both look very tasty to me. The GTO is a must-buy to complete the "trilogy", and I think I'll do the Aperta in a virulent metallic green like the HY-KERS concept... bestest, M.

The 458 is now fully assembled and decalled: I'm going to live with the £30 fine for not having a proper front number plate! Now it needs a good clean to get rid of the dust and greasy fingerprints, and then I need to figure out if, and how, I'm going to highlight the panels and shut lines... bestest, M.