Bugatti Fan

Raising the bar? Where do you start? It's one thing looking at super detailed models made from kits and another looking at totally scratch built engineered models. What makes each special is the level of detailing whether kit or scratch built.

Tomasz, your model making skills are well up there with the best of them!

Railroad right of way! Anyone would be a fool to argue about that one! The laws of physics dictate that the inertia of a locomotive hauling numerous wagons would take out an Abrams tank if it got in the way let alone a by comparison a puny truck or car!

Don, I forgot to mention that I live near Bedford in the UK. There was a company named Wolfrace Wheels that had a unit on one of the trading estates there who sold all sorts of custom goodies besides wheels. The twin steer Panther was on display there for some time and I saw it a couple of times whilst it was on display there. It would be interesting to know where the car is now.

I think that there is an option within newer windows programs to enable older programs to run on it such as ones that ran on XP. Worth interrogating your PC to see how this works? There is a large company named RS Components who have a 3D CAD program that can be downloaded for free. I think it is named Design Spark Mechanical for drawing 3D Solids. Worth a look if anyone is thinking about 3D Printing. I would guess that their program can output files compatible for 3D printers. They also have a PCB design program and a Sheet Metalwork Development CAD Program I believe. If anyone on here is already using it I would be interested to know how good it is. Google had a 3D program named Sketchup some time back. Not sure if this is still available. Another program named Pro/Desktop used to be available free to schools until support was dropped about 10 years ago. This program may be avaoilable as free downloads from some sources still. The RS one appears to be the most current one.

My idea of a car (if I could afford to run it) would be a Jensen Interceptor...……….1970's .British Built Muscle Car...….Italian Styling...………….With a huge American V8 for the grunt Basically an unforgiving brute of a car! Yes!

You are absolutely right Don. Failed to check my spellings before logging off.......Seville should read DeVille.and Parker should read parked. Also as you pointed out, the background cars look like Limas and something else now that I am looking at a large PC screen and not my small tablet. The red car behind the silver and black Lima looks more like a Jaguar SS replica but cannot be sure. So I humbly stand corrected on both counts.

Looks like the last pic was taken in the Panther Car Co's parking lot. The twin steer car was built back in the 70's I think. In the background you can see a Panther SeVille Parker up with loose BugattiStyling. One of these featured as Cruella DVille"s car in 101Dalmations with Glenn Close playing the part. The little 2 seater sports cars parked further beyond are Panther Limas

Looking at Rob Hall's post, the photo he included of Lady Penelope's car from the Thunderbirds movie was interesting to see. The original car resides at a UK motor museum at Gaydon in Warwickshire. It is Ford badged and huge!

The tired old 1/25th scale Revell E type Jaguar that has been re re re re issued many times since the sixties is a good example of an offering from clapped out tooling. But just recently Revell Germany have issued a completely new retooled kit of this iconic car in 1/24th scale that will probably be very good, and much less expensive than if Tamiya did it.

Self driving automated cars.........I believe that at least one pedestrian has already been killed by on it these! Not convinced! Also, if the controlling mainframe is cyber attacked......Chaos! Plug in electric cars? Surely we need the investment put into generating more widespread power first. What happens if everyone buys plug in electrics? Over here in the UK the big thing is renewab!e energy sources and taking out coal fired power stations too soon as well as one of two of our nuclear stations needing to be replaced in the interim. It is all very well government trying to meet emission targets, but one has to be realistic and get enough of the renewables up and running first. Flogging electric cars now is putting the cart before the horse at present. I am waiting for the day when everyone plugs their electric cars into the grid and all the lights go out! Toyota have the right idea by making self charging hybrids in the interim. Electrics are alright for buzzing about town but simply do not have the range for any distance motoring. It is not as though you can just top up from a gallon can go keep yourself going, is it?

This might be worth a try as it worked well when I tried it. First coat was white automotive primer (aerosol), When dry it was rubbed VERY gently with worn wet n dry, just enough to take away the powdery feel that you get with primer paint. after dusting off I sprayed with an aerosol polished metal finish. I let this dry thoroughly and went over it with Johnsons Klear ( I think it has been renamed Future now). This dulled the shiny finish a bit but left a hard coat on the part when it had dried. Now for the finishing touch I used C1's polishing powder and it buffs upwell to a high shine. The beauty of this stuff is that you can handle it afterwards.

Correction!!! In my last post 'creates a deal' should read 'creates a seal'. Sorry about the typo.....Should have checked!

Two angle poise lamps on my bench with 100w equivalent white LED bulbs does it for me!

Marvellous writer. Read many of his books and sad to hear of his passing. Did not know that he had a collection of classic cars though.

A 'Lazy Susan' turntable for cake decorating might fit the bill, and be cheaper than a Tamiya one.

Rather than getting ready punched whitewalls invest in an Olfa Circle Cutter that is a little tool for cutting out circles for artwork. It is used like a compass and can be set to different diameters so you can cut whatever diameters you want. Just make sure that you cut the outer circle first when cutting a whitewall. As there will be a point mark in the middle a series of outers can be cut and then a series of inners by relocating on the mark for each.

Fantastic model! I will have to arrange a mortgage for the MFH kit I would like!

A headache at the daunting thought of reading nearly 25k of replies to this thread! Lol!

Having looked originally at the MPC Rolls Royce, Darracq and Lanchester on a small tablet I could not make out that they were customisable kits. Although Airfix and MPC had dealings, the original Airfix kits were not custom cars. Do not know if MPC used the Airfix kits and stuck custom goodies in the box or not, or whether they were totally different kits altogether.

Cruella De Ville ( played by the Bunny Boiler Actress Glenn Close) in 101 Dalmations actually drove a car in that movie named the Panther de Ville that looked like a parody of a Bugatti Royale. It had what looked like a UK reg no DEV 1 L on it. Incidentally Panther also made a custom twin steer 6 wheeler way back in the 70's I think. These esoteric customs are a bit way out for me, but, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Just recently I started to use some C1 polishing powder. What I did was prime the part with grey automotive primer followed by a craft shop shiny chrome from an aerosol. When this had dried thoroughly I went over it with Johnson's Klear (now Future) floor sealer. This hardened off and dulled the chrome finish a bit underneath. I then buffed up the parts using the C1 polishing powder. This gave me a polished aluminium finish that I was trying to achieve. What is more is that when the C1 is buffed up it is quite resilient to handling unlike many other products. C1 claim that you can apply deals straight on to it. If I go for a chrome finish I will try gloss black over the grey primer and use the C1 on this and see what happens next time I use it.

Scott, the Lanchester, Rolls Royce and Darracq kits look like the old Airfix ones that were sold as bagged lots say back in the 50''s.

Getting back on track to let peeves..........Spending loads of time and effort modifying a kit only to find that what you have been modifying is due to be released as a kit!

So far the conversation has been about the marker pens and a good number of suggestilons have been put forward. Have any of you guys used this ink through an air brush? Interested to know what experience anyone has doing this? A number of years ago I had a Rotring technical pen that was refillable, normally with their black ink. I wonder if the Molotow chrome ink would be thin enough to use in one of these. Not sure if they are actually made any more as so many disposable fline line black pens are on the market now.