ShawnS

Yeah I found out about those SK Decals parts two days after I had finished modifying the kit parts. I have another Group A M3 planned so I may go that route in stead of doing it myself.

I got them from hiroboy.com earlier in the year but they are listed as sold out now, spotmodel.com do have them in stock if you are interested.. Thanks everyone for the kind words. Cheers ShawnS

Ah I didn't think of that. I know Fujimi did almost the same thing with some of their touring car kits in the 90's but instead of making the tyre look awful like Beemax did with this kit they just angled the outside of the wheel rim. It took me a while to get used to how the Fujimi wheel looked but once I assembled a kit it all made sense. and could do a better job than any of the photos I could take. Cheers ShawnS

Hi Guys, I got one of these little Volvos delivered to me yesterday from HLJ and after a quick look through the sprues it appears to be every bit as good as the BMW M3 kit... BUT...., the tyres are no good. The tyres have one side molded thicker than the other. Here you can see the shape is anything but square. this after the tyre has been fitted to the wheel. Thickness check Luckily the tyres from Scale Productions E30 BBS fit perfectly so that leaves the option to use the kit wheels open. Also the chrome on the wheels isn't all that great with a rough texture on the spokes and the outer rim only the area in between is clean and smooth. So that's something to consider for those looking at buying this kit. Cheers ShawnS

Hi guys, I'm finally back building again. This one is the BMW M3 that Jim Richards won the 1987 Australian Touring Car Championship with. The kit is from Beemax with wheels from Scale Production and decals from Decalcas. I have back dated the model from 1991 DTM spec to 1987 Group A spec by modifying the front airdam and rear wing, I scribed a fuel flap, fitted a side exit exhaust and added detail to the interior door cards and modified the dash to analogue gauges. I have also changed the mirrors and moved the air jacks to match references of the 1:1 car. There was a fair bit of work to get it sitting just right because the scale production wheels are smaller than the kit supplied wheels so a straight swap leaves the car sitting on it's belly with JDM/tuner style camber on all four corners. Enjoy. The Decalcas decals are some of the most beautiful I have ever seen they went on easily and have reflective gold graphics, I took some photos outside to see if I could get the reflective gold to pop Thanks for looking Cheers ShawnS

I finally got around to digging out my Mustang decal sheet that I got from Patto's several years ago and after looking at it and comparing it to some reference photos I found some other discrepancies that may just be a reason to put the project on hold even longer. I've noticed that many Patto's decals have incorrect fonts and under/oversized or incorrect/missing sponsor logos and this sheet is no different. I know that he will change the colours of any logos at the customers request but I don't believe that he is willing to do anything else to the artwork. You could always ask him I suppose. Cheers ShawnS

Thanks for the extra pics Matt. They definitely look like racecam brackets I'll have to add those on too. When I was tossing up between building the AGP version or a Bathurst or ATCC version I realized that the AGP version didn't have a racecam so I was happy that I dodged a bullet by not having to do all that extra wiring and whatnot. I did put a camera from an old Nascar kit in a Johnson Sierra that I built many moons ago but I didn't go to town with the wiring. Cheers ShawnS

Most excellent Matt . Thanks that helps a lot. If I didn't have a thousand other things to do I'd get back into it.

Hey Matt, would you happen to have any pictures of the rear interior area from the doors looking backwards? I've got pics of most of the rest of the car but nothing that shows the extent of the roll cage or where the seat belt mounting points are. It's one of the two main reasons that the project stalled. Cheers ShawnS

Hi Matt, I started working on a model of the very same car several years ago that has stalled due to the amount of work that I needed to do. I'm using the pace car model for the body and the bonnet from the convertible. I had originally planned to do the early version but settled on the race winner from the Grand Prix support races (the cars 1 and only victory) I am using a heavily modified interior tub from a Tamiya Sierra and the Momo wheels are copied from a Tamiya 1:20 F1 kit. I started scratchbuilding the front clip but I still haven't finished it yet. I am yet to decide on which 302 to use but it won't be the original kit engine. There is a fair bit of work to do to everything. I have had a MPC version in my hands and I can say the Monogram models are easier to convert into a better detailed race car. The interiors of the MPC models are very shallow and the chassis isn't all that great or detailed either. good luck. Cheers ShawnS

I pre-ordered 3 TWR Jags from HLJ a couple of weeks ago and they arrived today. I've been waiting to get this kit since the 1980's and I have never had the opportunity to buy one of these kits so when I found out they were being re-issued I jumped straight on them. After a quick look I can't wait to get them started. The only disappointing thing that I can see from first glance is that the large white stripe on the side of the car is not supplied as a decal and has to be painted. Can someone who built the original kit tell me was the stripe a decal in the original issue or did it have to be painted as well? Cheers ShawnS

Thanks guys. I had planned to have the white car finished by now but as usual life has gotten itself in the way of finishing a build. As far as recent progress is concerned I have assembled the interior and painted the interior headlining as well as painted the blackouts around the windows and the areas on the inside of the body that needed to be blacked out but that's where work came to a halt. The good news is that I haven't lost interest again and I am just waiting for all the ducks to get in a line to get this first one done. Thanks, ShawnS

The wheel backs got the treatment too. The wheels themselves were also finished. Before, after. The blackouts and the silver centre are all decals. I painted the interior too. I gave the seats a wash of slightly darker brown but I am still unsure about how they look. Obviously there is still a little bit of work to do but it's very close to being finished (I hope). Thanks for viewing Cheers, ShawnS

Hi again, Work continues on the white version. I am using this most recent build as a test run to hone some techniques that I haven't used before and I finally figured out a way to do the rough texture that the 1:1 had on the underside. I used Tamiya liquid primer with a couple of old brushes that I had trimmed the bristles closer to the ferrule (the metal bit) to make the bristles stiffer. I just dipped the brush in the primer and dabbed it repeatedly on the model until I got the finish that I required. I did a test on a spare piece of chassis that I had lying around in my scrap box and I was happy to continue onto the build. First I had to mask the areas that I didn't want extra primer on. Once the masking was removed I painted the front chassis rails white then I sprayed the diff and the fuel tank semi gloss black and once they were dry I masked them off and hit the rest with matt black. When that was all sorted I started with the weathering using some of the products that I bought when I did the trailer a couple of years ago. I was aiming to depict a low mileage car from a dry dusty area so no big wads of mud and no massive oil stains. after all of the extra parts were added and weathered. To be continued..

Hi guys. One day a month and a half ago I was looking through some cupboards trying to find something when I came across a box containing the third body, chassis and parts that I cast a couple of years ago. All of a sudden a switch flicked in my head and I commenced an attempt to bust my slump. I wanted to build a Falcon that didn't de-value any of the work that I had done on the other two and that I didn't have an emotional connection to so if something went wrong it wouldn't be a major issue. I also figured that I would use it as a practice run to iron out any bugs that may occur during assembly. I also wanted to keep it simple Out Of Box style with minimal extra added detail. So armed with that I made a choice to build a model that was not only box stock but a model of a base model spec car. So there will now be 3 Falcons; 1.A base model box stock OOB no extra detail. 2.The beige model with added detail and a trailer. 3.The super detail version. Lets start with the body. Plain white with black outs. Still a little work left to do on it with some more black needed around where the window rubbers should be and some BMF on the trims over the windows. I also finally got around to polishing the beige body and painting the blackouts after it had been sitting in a cupboard since 2015. I also did the bumpers. The new model spec dictated a new interior spec to differentiate it from the other two. I also opted for a front bench seat. and some new base model steel wheels. I couldn't resist doing some mock ups. I used the wheels and interior from the beige car because neither the wheels or interior were ready yet. Still plenty of work to do on both cars but I'm feeling like I getting close to finding my groove again and I'm very happy with how both builds are looking after being unsure for the last 6 years. Future updates will be patchy as most of the work will be minor stuff for a while but I'll keep you posted. Thanks for your support. Cheers ShawnS

Thanks guys, Ted, that video has been a main point of reference for my models of various scales for several years now and even after seeing it several dozens of times I never get sick of it. Car 6 is Bob Jane's '67 GT from the 1967 ATCC race at Lakeside which would become Chris Brauer's car in 1970. The orange #7 car in the top photos is Bob Jane's ex-Shelby Trans-Am Mustang that he raced in the '69-'70 racing seasons. CheersSS

Go for it guys you wont regret it. Thanks for sticking around guys. Here's the deal. When I started this project I wasn't in a very happy place in my life, there wasn't anything drastically wrong ( I've always had a roof over my head and food in my belly so I'm not complaining) it's just that I was in a very dark and unhappy mind set (definitely no thoughts of self harm and I don't ever use the 'D' word ). Over the course of my 43 years I have found that when I feel like that, I am at my absolute creative peak. To deal with it when I was young I would spend hours making all sorts of things with Lego, when I was a teen I would pick up a pencil and spend hours drawing and now I build models. The real problem is that I can not turn on my creative side like a switch no matter how many times I pick up the model or some styrene. The period between starting this build in 2011 and last doing anything on it in 2015 was creatively intense and I think I just burnt myself out. Even though I still dabble in the hobby with modifying 1:43 diecast models and drop by here to see what's happening there is still no sign of inspiration striking anytime soon. I guess I (we) will have to wait it out. Thanks again, CheersSS

Sorry David, I'm not offering any for sale. I have cast just enough to finish my planned projects plus 2 spares (now down to one) and now the mold is past its best and I'm not willing to make a new one. Thanks Bill I agree with you 100%. You would have figured someone would have wised up by now. Hi again guys. I have just recently finished some more Mustangs so here they are. Thanks ShawnS

and finally this car was driven by Niel Allen also in 1968. I used the chassis, dash, windscreen, grille, bumpers, tail panel and tail lights from the Greenlight '67 and the wheels, brakes, rear window, steering wheel, photoetch, door handles, wipers and rear 1/4 windows from the Apex '65 model. The interior is mostly scratch built with various modified parts from another Mustang. Thanks for looking Cheers ShawnS

The first one finished. The 1967 Australian Touring Car Championship winner Pete Geoghegan. This car was driven by Fred Gibson in a couple of races in 1968. Part 3 coming up..

Hi guys, I have been a collector of 1:43 Australian Fords for years but recently I have been into modifying them just to get a modelling fix while I am waiting for my Mojo to return to 1:24 Falcons. This is what I've been up to lately. After years of waiting in vain for someone to release a decent 67/68 Mustang coupe in 1:43 scale, I was stoked to see Spark finally bring one out but after closer examination of the Spark model I noticed that it had a 64-66 nose and interior on a '67 body. It was not good enough for my tastes so I decided to take action and make one myself. I used the same trick that I (and several others) have used in 1:25 to take the roof from a '65 Mustang coupe and put it on '67 Fastback body. I started with a '65 coupe from Apex and a '67 fastback from Greenlight. Because I wanted to make a few I had to resin cast the body. Here are three bodies prepped and waiting for paint. part 2 coming up.

Sorry no updates yet. The whole project seems to have gone into a permanent stall. I did try to do some paint and texture work on the curbside chassis but after that failed to work out well it killed any motivation that I had. It seems that any time that I try to get momentum up something happens and I'm back to square one. At the moment I'm modifying some 1:43 cars to try and re-ignite my love for models and building that I seem to have lost over the last couple of years. So if anyone finds my Mojo please return it to me as soon as possible. Cheers ShawnS

No updates at the moment. It's winter here in Australia and it's a bit too cold where I am to paint anything and I've not been motivated to do the remaining building and modifying that I had to do. The cold weather is killing my motivation for anything model related at the moment. I'll get back on it soon enough- hopefully. CheersSS

Thanks Jim. I'd trust my gut any time My camera doesn't seem to take good pictures of beige but in the flesh it looks scale perfect.

Here's how I fixed that. I stuck some Tamiya tape underneath the tail light cut out and mixed up some talc and superglue and slapped it on to the damaged area. When the glue set I removed the tape, and shaped the area to suit. Good as gold I hit the body with Tamiya TS-46 light sand for the base coat. Mixed up some beige using Tamiya TS-7 Racing white tinted with TS-16 Yellow and AS-22 Dark earth to make a pale caramel colour. Done only by eye without taking any notes about how much of each that I used. The first coat was sprayed today. This are some samples of what the real Bahama beige looks like. So with the first colour coat on the body I will work to get it nice and smooth and hopefully the next update will include a fully painted body. Cheers ShawnS