An Old Tamiya Toyota Celica GT4 Given A Rebuild

[oldcarfan]

This is a kit that I bought years ago on eBay. Actually I bought two about six months apart. Sadly the first kit left the seller in mint condition and got to me with the A,B, & C pillars crushed.  If you've every built one, you know the pillars are super thin. UPS blew off the damages so back on the shelf it went and I ordered another one. It also arrived with the same damage.

Being bored I dug one out a couple weeks ago and tried to fix it. No pics, but I used a fine Dremel saw blade to carve a groove in the backsides of the pillars and glued in thin brass rod. After that the assembly was typical Tamiya easy. I did manage to lose one of the front turn signals so I made one out of a piece of clear blister back. 

I like to have a theme for my builds and this one was easy. When these cars were new, Toyota was really into WRC rallying. For this one, I decided to do something a couple of budget racers might build as a fun adventure car.

So here it is my 1986 Celica GTR Safari . In honor of Halloween, I did a couple of pictures in front of a spooky, foggy, old mansion. Would've got more pictures if not for those meddling kids!

The basic car is box stock, but I used it as a practice for some new scratch building ideas. All the lights are scratch built, mostly from some Hobby Lobby adhesive gems. The light bar on the front is Plastruct tubing, four pieces glued together and then filled and formed to fit the grill. The pushbar on the front is plastic coated floral wire bent to shape. 

The Marlboro racing livery is one of my favorites so I borrowed it for this car with different colors. The decals are homemade using the Marlboro font as well. 

The only variations to the basic kit were to raise the ride height a scale 3 inches and give it some skid plates. The wheels and tires are from a Kinsmart 1/32 scale Jeep Wrangler. Strangely enough, they measured out to 15 inch in 1/24th scale. It's amazing what you can find if you keep an eye on cheap toy diecasts. The skid plates are standard thin Plastruct sheet that I tried my new hole punches out on. The exhaust is box stock with some paint and foil details.

The rack on top is also Plastruct with floral wire rails and some cargo. The toolbox is scratchbuilt, the blue water containers are off an offroad truck, and the gas cans, backpacks, and tarp are from a 1/35th Tamiya military parts pack. The air snorkel on the fender and A pillar is stretched sprue. 

The rear also features a floral wire rack supporting the spare tire, an Alice pack and another water can. 

 

[Jim B]

Cool looking rally car. Well done. 

[Kanada Kustoms]

Cool build... Love all the accessories on the roof and hatch!

[meechum68]

Very well done and great scratch building work!

 

[espo]

Excellent Rally detailing. Like the paint work and finishes. 

[89AKurt]

I like how you sourced details and adapted.  Almost looks like a map in the co-driver seat. 😉  The LED light bar is from where?

[oldcarfan]

6 hours ago, 89AKurt said:

I like how you sourced details and adapted.  Almost looks like a map in the co-driver seat. 😉  The LED light bar is from where?

The map is actually a computer from (I believe) a Lindberg Police Crown Victoria. I bought a bag of assorted parts at a hobby show a while back and that was in it. The screen is a reduced screenshot that I copied and pasted to print. 

The LED light bar came off a Kinsmart 1/43rd-ish scale diecast 4x4 toy truck. I bought a bunch of them from Walmart over the last year. Even though they are smaller, some of them have a few useful parts I can adapt. 

[XYHARRY]

Great use of different scale parts. Your scratch built accessories are well done. Over all, a fine endurance rally car. Well done Gary. 

[Shelby 427 1965]

The Home Improvement fan in me loves the Binford logos.

[ChrisR]

Very nice!

[oldcarfan]

5 hours ago, Shelby 427 1965 said:

The Home Improvement fan in me loves the Binford logos.

More power!