MPC 1988 Corvette Convertible. Completed 22-May-2012!

[Jdurg]

Earlier this week, while looking around online, I noticed on Amazon.com that there was a seller who had the 1/16th scale MPC 1988 Corvette for an incredibly reasonable price. Seeing this, I picked it up and was happy to have the package arrive a week earlier than expected. Therefore, I have been able to get started on it. The kit is in good shape with no warpage of parts, and nothing that stands out as a potential problem. I have already inspected everything and begun my plan of attack. The model has quite a few sink marks in there which I will need to fill in, and after painting the wheels (I'll get into this later) I noticed some more sink marks that I'm thinking about filling in before progressing any further. Just need to get used to using the Squadron Green Putty and once I'm more than a novice at that, I'll fill these in.

The model already has opening doors which is a very nice, and surprising, touch since I have never bought a model kit before where the doors were designed to be opened. The convertible top is not an opening portion, but based on the design of the kit I think I can get that to open. Right now, my plan of attack is as follows:

Open up convertible lid and perhaps come up with a folded up cloth "top" to store in there. If I get really ambitious, I might even try and get it to fold/open like the real thing.

Wire the engine and engine compartment. On a model of this size, I discovered that USB cables contain perfectly sized wiring for use as spark plug wire. I cut apart an old USB cable and inside I found plenty of red, black, and green wire that works perfect for spark plug wiring. I've already drilled the holes in the cylinder heads for the acceptance of these parts and was happy to find a VERY detailed wiring/firing order diagram for the L98 engine online. The distributor has had the center of it drilled out to accept the wiring there. Since the top of the distributor is concealed by the Inlet Plenum Body, just drilling a center hole is good enough. For the rest of the engine compartment I've done my research and have dozens of photos of the 1988 Corvette Engine Bay.

Correct the Alternator Bracket. The alternator bracket on this kit is incorrect in that it's completely solid and not "ladder-like" like the real thing is. I may need to go and fashion my own bracket out of sheet metal, or some very thin styrene if my attempt at cutting the proper holes in the existing bracket doesn't work.

I do have some things that I'm not quite sure how to handle yet. One is the logos on the body of the car. I would like to get some photo-etched logos to use, but nobody makes a photoetch set for this model so I'd have to either find a place that will custom create a set for me, or pick up my own photo-etch producing device. This is the aspect that will make this a fairly lengthy build. I am certainly not going to just use the details molded onto the car. Makes sanding/painting way too difficult.

Anyway, I'll post photos as I go along. Thus far, I have four photos to show:

I de-chromed the wheels and a good deal of the chrome parts in this kit. Easy-Off Oven Cleaner took care of the chrome in minutes, and it also ate through the clear coating underneath it in a heartbeat. The 1988 Corvettes I've seen photos of have had aluminum wheels and not chrome. Only a select few have chrome wheels. On the bottom right, I honestly didn't see the sink marks until I put the first coat of aluminum paint on there. Since I can now see them quite easily, I think I'm going to sand the paint away from those areas and fill it in with putty before I put another coat of aluminum on there. Once the aluminum is all dry, I will spray a semi-gloss clear coat over everything to get the sheen I want. For the logos in the middle, I'm hoping to perhaps get a photo-etch set made of those emblems so that I can detail paint them easier and then epoxy them to the centers. I'll need to find someone who can create a set for me, or I'll need to get the equipment to create my own. (Creating my own may be a good option as I also need to get wire looms and whatnot for the wiring in the engine bay and the only ones available online are 1/24 or 1/25 scale).

It's a little blurry and still has a small bit of the milky haze to it from the clearcoat, but the sheen is exactly what I wanted. The engine block and oil pan on the L98 engine is a black color which I obtained by painting the engine block and the oil pan a nice flat black which went on smoothly, covered well, and didn't obscure any details. By spraying a semi-gloss clearcoat on top it gets what I wanted for color without the difficulties associated with painting with semi-gloss or gloss colors. (For me, flats are always the easiest shades to paint as they leave almost no brush strokes). I was also able to make use of the "poor man's airbrush" that I picked up today. It's a propellant can with a cap that attaches to a bottle with a siphon feed on it. Depress the button on top and the paint in the bottle is vaporized and sprays on the object. I used it to coat the oil pan and it worked great. It's also my first use of the acryl paints and my god I love them! They cover well, they dry fairly quickly, and they level out and don't run away from high spots. I wouldn't use them to cover the body of the car or any highly handled areas, but they definitely are great for small details. Plus, the clean-up is simple. Soap and water.

Here are more parts which got the Easy-Off chrome removal. The Intake Plenum Body, the Fuel Rail, and the Throttle Body. By de-chroming these parts, I was able to attach the Throttle Body to the Intake Plenum Body and paint them as a single unit. The flat part on the Throttle Body is another area where some custom photo-etch would be nice as the real 1:1 car has the Tuned Port Injection label plate on there. With this kit being an older kit, it's not surprising that a decal wasn't even included for this. The manifold has been painted aluminum even though the instructions say to paint it black. In the images I have seen of L98 engines online, the intake manifold is always an aluminum color. The pipework is many times a shade or so darker, and I think I may use my gunmetal paint to darken the pipes on there. Finally, in the upper right corner is the oil filter from the kit. I painted this using the gloss blue Testors Acryl paint that came with the spray gun kit. I mixed it with some of the semi-gloss clearcoat to lessen the gloss of it, and painted away. I am simply amazed at how smooth the paint went on, how quickly it covered everything, how it leveled itself out and removed all brush strokes, and how it didn't "run" from the high parts and raised areas of the plastic. The filter was molded in bright red, and I can't see any of that through the super smooth paint job on it. I'm looking around online to find some logos/images to put onto the filter. I figure I can invest in some ink for my inkjet printer and some decal paper and come up with something for this.

And the final photo for today. This is the engine block with the aluminum and flat black paint completed. (The oil filter is also visible in this image). I still have some touch-up to do for some of the aluminum, and I need to pain the molded in hoses on the valve covers and the oil cap the proper shade of black. In addition, I have to go and detail paint the Corvette logo on the driver's side valve cover. The valve covers were de-chromed since, again, my source material shows these as being aluminum and not chrome. The cylinder heads were also painted aluminum to match all of the source photos I have and not black like the instructions stated. Same with the transmission. I've always seen them as aluminum/metal and not painted. The only areas which did match what the instructions stated were with regards to the block itself. All the images I've seen have that as a semi-gloss black color. So I painted the block flat black since it covers very easily, and doesn't leave a lot of nasty brush marks. The two halves of the engine fit together fairly well, but there was still a noticeable gap down the middle. (You can still see the seam/gap in the manifold area, but since that will be covered I didn't concern myself with it). I spent a good deal of time with superglue and baking soda to fill in the gap and smooth out the seam around the bell housing and the transmission. With the paint coats on there, I think I did a pretty good job. Though it can't be seen in the photo, I have drilled the holes for the spark plug wiring according to the wiring diagram I have. After the paint has a day or so to fully dry and cure, I'll use the spray setup I have to put a coat of semi-gloss clear over everything. The rest of the engine parts have not been painted or cleaned up yet, but that is my goal for tomorrow. I'm trying to figure out how to get the pulley/gear system corrected as the "belt" molded in there is WAAAAAAAAAAY too thick. But many of the gears are "hanging" from this setup so I'm not sure how I can cut the pulleys/gears off of it and still keep its shape. Right now, I'm thinking drilling a couple of small holes in the gears and putting some stiff wire in there, then covering the two wires with masking tape to act as a belt. Or, cut some incredibly thin, but sturdy, sheet styrene or metal and use that to stiffen it up. Regardless, I'll figure out something and make this look more realistic.

More to come likely next weekend as I get more finished here.

Edited May 23, 2012 by Jdurg

[Custom Mike]

Great work so far, I've always wanted to build one of the monsters, but just don't have anywhere to put it once it's finished!

t's also my first use of the acryl paints and my god I love them! They cover well, they dry fairly quickly, and they level out and don't run away from high spots. I wouldn't use them to cover the body of the car or any highly handled areas...

Justin, there's no reason not to use them for the body, you just need a good clear coat to protect them. I've painted two with Model Master Acryl, and was extremely happy with the results!

[Chris guthro]

mike, where did u get the bf'gs off that mustang? very nice start to the corvette!!

[Jdurg]

Thanks! The only reason I wouldn't use the Acryls on the body of the car is because I like to use the very readily available polishing compounds and automotive rubbing compounds that would likely eat right through the Acryl paint. I don't have a hobby shop all that close to me, so it's more difficult for me to get the model car polishing kits, etc. Still, after using these Acryl paints on many parts in my current build, I'm not going to permanently shut the door on that.

The Acryl Gloss paints go on just like the flat enamel paints, and the finish they provide is incredible. The oil filter and starter, which are gloss blue and gloss black respectively, look and feel amazing. I will definitely be buying more of these paints as time goes on.

Oh yeah, I may have a picture up later, but I was able to use the Squadron Green Putty to clear up the sink holes in the one wheel. Now, after re-coating it with the aluminum paint, I can't tell which one is the putty wheel unless I look really closely. So it looks like I've succeeded.

[Dr. Cranky]

Mike, I like those. Nice colors and paint on there.

[Jdurg]

By use of logic, I have figured out how to get the small emblems on the wheels and on the driver's side valve covers painted. Thankfully, the pieces were molded in black plastic and I plan on covering the wheels and the engine components in a semi-gloss clear coat to add some depth to it, and to give it the proper sheen.

I was cleaning a brush after putting a coat of aluminum paint on a wheel when I wondered what would happen if I went and took a toothpick, soaked it in some paint thinner, then used the toothpick to gently scrape away the paint from the Corvette Emblem on the valve cover and the wheel? Upon trying this out, the aluminum paint was removed from the high spots in the emblem but paint in the lower spots stuck around. No worries about fine detail painting with a brush as I was able to take a sharpened toothpick, dab it in some of the red and the white paint needed on the emblem, and just brush the paint on with the toothpick. After the Acryl paint dries and hardens, I can just take a plain old toothpick and rub it on the high spots to bring the black plastic color back out. I think it turned out great.

So here's an image of the engine with the emblem taken care of as described above. The photo really doesn't do it justice. In person, it looks even better.

Here's the corrected wheel. The coloring on this photo is off due to the angle at which I took the picture. (Should have kept the same angle as on the engine photo I posted here as both parts were sitting on a sheet of white styrene). Anyway, there's still some smoothing out that I need to do on this, but the sink holes are now completely gone which makes me quite happy. Some VERY fine sanding with some 2500 grit sandpaper is in order to smooth out the rough spots. (The picture makes it look like there's a ton of paint on this thing, but that's not true in person. The real thing looks perfectly fine with a few little specks here and there that the 2500 grit sandpaper will handle). Once the semi-gloss goes on this, it will look even better. I plan on doing the emblem trick on these wheels just like I did on the engine.

[Modlbldr]

Justin-

Your work on this is looking good. The repairs you made to the sink marks on that wheel turned out just fine. Sounds like you have plenty of reference photos to work from. Keep up the fine work.

Later-

[Roadkill2525]

mike, where did u get the bf'gs off that mustang? very nice start to the corvette!!

Those are from the Otaki/Doyusha/Arii '71-73 Mustang, the individual wheel sets show up on eBay every once in a while.

[Custom Mike]

Michael, I bought these as an aftermarket set of rims/tires from a hobby shop in Jacksonville, NC. I believe they were made by American Satco (But I'm not 100% positive of who made them, just that they were a set of rims/tires only) about a decade ago, they may have been from those kits prior to that though, I wouldn't know, as I've never heard of 'em myself! I also got a set of slotted rims with the same tires (At the same time), I used those on a '32 Highboy.

Justin, neither of those models were polished, that stuff lays down smooth as glass straight from the airbrush! I used some Mequiars #7 to bring the blazing shine out on both of them, but no polishing kit was used on either one. BTW, Great work on the Corvette emblem, and a great solution, gotta start sharpening some toothpicks!

Edited March 6, 2012 by Custom Mike

[Jdurg]

Thanks everyone. I put a layer of semi-gloss Acryl paint on my wheels last night. I consider them "done". The photo doesn't do them justice. In real life, they are very bright and metallic looking. The emblems turned out great, and the black wash I gave them turned out perfect. I am quite happy. I now need to focus on cutting some support for the gears/pulleys and making them look like real belts. The finished engine I plan on showing will be great.

[Jdurg]

Alright, a little bit more progress. I've been focusing on the engine work while I apply putty to the body and sand that all smooth. Using Squadron Green Putty which I am then "sealing" with an ultra thin layer of superglue. So here's a picture of the engine from the driver's side, the passenger's side, and the top. Also, I made up some decals that I plan to print out as I picked up some decal paper (white and clear) and after I get my ink-jet printer cleaned up and replace the long since dead ink cartridges, I'll be able to print them. For the Tuned Port Injection decal, I'm still not sure if I'm going to use this as a decal. I'm looking to see if there are any places online that will make some custom photo-etch parts. Or, I'll pick up the Micro-Mark Pro-Etch Photo Etch System once I get some funding. (Recently had a nasty legal issue crop up that I had to pay out of my butt for a lawyer to prove that I was not guilty of what I was accused of. It was worth it, however, as the courts agreed with me). So I may see about having a photo-etch TPI logo for the throttle body which would look more realistic. Anyway, here are the photos.

Driver's Side. I'm a little irked with the exhaust manifolds since they didn't go on in a manner that allows the exhaust to fit easily. I'll have to modify the exhaust later on.

Passenger's Side. Just like the Driver's Side, there are spark plug wire brackets that I made out of thin styrene because I couldn't wait to figure out how to make photo-etch ones. I think they turned out well and work great in order to route the wires properly. I have a .pdf file that shows the proper routing of the wires. Since the plenum cover will hide the top of the distributor, I don't need to worry about the way the top looks. After the semi-gloss clear coat on the brackets has dried, I will route the wires and take another photo. This will be my first ever spark plug wiring job, so while it won't be perfect, I hope it will look good. Also, once the plenum cover goes on, I'll be able to route a fuel line from the fuel filter to the TPI setup. Also, a red wire will be attached to the starter so I can route it to the batter once the engine is installed.

Top view of the engine.

Here's the decal I created for the oil filler cap. It'll be scaled down and applied to the oil cap on the passenger's side and should look good.

I'm the most psyched about this decal. I found an image of the oil filter used on the L98 engine and it was large enough where I was able to put it in Photoshop, grab the logos from a Google Images search, clean them up, then create the design in Photoshop by placing the text and logos on the background I made. (The original image was rotated and unable to be used. It was also too blurry. I only used the image in the lower left corner from the original. The rest was created or copied from an image search). The bar code was a random bar code I found and used. Once this is scaled and printed on the decal paper, it will look GREAT on the oil filter.

Finally, here's the TPI decal I'll use if I can't somehow make, or acquire, a properly scaled photo-etch piece. The final size will be 2mm tall, by 3.5mm wide.

I also discovered that I have made a fairly major boo-boo.

The belt on the gear/pulley assembly was WAAAAAAAAAAAY too thick so I cut the pulleys/gears off of the belt and sanded them smooth. My plan is to use the .015" thick styrene sheet to cut belts for the "sturdy" part. (The hard part will be cutting a notch in the gears/pulleys to insert the styrene belts). I am then going to cover the belts with some blue painters tape and paint it black. The texture is perfect. Where I screwed up is that I didn't measure the distances of the belts before cutting them off. So I'm going to need to either find someone who has this kit and can measure the belt lengths, or somehow get a replacement part and measure. This will be rough. Thankfully the engine gets put into the overall model towards the end of the build.

[Jdurg]

The spark plug wiring is done. It did not come out exactly as I wanted it to because of the fact that the wire I used, with the insulation on it, was a bit stiffer than expected and also there was not enough room in the distributor. In retrospect, I should have started by gluing the 8 wires into the distributor and then routed them and cut them at the insertion point into the engine. As a result, the driver's side wires do jam into the top, but the passenger's side had to just be wrapped around the shaft of the distributor. Although the Plenum Inlet Cover hides the distributor, you can still see on the driver's side how it rides up, but on the passenger side it does not. Oh well. Lesson learned for next time. The little looms I made for the wires out of thin styrene do look good on the engine, so I'm happy with that. I'm currently working on building some seat belt latches for the interior.

For my first attempt at wiring an engine, I think it came out okay.

Top View

Passenger Side View

Driver's Side View.

[Jdurg]

Don't have any more photos to post, but I've gotten some more work done on the build. The chassis has been painted, and I LOVE how quickly the Acryl paints dry and how smooth a finish they leave. This weekend, I'll apply the flat clear coat to the proper parts of the chassis and put some semi-gloss over the rails. I've attached the upper part of the front suspension and painted the A-Arms silver as my reference photos have shown. The lower part of the suspension has been painted the proper silver and black (silver for the tension spring and lower A-Arms, and black for the structural portions), and the entire thing was sprayed semi-gloss to give it a nice "hard" finish to it, and the proper sheen.

I finished up the construction of the seat belt buckles for the interior, and put the base silver coat on it. I have decided to go with a silver exterior with a tan interior. With the body being molded in red plastic, the silver color for the exterior will help cover the red. I think the silver/tan combo will look quite nice when finished.

This weekend I hope to get the rolling chassis built and start on the interior. I need to work on heavily modifying the exhaust system due to how the manifolds attached to the engine block. (I'm going to need to go and heat the exhaust where it is supposed to connect to the manifolds and warp it so that it will connect properly. I may need to fabricate some spacers in order to make it fit). In addition, I think I'm going to need to search online for a spare pulley/gear assembly as I foolishly cut mine apart before measuring it in order to properly create belts from strip styrene. Ah well. Lesson learned.

Overall, this is still coming along great and it is definitely going to end up being my most detailed build ever.

[Jdurg]

No more pictures at this point, but I have gotten more tools needed for my build. The Micro-Mark Photo-Etch kit arrived a few days ago, and I am now working on all of the photo-etched items that I will want to use. A couple of these replace decals that I had planned on using. Thought it may take some practice runs, I plan on producing photo-etched versions of the following:

Tuned Port Injection Emblem on the Throttle Body.

Nose Corvette Emblem.

Gas Cap Corvette Emblem.

GM Seat Belt Buckle.

Seat Belt Latch.

Seat Belt Hardware.

Interior Speaker Grilles.

Alternator Top Bracket.

This is what I need to create via Photo-Etch. If I had gotten the kit earlier, I would have made my wire looms and associated parts via photo-etch, but I still think the styrene sheet came out fine.

Today, I got the interior painted and the semi-gloss clear coat put on top. It's turning out REALLY nice, and once the proper colored flocking comes in the mail, I'll be able to put that on and get the interior finished. Again, I can't express how much I freaking love the Testors Acryl paints. They go on so smooth and just look so good.

[Jdurg]

Got a little bit more work done on the Vette the past few days. I went and shaved/sanded off the gears/pulleys on the assembly and began to mount them to the engine. I am creating a bunch of mounts/brackets so that the alternator, A/C compressor, power steering gear, etc. etc. can mount directly to the engine block and I can then make a belt and wrap it around. Overall, I think this is coming out pretty damned good as the belt will be perfectly to scale as opposed to the MASSIVELY thick belt molded into the original gear assembly, and in addition I don't have to worry about the fact that I forgot to measure the part before cutting it apart. For the mounts that don't look so good, I will have them hidden in the engine assembly once it's on the chassis so that is a positive. The only issue I'm coming across is that I can't get accurate measurements since any place selling the parts doesn't provide measurements, and I keep getting ignored or laughed at when I go to 1:1 scale Corvette forums and ask for help. I guess I'll just have to wing it and hope it comes out well, or find a repair manual that gives all of the dimensions. Regardless, I think I'm going to pick up another one of these kits since it's a VERY well made kit and we don't seem to have a whole lot of good modern era Corvettes. With the next version of the kit, I think I'll try and scratch build a TON of parts and make a 1996 Corvette Grand Sport. With the Micro-Mark Photo-Etch kit I picked up, I think I'll be able to do a lot of that. Making the engine for the Grand Sport will probably be the toughest part.

I'm taking some vacation days later this week, and I think I'll go ahead and prime and put the first couple base coats of silver on the body this weekend. The silver/black exterior (The lower portion of the car will have the black paint) with the tan interior is going to look VERY sharp. Can't wait to get this done. I got my seatbelt latches made, but now that I have the photo-etch kit I think I'm going to scratch the parts I've made and just go and build new ones out of the sheet styrene I have and use the photo-etch kit to design the buckles and latches. I'll update my "how to make your own seat belt hardware" thread once I'm done with the new versions.

[Duntov]

Justin:

You are doing some nice work here... as a former owner of this vintage car I can say you are well on your way to a nice build.... keep it going....

Regards

Bill (Duntov)

[Jdurg]

Thanks Eric! I'm having a ton of fun building this. If anybody is looking to build a large scale Corvette, this is a GREAT kit to build. Today, my first day of vacation as I am taking time off of work through Monday of next week, I went and attached all of the pulleys/gears to the engine block. I have discovered that even had I kept the initial pulley/gear part intact, there would be fit issues with the engine block, pulley/gear assembly, and the radiator hoses. I will have to cut the radiator hoses apart and put my own parts in there. I have a bunch of perfect diameter tubing I can use for the hoses in order to weave their way around the parts that are now cemented to the engine block. I'll cut some tape apart this weekend in order to route the belt. I also plan, on Saturday, to do my first work with my photo-etch kit. I have the fret already designed in Illustrator, then converted to a raster image in Photoshop with a resolution of 3200 DPI. It's a massive file size, but this will work perfect for printing on the film that the kit provides. I can't wait for this to come out. If it comes out right, I'll make a bunch of these for future 88 Corvette builds in this scale. If anybody else wants to build one of these, providing the photo-etch work comes out right, I'll be willing to help out. Can't wait to finish up this build. While on vacation, I'll get the body paint done. Can't wait!

Edit: I just put the first coat of the Rustoleum gray primer on the hood. It came out SUPER smooth and looks fantastic. I ran out at the end, but I needed to go to AutoZone tomorrow anyway to get the metallic silver and black color for the top coats, and another can of clear coat just to make sure I had enough. Applying a coat of paint to a main part, like the body, just gives a feeling that words can't describe. This is why I am so happy to be back into modeling. I can't WAIT to get the photo-etch stuff done this weekend. I found an LED flashlight that emits ZERO UV rays which I can use to work on the photo-resist application, and also have a bunch of compact fluorescent bulbs around the house which I can use to expose the photoresist. I'm really psyched about this. I expect my first go around to not be all that great, but if it's acceptable to me, I'll go ahead and use it. I ditched the seat belt latches I had made previously, and while they looked fantastic, I figured that making them in scale with my photo-etched buckles and gear will be best off. I will be getting my tan colored flocking in the mail tomorrow, and will then be able to finish up the interior. It's already looking so good, and I think I can now call this my best model build ever. While I love the old school Corvettes (and I need to get me a 1953 model to super detail since it's the start of the series), the modern era Corvettes are just so much fun to build. The engine compartments on the newer Vettes just look so good when properly detailed, and while the AMT/Ertl line of Corvette kits have generally been much poorer with regards to detail than the Revell/Monogram lines, the MPC large scale kits which are no longer in production always come out great. I've already built a 1963 split window 1/16 scale kit, and am VERY happy with this 1988 Vette. Seeing it available on Amazon for only $40.00 is a STEAL. If you are a Corvette fan, I suggest checking it out, even if it means I may not be able to get another one.

Edited March 30, 2012 by Jdurg

[Jdurg]

I got my flocking in the mail today, along with some GM seatbelt work. The seatbelt hardware is designed for 1/24th scale cars, but I figure out how to use it for my 1/16th scale Corvette. I can use the litany of seatbelt latches to make the logo I need for my Corvette. Therefore, I don't need to make this out of the photo-etch I'm toying with. I'm happy. I have just finished applying the flocking to my interior, and this looks AWESOME! Once the paint dries, I'll take photos and update this thread. I'm super psyched. Today, I also put the final primer coat on the hood of my Vette and it is silky smooth. I got the silver and black paint that I need, and I'll have the body worked out by the end of this weekend. This is becoming my best model build ever. I can't wait to post the final product in the Under Glass section. Thank you to EVERYONE for your support.

[Brizio]

Nice detail!

[Jdurg]

Thanks Fabrizio. I know I promised pictures, but the photos I took turned out poor so I can't really post them. Still, I got the second coat of silver paint on the hood today, and frustratingly some dust fell on the wet paint which means I'll need to sand them out. Hopefully it doesn't go through to the primer, but I'll likely need to put another coat of silver on there. I pray that I don't use too much of the silver paint because my sources of Rustoleum Auto-Touch pain have dried up. The two AutoZone stores I go to in order to get the paint I need has stopped selling touch-up paint! I asked why, and the workers there said that too many kids were buying paint to huff the fumes, or people were buying paints for purposes other than touching up their cars. I frustratingly asked them why they would stop selling paint to people buying it for things other than car touch-ups, and the douche of an employee said "We are here to help people repair their cars, so if you're not buying things to fix a car we don't want you here." I then told him that he just lost a customer and sales, and can understand why the store is in financial trouble.

I don't understand why it's so hard to find auto touch-up paints. I was able to get one can of silver paint and black paint for the body of the car, but they were out of clear coat and don't plan on re-stocking. I'll have to buy paint online now which will cause me to have to wait a good week to get it in the mail, plus extra shipping. SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO frustrating.

Anyway, I got the flocking done and will probably put another layer of flocking on there. The Testors Acryl flat paint, when diluted with distilled water, does a great job of re-enforcing an already applied flocking layer without making it clump up. The doors and dashboard (which has a layer of "fuzz" under the black top to it) have turned out great. I got the doors primed today, and will get them painted with the silver paint tomorrow. The black lower section will go on after the silver as the silver does a GREAT job of sealing the red-colored styrene, and the black/silver combo will look great with the tan interior. I'm really psyched by this build, and I promise, once I get good photos I will post more. Today/tonight I went and re-did the seat-belt latches I had made earlier. This time, I used the 1/124th scale GM buckles I bought from Detail Master. When I use them as the logos on the 1/16th scale car, they are a perfect match. I now only need to create the actual insertion parts in the photo-etch sheet I'm making. I had hoped to get that done this weekend, but since I've never done this before, I'm being super careful when using this kit. I still think this is turning out great, and I really appreciate the good words you are all leaving. Gives me the motivation to continue. I love building large scale Corvettes. I think I'll have to bite the bullet and pay the higher prices out there now for the 1/12th Scale 1967 Revell Corvette.

[Jdurg]

Okay, I finally got a postable picture. Here you can see the hood of the Corvette. Unfortunately, I didn't get any images of the hood before I did my clean-up work. There were some nasty sink marks and the such all over the hood. The Corvette Emblem was also positioned right up at the front, but since I'm making my emblems with the photo-etch kit I built, I had to sand off the built in ones. Afterwards, I did have to take some putty to the area and I have to say that the spot where it was is not even noticeable anymore. There is one layer of silver paint now on the hood, and as mentioned earlier, some dust particles got in there which I'm unable to sand out without going down to primer. So I will be putting on another layer of silver. Overall, it looks good. Once the second coat goes on tomorrow, and then the clear coat goes over that, it will look great.

The body still has some work to be done. I need to apply another thin layer of putty, or more likely, some superglue with baking soda thrown on for hardness purposes. Although I can't feel the poor spots with my fingers, I can see them after a very light mist coat is applied so I need to work on that a little bit more. The fit of the body over the interior tub and the chassis is still a concern of mine. The model has opening doors which leaves a VERY thin area in the middle of the body shell that is undoubtedly warped a bit. So when I go to put the interior tub inside and then the chassis, some fit problems may occur which will concern me with the paint and the glue. I think I'll pick up some five minute clear epoxy so that if there are some gaps I don't have to worry about it, plus the epoxy won't go and mess up the paint.

The paint job is going to first be a coat of silver paint over the entire model to seal out the red styrene plastic on the kit, then I'll mask off the top half of the model and apply the black paint for the bottom. The C4 Corvette design has a molding right down the middle of the model which makes masking super easy. The full size cars were available in some two-tone color schemes, with silver and black being one of them. I will be able to put some masking tape over the molding, then using an x-acto blade and a steady hand, follow the molding line to cut off the tape and leave it right there in the midline. At the front end, I just need to mask off the front nose piece and that is it. Since the molding is right at the seam, I don't need to worry about any paint "seams". Plus, once the clear coat goes down and covers everything, I'll go and take some flat black to paint over the molding itself to help it stand out a little bit. This thing is going to be gorgeous.

[Jdurg]

Okay, it's been a while since I've posted photos of my progress and I have a fair amount to talk about. I've spending a TON of time, and creating tons of styrene sheet shaving, trying to scratchbuild the seat belt buckles for the interior, and keep needing to make adjustments. First it was the design. Second was the width of the buckle. Right now, it's the depth. The width is just fine, but the things are coming out way too thick and look horribly out of scale. This is in addition to not sitting properly on the seats. So back to the drawing board to try and figure out how to make the width come out proper.

I still have my photo-etch kit that I need to start building from, and this past week I was able to get the to-size frets designed in Illustrator and Photoshop, then finally print them out on the clear sheets provided in the kit. They came out BEAUTIFUL on the transparent film that is provided, and I was able to print them out in Photoshop with the addition of registration marks on the outside so that I can line them up on the front and back of the metal sheet. When I lined up the registration marks on the film and held it up to the light, it was spot on perfect. So that's a good sign. On the metal sheet, I'm going to drill very small holes in the center of where the registration marks are so that it lines up just as perfect. The only hold up for me right now is trying to find a UV Free place where I can work with the photosensitive film. Once that's all set, I'll be fine. (I'll probably end up making a bunch of these frets as I like building this model and may want to get another in the future and do some mods to it). The fret will contain speaker grills for the interior behind the seats, the seat belt insertion parts of the buckles, hardware for the seat belts and another tie down belt that was molded into the interior but I'll replace with actual belt, the nose and gas cap Corvette Emblem, the Tuned Port Injection plate for the engine, and the top bracket for the alternator.

Anyway, onto my photos.

After doing a bunch of sanding and filling, I got my first primer coat on the body. It came out great and I just have one more tiny little area to fix. Otherwise, the body is in good shape and will be ready for a wet sanding and first coat of silver in a few weeks. (Have a LOT going on at work, and will be travelling to Dallas for a meeting the week of the 16th. Also am looking into employment options as I have a feeling the layoffs going around at work are going to hit me in the next couple of weeks.

The next one is the hood after putting another coat of silver on it (after sanding out the particles that got onto the previous one), followed by a clear coat which was put on yesterday. While the clear coat won't need any sanding, I will put some rubbing compound on it to smooth it out just a little bit. One TINY speck of something got into the clear on the drivers side of the "bulge", and on the driver's side nose part of it, the paint collected as it was being applied and the ###### thing developed a little bubble which I'd have to strip the entire roof for in order to correct. I'm just going to deal with it and treat it as a bit of "character" on the finished build. Just need to let this dry out and will polish it out later this week and put a black wash into the headlight lamps, but only a very fine one as I don't want it to be sharp black, but I do want it to be a little bit darker.

Here's the underside portion of the hood. This is all set aside from trim around the headlights which I'll get to later. The main black parts are semi-gloss with the depressed inner panels flat black to match the paint applied to the underside of the hood itself. Headlights are the same silver as the hood with a gloss coat over it.

I also got a bit more work done on the engine. I started attaching the components from the belt/pulley assembly that came in the kit molded as one big piece. The belts were about as thick as the chassis rail on the car, so I cut everything apart with plans on building new belts out of thin styrene. Well, foolish me forgot to measure everything before chopping it apart and therefore was put in a bad spot. So I decided that what I would do would be to take a very close look at the instruction sheet and the photos of the real engine, as well as the pictures on the box in order to figure out where all the parts go. I then took some pieces of thin styrene to use as brackets to attach the parts to the engine block. The only parts not attached yet is the gear that connects to the alternator via the alternator top bracket. That will be attached once the bracket is made from the photo etch kit. Once that is done, I'll be able to take some thin electrical tape, which I have some in a flat black color, and cut a strip out and wind it around everything. It will then be in a good scale and look really good. I also wound up cutting the radiator hoses and shaving off an attachment point (seen as the orange part on the photo above) so that I can take some tubing and wind it around the parts so it will fit in the finished model. I cut the hoses where clamps or other items were on the molded pieces so the join will look just fine. Even if I wasn't putting my own gears and belts etc. on here, from my dry fits it didn't look like the stock hoses would fit properly in there. By using tubing (which will likely be wire insulation after I pull the wire out of it) I'll be able to wind it around how I need it to go.

I got the outside and inside of the doors finished. Attaching the mirrors was the BIGGEST P.I.T.A. yet. There were no mounting points for the mirrors on the doors, and it's really hard to tell where the mirrors need to be until the entire thing is built. I have done some test fitting and just hope everything turns out okay. (I know already that the attachment of the dashboard to the top in the body shell and having it sit right in the interior tub is going to be a real pain). The exterior image has the silver top and black bottom painted, smoothed out, and clear coated so it is done. I still need to apply the center trim black paint and paint the upper part of the handle inset black. Not sure if this is how it is on stock cars as I've seen photos of both. The interior parts were painted according to every photo I've seen of tan 1988 interior Corvettes. The top half is flat interior tan from Model Master which I then coated in semi-gloss clear, and the bottom part that is tan has also had flocking applied to it. It looks perfect.

Dashboard is also done. It's done factory correct with the top half black, and the bottom half the interior color (tan) and I also applied flocking to the tan part of it which also came out well. (Flocking is super easy to do with the Testors Acryl flat clear coat. It dries at just the right pace to allow you to put the flocking on there and have it stick just right). The detail painting on this came out incredibly sweet. With perhaps the most steady hand I have ever had, the gauge details and the Corvette Emblem on the steering wheel came out nice and sharp. The very well molded details from the stock pieces came out great.

Finally, some scratch built stuff. Having picked up a pack of very thin styrene sheet, it's given me the opportunity to try out different thing. Looking at the interior hub, the floormats molded into the tub just don't look right. So I went and took some paper and was able to trace out the shape of the mats. I then took my sheet styrene and cut out two mats for each side of the interior. On one of the mats, I took a pencil and made a fine line around the edge in order to create the raised edge seen in the photos above. With a steady hand and a sharp X-acto knife, I cut out the perimeter. With a little bit of liquid plastic cement, I was able to fit the two together, tape it while the glue did its magic, and later remove the tape with the two piece of styrene nicely bound. While the border isn't 100% the same width all the way around, it did come out good enough for my level of acceptance. I then sanded the exterior smooth so there was no seam visible, and applied a coat of the tan paint to the whole thing to match my interior. Once dry, the Acryl flat clear was applied to the inside part and flocking quickly added and pressed down. The finished product is fantastic. Even better is that before I did the painting, I was able to bend the styrene so that it will fit snugly inside the interior and won't even need to be glued. This will make it look like it is actually sitting on the carpet like real mats would.

In the middle, you'll see the latest iteration of the seat belt buckles that I am trying to create. The width of the buckle is just fine and it looks incredible, but the depth is about twice as thick as it should be. I need to figure out how to build the front part of it that has an angled top part that goes back, and also build the exterior shell with the thin styrene. The difficult part is the interior buckle part. Thankfully, the detail master scale GM belt buckle set I picked up has a ton of parts which will let me perhaps use those to build the interior. I'll figure out something, but I'm going to get this right before I call it done.

So that's my progress thus far. I think it's coming out great and I can't wait to get the body painted. I just hope I have enough silver paint and clear coat as trying to find cans of the Rustoleum auto touch-up paint around here is next to impossible. The local AutoZone stores are phasing out carrying touch-up paints as they seem to only want to cater to the folks putting the "bling-bling" on their cars, and not anybody who would want to touch up a paint mar or use the paints for other reasons.

[Jdurg]

Just wanted to make a quick update here. Don't have any photos to post, but have some updates. I ran out of the silver Rustoleum paint used to paint the hood and the doors and switched to Duplicolor. I thought that my local Autozones were stopping their touch-up paint sales, but it turns out they were just switching from Rustoleum to Duplicolor. Thankfully, I was able to pick up a can of the Duplicolor silver touch-up which is supposed to match the same silver that my Rustoleum paint was. It's VERY close, but I can sense that the Rustoleum seemed to have slightly bigger "specks" of metal in the paint. However, I haven't put the clear coat on and that may hide it. The difference isn't huge, and certainly not huge enough for me to re-do everything. Definitely not worth the hassle.

Anyway, I got the silver and black bottom parts of the body painted. Next weekend I'll put the clear coat on and the paint on the body will be finished. I discovered a fairly significant fit problem with the hood and the body once the underpart of the hood was added, but was able to see that it was caused by the passenger's side wheel well area. So I took out the Dremel and ground away the wheel well area on the body (as this will be painted semi-gloss black once the clear coat on the full body is done). The hood now fits PERFECT!

The interior has had the mats I made epoxied on there and they look amazing. I also went and created gas/brake/clutch pedals and have them in there. Although not fully detailed, they'll be fairly hidden by the dashboard but they still look better than the molded in pedals. I have finally become happy with the seatbelt parts and the paint on those is drying. I'll attach them to the seats and then epoxy the seats to the interior pan and that will pretty much complete the interior.

I still need to find a dark-room style light so I can go and get the photo-etch kit I have up and running. I printed out the images on the film and will be able to line them up perfectly. They turned out amazing. Once I get the time to go and get the photo-etching complete, I'll have the last parts I need to finish up the interior (seat belt parts, speaker grills) and the engine (The top alternator bracket needed to attach the alternator to the engine, and the TPI plate). I will need to find some black tubing of sorts in order to re-make the radiator hoses as the ones in the kit had massive fit problems and wouldn't fit properly. I will likely go and use some black electrical tape for the belts on the engine, and then I'll FINALLY be able to fit the engine to the chassis. While picking up paint for the body, I found some tan colored painters tape which looks GREAT as seatbelts, and is thin enough where I can take two pieces, attach the sticky sides, then cut a thin strip the width I want and have it be a very convincing belt.

One other "test" I need to do is see if the Elmers 5-minute epoxy I have will be compatible with the tire material. I will take a little dab of it and try it on an inside facing part of the tire. I need to do this as the wheels fit somewhat loosely inside the tire, and if I attach the tires to the spindles the rotation of the internal parts is a bit tight. Therefore, the wheels themselves will rotate inside the tires instead of the tire/wheel assembly rotating. If the epoxy is compatible, I'll be able to squeeze some inside the tires and attach it to the wheels, thus solidifying them.

More to come next weekend when the whether clears and I've given the body plenty of time to cure, wet sand lightly with very fine sandpaper, then spray a few coats of clear on it. Overall, it's looking good.

[Jdurg]

Thanks to the super dry weather out there, I was able to go and get a couple of clear coats on the body. It's sitting there drying now. Sadly, I can still see a difference between the Rustoleum silver and the Duplicolor silver even though they are both supposed to be used for the same silver color car. Ah well. The amount of effort needed to disassemble, if that's even possible, the doors and hood is far too great to make it worth it. I'll just deal with the slight imperfections caused not by the color shade, but by the fineness of the particulate matter in the paint.

By putting the clear coat on now, I'll let it dry until this weekend and then buff it out. My next big step is getting off my lazy butt and creating the photo-etch parts with the kit I have.

[Jdurg]

Alright. I think I can consider this one "done." Overall, I'd rate my build as a 6/10. It overall looks pretty good, but issues with parts and me gluing some things on too early led to a less than perfect quality. I think after this post, I'll post it in either the "under glass" section, or the "Big Boyz" section. I am a fan of the larger scale Corvettes, and would really love to see a C5 or C6 era 'Vette in a large scale.

The issues I ran across with this kit were some fit problems at the end, and myself making a mistake and putting sub-assemblies together which led to fit problems later on. (By putting the driveshaft in too early, it made it next to impossible to get the Torque Arm to fit in the transmission tunnel area. As a result, the cross-beam on the chassis didn't sit properly. If not for the Elmer's Quick Setting Epoxy and some tape to hold it in place, the cross-beam would have never sat in place. In addition, by putting the nose portion that the instructions said to glue in place after the hood has been attached made it impossible for me to go and put the hood in. In my attempt, the parts of the underside of the hood that allow it to open and close broke. So the hood now just sits in place instead of functioning. Overall, not a big deal but it does annoy me).

So I did learn a lot from this:

1: ALWAYS pay attention to the instructions. While it may look like you can fit something together ahead of time, it might make it difficult/impossible to put together other parts later on.

2: With older kits, fit problems that don't appear to be there when the parts are not painted will likely show up once you've gotten some coats of primer and end color on. This makes things a royal pain.

3: If you are replacing molded parts (e.g. belts), measure everything out before you cut the plastic apart. I got it to work in the end, but it was a royal pain.

4: In relation to item #2, apply some tape to parts when dry fitting so the thickness of the tape can simulate paint.

5: DON'T RUSH! There were parts where I rushed to get things done, and resulting issues with paint/glue blobs resulted.

Still, I think this came out okay. I got to try out making my own photo-etch parts (which turned out GREAT for the hood/gas-cap emblems, as well as the TPI plate on the engine), and I did some good scratch building for the seat belt buckles and other seatbelt assemblies. I feel that the interior turned out to be fantastic. Flocking seems to be the perfect scale on 1/12 or 1/16 cars, and the detail work on the gauges on the dashboard look amazing.

I'm a perfectionist so I can't even be completely happy with a project, but considering that this kit is over ten years old, I am content. Below are some of the final pictures of the build. I think for my next project I'll go back to 1/24 or 1/25 scale Corvettes. Possibly a 1996 Corvette Grand Sport convertible where I'll work on opening doors and convertible top lid. (The door assembly on this '88 kit was a &%#$@!!!! When I went to put the interior and chassis onto the body, I had to spread the sides of the body apart a little bit. This caused the glued in hinge assembly to break off. The only good thing is that part of the assembly remained in place so the doors remain in place, but you can tell they aren't fully secured when you open/close the doors).

Front of the chassis assembly with the Tuned Port Injection plate attached. Was nice photo-etching that part, putting black paint on it, then being able to take some sandpaper and sand the paint off of the high parts that weren't etched. Looks even better in person.

Here's the photo-etch created emblem on the gas cap. It's a bit off-center here, but not enough for me to want to pull it off of the body and reset it. I think it came out GREAT and was easy to detail with some paint and a fine tipped marker. It was then coated with a flat clear coat to seal everything up. With this, and the nose emblem being focal points on the car, I was very happy with this.

And here's a top view of the car. The silver/black exterior with the tan interior looks really sharp. The seatbelt equipment looks great, and you can somewhat see that same emblem on the nose up front. The windshield and framing isn't on yet, but you'll see that soon.

And here's the completed model. I REALLY need to dust my house as the dust on the speaker really shows up. (In my living room, I have my cable box and PS3 connected to my Onkyo receiver which feeds into my TV. To the receiver, I have a set of 5.1 speakers that I built from kits. The subwoofer was built by me and my roommate, at that time, from individual parts and wood. The front and rear surrounds were built from kits, and the center speaker I built after designing a crossover, buying the proper parts, and some soldering and wood construction. I spent a total of around $1000 on the set, but they put out sound of a quantity and quality that rivals setups five times that cost).

When I post this in the under glass or big boyz forums, I'll take more pictures with greater detail. I'll show off the engine bay with the fully wired engine, the chassis (which is really my least favorite part of this), and the interior which looks immaculate. The wheels on this came out really nice after putting a black wash on there, and after carefully painting the Corvette Emblem on the wheels. Looking forward to my next build now.