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Over the years I have aquired most of Fujimi's 1/20 Formula one kits. Many of them are now built but there is still a stack of them left and t4his one was on the top. Looked simple enough (he says) so why not. Color is Mr Color #3 Red with Tamiya TS26 white. Lucky for me I have some experience with these kits but I can tell you this one was not for the feint hearted. Details in the picture captions. feel free to comment. Had to take this photos as this will be the only way to see the chassis details. Body had to be completly glued down to look right. I deviated from the instructions and this turned out to be the right decision as all the panels fit with no gaps. Engine had a fair amount of detail and everything fit well. I used several mixtures of semi black with silver and gold added to simulate the carbon fibre. Front suspension proved to be the most challenging. The air scoop fastens to the upright and is a force fit. This had to be slipped over the suspension, the uprights assembled and then it had to be fit . Took some figuring on how to do this and if I had glued the scoop to the upright it never would have gone together. Wheels steer by the way. Seatbelts are from, Tamiya as none were supplied. Interior had some nice detail especially the steering wheel. Assembled car with all the little wing thingies (there were a lot of them everywhere) attached. Careful assembly of the suspension allowed all the wheels to sit flat. Assem,bling the rear wing took a lot of drilling and pinning. It is attached solidly to the bodywork. There were a lot of decals for a simple paint scheme. Tobacco decals were aftermarket by Hobby Design,. Front wing was no piece of cake either. Lot of waiting for glue to set up and getting it to sit flat and straight was a chore. Thanks for looking.

This is Fujimi's 1/20 Mclaren MP4/7 that powered Ayrton Senna to his third World Championship. Car was powered by Honda's V-12 and was the last car to win a wolrd title with this engine configuration and a manual transmission. Model is painted in Tamiya YS-26 white and Tamiya TS-36 Flourescent red over TS14 orange. I have done several Fujimi 1/20 F-1's and enjoyed them all. This one was the fussiest one by far and much careful work had to be done to get it right. Glad this is over but am still very happy with the results. More comments below the pictures. There was so muchdetail and many tiny parts that made this engine assembly very fussy. The exhaust was particularly troublesome and ahd to be re-engineered. I was so stressed that I decided there was enough detail there for now and didn't add any lines or other detail. Body is completly removable and that can be done at a later date. For now I just wanted to be done. Interior was faily well detail and the seatbelts came with the kit, Thought I would take a picture of the car without most of its decals to show off the very clean lines of the car. Notice the three chrome buttons along the bottom of the body. These represent the Dzus buttons that attach the body to the chassis. In reality they are pins inserted into posts glued to the chassis bottom (visible is the first engine pic) and they serve the same purpose. This is typical of F-1 kits with flat bottom chassis as they are just a little warped and tend to spring apart. This solution got a better fit without having to glue which is iffy at best. Finished car on its wheels. The suspension was very fussy but it all fit right in the end. Got lucky and all four tires touch without any adjustments. Rear veiw. Rear wing was a real bear to glue together. Top mounting had to be re-'engineered and the wing struts had to be pinned to the transmission. Glue points were very small and vague and were never going to hold. Body fit surprisingly well in the back. The only real addition to this kit were the after market tobacco decals...which were exceptional.

A while back , another modeler started a thread on this kit. It caught my interest for two reasons. It was 1/20 scale and it was Ayrton Senna. Found one on Ebay , ordered it, and started it right away. I finally got around to finishing mine but don't know if the other guy did. Fun little project that occupied more of my time than I though it would. Rest of the story is in the picture captions. thanks for looking and as always, comments welcome. First thing I did was cut the steering away and make new from brass. Non working steering is a pet peeve of mine and since this was all exposed it had to look right and work. A little more work than i thought it would be but fun just the same. As long as the wheels steered might was well make Ayrton look like he is doing something besides hanging on. Torso and right arm has to be modified and head glued on at an angle to look as if he is going around a corner in a drift. Aaaahhh...much better. Rear view shows a little more detail on the sponsor blouse. This did not come in the kit and was made with paper towel and white glue. Decals came out of the stash. I added a few extra details like the spark plug wire and brake hose. Yellow stripes were hand painted. Tried yellow tape and decal but it just didn't follow the contours like paint. White strips on shoes are decals. Ayrton Senna was World Champion in 1980 but this is actually his 1981 kart. He only raced it a few times as the regulations changed and by then he was on to bigger and faster things anyway.