Simli' R Ford GT

[ferrarijoe]

So i picked this up from ebay a few months ago. I thought at the price point (i paid 65)this would be a quality kit, at least on par with Tamiya with some photo-etched. Was I wrong, tons of flash and sink marks. Details are not very crisp. Every part involves a lot of clean up. There are gaps where parts meet. It seems like it came from a worn out mold. So its been lots of sanding. On the plus the decals look really nice.

This is the hood had large gaps to fill.

Edited May 15, 2015 by ferrarijoe

[superbike-shaun]

FJ when I opened your thread and saw the box art, I said,WOW!That looks cool!who did you win from so we're aware who is selling Bunk stuff.superbike-shaun

[ferrarijoe]

fixing hood. It cracked on me.

It has little boogers all over.

Ans ejector pin marks.

[ferrarijoe]

i got it from onlyracingcars. I don't think it is something on his end i think that its just a crappy kit. i have not seen any other builds so don't know if Simil' R are just sub par. I do know that the auction was for the gt with the red lion on it not the yellow, but that didn't bug me. I also bought some f2000 decals from him and those were perfect.

Edited May 15, 2015 by ferrarijoe

[ferrarijoe]

sink marks what fun. The small piece is the fuel filler it hand sink marks that almost went all the way threw.

and back to ejector pins.

[ferrarijoe]

these are the front fenders. the little strip is headlight trim, i held it up to front bumper and it is to short. I am going to build the chassis, the try to mount body panels to see if i can fix it. the body is made up of 12 pieces. Going to be a pain might leave most panels of and make it look like its in the pits.

these little blobs of plastic are supposed to be brake calipers.

[Guest]

Awesome! Finally something different! I'll be watching this one. You are doing a fantastic job with this! Cleanup sure gets boring, but pays huge in the end!

[Relic_Models]

The box art seems deceiving. Looks awesome; though the issues you'e having are not.

Completely confused by those 'break calipers'. They don't look like any I've seen before.

Looking forward to seeing what you have to do with this kit.

[Shelby 427 1965]

Awh, that's a pity. I had hoped that the smaller companies like these would at least have a quality product, since they definitely have the subjects down.. Interested to see how you do with this. I wanted one to make the cover car from Gran Turismo 4, but I'm a bit put off now... I'll be watching!

[superbike-shaun]

Looks pretty tedious but you are on the way!I have a tip for you ,when everything is fresh out of primer,use a contrasting color of primer to help smooth everything ,even the ghost imperfections.superbike-shaun

[Twokidsnosleep]

This is how you make brake calipers for a GT 40....actually how you make the whole darn car!

If you haven't seen the thread, it is worth a look

http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=96004&page=9

Edited May 15, 2015 by Twokidsnosleep

[Matt Bacon]

This is how you make brake calipers for a GT 40....actually how you make the whole darn car

Except this isn't a GT40... It's a Ford GT Le Mans from 2010. This is what the callipers really look like:

The plastic ones look fine, as long as you realise that you're looking at them from the back, in the plane of the disc, not from the side...

I'm still on the hunt for that SimilR kit, because it's a great starting point for a fantastic build...

bestest,

M.

Edited May 15, 2015 by Matt Bacon

[ferrarijoe]

Matt do you have more pics of the inner workings of the car? I can find tons of exterior, but under the body work are hard to find. I did find the Mecum listing for the actual Marc vds Gt for sale. but it does not show panels off it. As far of the brakes you must see it differently then me, to make them resemble the real ones is going to takes a lot of work. the ones in the pic have flat fronts sharp edges. the kit ones are all rounded. And I think lemans setup has different brakes only reason i say is Studio 27 has a trans kit to make it a Lemans car. Not sure if the brakes would be that different. I think also your pic is the Matech car. Any info is greatly appreciated thank you. And for the price it should be a quality kit not just a starting point. I don't expect MFH details, but this is AMT quality. But oh well I will just have to make the best of it.

Shaun that's why i use gray primer since its white plastic, nice contrast when sanding.

I want to find a nice set of wheels, I don't like kit wheels. Was thinking hobby design z4 wheels, have to check to see if they are same size.

think I have the hood where I want it. when i get to the point of hanging panels I will do final light sand.

Edited May 16, 2015 by ferrarijoe

[ferrarijoe]

here are the rockers. lots of work to clean up. ones rough sanded, the other just primer coat to show defects. the panels with the x molded in are a pain to sand. the pics don't show it very well but the panel behind the door openings it wavy and just not to smooth. and that is an exterior part of the car.

[RAMBENNA]

a lot of nice work there, looks good so far

[rsxse240]

As bad as you're making this kit sound, it sure looks like a really good kit to do a super detail build. If it was Tamiya quality with that kind of engineering, it would have been in the hundreds of dollars range.

[Zarana-X]

I think the company name is a misspelling. Should be Simil'r, as in the kit is similar to a real car. That looks worse than and old Revell kit with worn out tooling.
You're doing fantastic with the clean up, though!

[aurfalien]

I was going to buy this kit but after a few similar reviews I thought not. Plus at my skill level (or rather at my lack-of-skill-level) it would have been waaaaayyyy too much.

By there lack of FB updates and bunk web site, they may be out of biz.

This kit needs a pro to get it right!

Edited May 16, 2015 by aurfalien

[Vric]

Had this kit before. After inspection, I came to the same conclusion as you. This kit can be made to look really good, but lot of work is needed.

See it like a resin kit, but in plastic. Good luck with it! Will follow.

[Matt Bacon]

Well, Roy is a pretty good modeller, but it can be fought into submission:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234925603-simil-r-ford-gt40/

bestest,

M.

[aurfalien]

Yes I've seen ferrarijoes handy work on this forum and he is a master. So I feel this is perfect for him to do.

[ferrarijoe]

Appreciate the kind words Brian. So I was bored sanding so figured I would do a body mock up. It fits together a lot better than I thought it would. Still don't like the way the headlight surround looks, I will deal with that later. I am using a new primer (new to me) for this build. Scalefinishes.com super primer. I really like it, you have to be careful on how far you are from the part when spraying or it grains really bad. But once I found the right distance it laid down really nice. And I can't say enough nice things about his customer service, He will go above and beyond to make you satisfied with your order.

[martinfan5]

Good luck, trust me, you are gonna need it

[ferrarijoe]

So after a lot of searching i found some great pics of the real car. I feel stupid because I didn't realize matech built the Marc VDS gt's. So after finding that out I realize I can use the Matech GT's as reference. So after looking at pics, I realize even though Simil' R put a lot into this kit they left alot out. And its things i think should be included, like interior details. Such as electrical boxes, dash switches, and a shifter that looks like the real one. I even noticed in the pics of the real car Simil' R has their logo on it. So they probably had great access to it. Maybe I've just been doing to many Tamiyas so my expectations are to high. And I am actually starting to enjoy it, having to put so much effort into making things look good will hopefully carry to other projects where i would of just left well enough alone.

So I am not in any way a scratch builder, but I figured I have to start somewhere. So I will be trying and probably retrying to add some of the details missing from the car. First in the interior there is a brace missing of the roll cage. also on the passenger floor there should be a box with a plexiglass lid. I think it is battery box or black box protection can't really tell. So I got some styrene to make it. And none of the electrical boxes are in the kit. Also the master cylinder reservoirs are missing. Does any company make some or do i need to make my own? They give you a nice photo etched wiper mount, but no motor for it.

[ferrarijoe]