mrm

And here is the finished piece

The exhaust pipes' tips were angled to match the shape of their surround and then fitted in the underpanel, which was already flat black The wheels received brakes from the parts box, with the calipers painted same beige as the interior to tie things up. The rear received quite modified grilles, which together with the two tone stoplights were massaged to blend all the shapes, openings and lines together The front received a nice big aluminum radiator and some carbon The front grilles were tweeked to fit in the new openings. (the original grille is on the right) A new spoiler lip was made from styrene

Only to decide later on, that I was not happy with the color and I should try to "spice it up". So I decided to experiment with a duplicolor spraycan set I had in my garrage. It is one of these flip flop colors, that is called black ice, or something like that. They come in three step process, where the first step is flat black of some sort, then comes the pearly stuff and then clear. So I sprayed only the pearly stuff over the red I already had the car in. The effect blew me away. I was loving it and pictures don't do it justice.

After many sanding hours, finally some red paint was laid

The model started receiving primer coats and putty.... ...when I realized that I had still to do a rear underpanel. Fitting the factory panel with its difuser ventury was not as easylly done as I had in mind, but at the end it was there to stay and a couple of center mounted aluminum pipes were made for the finishing touch Things were starting to look a lot better and complete now

Now the V10 fitted very nicely and snug. For seats were chosen the buckets from a Ferrari 599 which were painted in beige. The dash was painted and detailed and so were the doors, which received only minor modiffications Since the interior was all black, but the seats beige, I made beige accent panels on the doors, but wanted to continue them all the way back. So some of the panels in the engine compartment were painted the same color Now everything was nicelly flowing and detailed, being color coordinated with the overall look of the car.

Next I removed the moldings from the doors, as they had no longer matching lines on the fenders and did not fit with the rest of the car. Now I had my "factory tuned" wheels and all needed body panels, so I could start test fitting everything together and start working on smoothing it out. But first I had to figure out the inside of the model, which at this point was a piece of floor with a thin outline frame. First I grafted the center tunnel from the R8 Then some pieces from the R8's engine compartment were transferred with a firewall from sheet styrene. The rest of the interior, save for the dash was scratchbuilt.

While the Miliput was hardening I had to decide on wheels. Original R8 wheels, or something from the parts box. This is what I liked and had on hand but I wanted more factory looking wheels. So I ended up cutting the original R8 centers and putting them into Pegasus alu rings. Because of the now huge rear fenders, I reversed the rear rings to make the REALLY deep. After I was happy with everything, the centers were dechromed and painted black and the Rims got primed and painted the color I picked for the Golf - Ferrari red, what else?

Now that teh car had an aggressive new skin, admittedly inspired by '80s rally cars (it did not start this way, but hey-it's what it ended up to be) I had to give it some some balls, so I started rethinking the entire model. I had the entire drivetrain from the R8, so why not. Midengined V10 it was. That meant that the entire interior, or most recognizable parts, went buy buy. But not before I went throught the nightmare of integrating the front fenders, making an opening in the hood for exit of hot air (all the space on earth for big radiator now) and shortening the tailgate.

At the rear things were a little easier, as I now started with the idea of replacing the entire rear clip with teh fenders. So I removed the rear of the Golf from under the hatch and then cut from the R8 the entire rear with most of the rear fenders and the skirts under the doors all the way to the front wheels. All this takes a lot of Dremel noise and CA fumes.

So, here is part two of "ANYONE CAN POLISH A DIECAST" This part has nothing to do with any show, but is ratter addressing the mentality that diecasts are not a part of our great hobby. Up to a point this statemen would be true, but not once you cross the line of completely reworking one. About a year or two ago, there was a internet contest organized by a European diecast forum I used to visit. I decided that I am not going to participate in the contest, because it was not fair for many reasons, but I wanted to build a model with everyone else and then I would give my creation to the winner of the contest (the contestants were not very experienced and mostly young kids) The rules were simple. Had to be 1:24/1:25 scale and based on a diecast model. The required subject was VW Golf from any production year. I had no such thing laying around, so I just went to WalMart across the street and picked up a blue Golf from Maisto for something like $9. I had no idea what to do with it. Golfs are as far from my comfort zone as I could possibly imagine. But this was the whole idea of the contest, to show that no matter the subject, with a little creativity we can bring it IN our comfort zone, which by the way is kind of the idea of this whole story. So since I knew nothing (and still don't) about hatchbacks, I decided to mix it up with something exotic, so I could feel a little more comfortable. Now, my idols are all people with very familiar style. Pininfarina, Foose, Coddington.... in other words I like clean smooth lines and everything to flow and interwine in some way. Therefore if I wanted exotic Golf it had to be mixed with Audi as they are basically the same company. I went downstairs in my garage and found an Audi R8 kit which I have no idea what did I buy for and when. Then the headscrathing began. I wanted to lower the Golf and to give it a more aggressive face, so I decided to graft the R8's front. The problem was that the R8 is much wider. This lead to the decision to add the fenders and then all hell broke loose. LOL First the metal was cut right under the front bumper and then the R8 front was cut into three pieces in order to narow it and also make it more rounded in order to fit the Golf's front contour and then it was hollowed out.

Thanks again guys. Plowboy, it was not displayed this way. I assume you mean if it was screwed down like on the pictures. I made the model for the owner of the real car and it was screwed down to be packed and shipped. I took it to the show with his permition, just because I saw in the last moment there was a diecast class-something new to me. This is the reason I did not have a whole portfolio made. And being honest even if I had the time I probably would not have done it, because I did not know better. Not hapenning again tho. Too bad I don't have the model anymore. However I have a black Mondial 8 that went through the same ordeal, but I accidentally erased all the pictures I had from the buildup process. Someone asked about polishing. It is a simple three step process. 2000 grit wetsand, rubbing compound and then wax. I am a firm believer that good paintjob is all in the prep work before you lay the coats, instead of polishing out blemishes afterwords.

Fantastic build. It really looks metal.

Some seriously cool models in that bunch. Awesome builds.

Love the style of your builds. For me personally the red '29 takes the cake

Thank you very much. Are the wheels from the '67 Chevelle shod in the tires from the same kit? The rears look to be beefier, or it is just an illusion?

Super cool!!!! Not a fan of the side door either, but everything else is really nice. I love following builds like this. Keep it coming.

Well guys, first and foremost I want to say a big thank you to everyone, not just because of the compliments this model is receiving, but also for the participation in this discussion and keeping it really civil. I still have not figured out how exactly the multi quote works, so bear with me. Just like someone said, this is the best thing about this place - so many diverse opinions, yet presented in a civil way that is not offensive to anyone. I love reading the different points of view belonging to the different people on here. And I must say it gives me a nice insight that I did not have before about some things. I agree with almost all said so far even if some of the opinions expressed are somewhat contradicting with each other. I believe that diecast and model kits are two different things that will never be able to mix and their respective fans will probably never integrate, me being an exception. I fully support the opinion that if diecast is alowed on a show it should have its own class and be judjed separately from the rest of the models. But also it should be judged by people who are at least somewhat familiar with the medium. And if they are not, then reading the descriptions should be a must. The issue here is not that judges don't read descriptions on contests. I am sure they do, but when it comes to diecast they are just being bypast, because anyone can polish one. That phrase cought on me, not because of the demonstrated ignorance in the particular case, but because I realized that it is the mentality of a huge portion of the model builders in general. Here I will have to agree with the previous comments that there is a line in diecast, which when crossed makes the model just that - another model and it no longer matters what it started as. Once broken down to pieces and start over it is no different than any Monogram model in my LHS. I mean if you look at the model I showed, the interior is all plastic, the engine is all plastic, the rear hood is all plastic and pretty much the only thing metal are the fenders and the doors. I would still not enter it in a class to be judged against regular plastic kits. Now, let me say this. I really enjoyed my time at the Heartland Nationals in 2011. I was blown away by the hospitality of the people and how comfortable I felt. I am really bad with names, so I'll ask to be excused for not mentioning everyone who I met. I got there in a Red Bull infused rush and arrived beat up and all sweaty. They were nice to chat with me and give me a new T-shirt to change my stinky one. I had every intention to make the trip in 2012 again, but after I found out the theme is going to be '32 Fords the visit became A MUST. I think the show was fantastic with a great number of outstanding models and I would recomend to anyone to go check it out. I think that having a couple of diecast speciffic classes is a great move and a step in the right direction toward attempting to integrate the diecast enthusiasts with the plastic kit builders. However I think that next year a little more attension should be paid to what is on the table in that class. This thread is not about critisizing the said competition, but to show that that the gap between plastic models and modified diecast may be smaller than most think and through showcasing what goes into one such modification, there could be some appretiation earned for diecasts at contests. Hopefully that would also earn more respect for the class on future contests across the country.

If you don't mind, can you tell me please where are the wheels and tires on these two models from?

Nice

At first I was - COOL GREEN...then I went NO< IT"S BLACK and then I saw the other picture with the comment and realized it's both. Really cool build

WOW!!!! Epic stuff in here guys. I don't know who started this thread, but THANK YOU. So many cool ideas. I have a couple of things that fit the bill, but got to take pictures first.

Well, see, the model does have one hell of a polish job, but the real slap in the face was, that the comment was made by someone who participated in the judging and the model had very nicely printed description of everything done to it. The very first line on that description was "made famous by Al Pacino in the movie scent of a woman" and it wasn't even included in the models qualifying for the theme of the show, which was cars from movies. Honestly, I could not care less what place this model came in, but this makes me think, that no one even cared to take a look at it, as it is a die cast. And anyone can polish one. There is going to be part two and three to this story, which will include two more models, that were not there at all.

And here is the never before made in 1:18 scale by any manufacturer, Ferrari Mondial 3.2 Cabriolet, with Ferrari 308GTS wheels, which is a not so popular choice amongst 1:1 owners.