Shelby GT350R - restoration

[Phildaupho]

This model was built in 2003 for the original driver Tommy Hamilton. It even appeared in Model Cars magazine. At some point the model had a big crash, falling from its display shelf. Fortunately it did not break. Rather it came apart. Tommy did a very good job putting it back together with only a few parts getting lost – a front disc brake,a rear shock and the radiator hose. He used some sort of glue that was very sticky but not harden so disassembly was fairly easy to undertake a restoration. This model was my first attempt at making my own decals using my first colour copier and I also had some serious issues with the kit supplied stripes. Other than replacing the missing parts and reassembly, the main part of the restoration was applying new livery decals and fixing up the stripes. It took me awhile to figure out how I was going to fix the stripes. During the original build, the first set of stripe decals completely bubbled and weremvery difficult to get off. The second set I used did not conform ton contours with decal solvent so a couple of areas that should have had stripes did not. These stripes seem to have permanently bonded to the paint. During the restoration I went through my collection of Shelby GT350 decals and could find none that were suitable. Then I remembered the story Tommy Hamilton told of getting a roll of reflective blue tape that was used on phone booths. Over the winter he used this tape to re-do the Shelby stripes. The blue sign vinyl I had was not reflective but it was metallic so I cut and appled new stripes just like Tommy did.

For more photos go to

http://public.fotki....n_bros_gt-350r/

[Dave B]

Nice resto Phil

Dave B

[mickey1938]

Beautiful job!

mickey1938