Koenig Specials tuned Porsche 928

[mrm]

Willy Koenig was one of the pioneers of tuning and thinkering with really high end cars as early as the '80s. Ferrari, Jaguar, Lamborghini, Porsche, BMW, Mercedes Benz….. His creations were celebrated by some and frowned upon by others. No matter which camp you chose, there is no denying that his cars were the epitome of '80s flash and excess.

The only company brave enough to release some of his cars in kit form was Fujimi. It must be something with this kind of cars and the Japanese, as Koenig is celebrated to this day in the country of the rising sun. A lot of his cars actually ended up in Japan today.

Anyway, I am going to tackle his Porsche 928. It is a very simple kit with not too many pieces. Typical early Fujimi. I bought my kit years ago from a swap meet, so all the parts were carefully cut from the molding trees and then packed in small zip bags bundled by the steps in the instructions. This means that the original box I bought it in, was almost empty when I opened it. Now, just because the number of parts is really low, does not make this kit easy. The mold lines on the body were ridiculous and in some pretty weird places. And the side intakes in the wide body are a nightmare to align and fill, so there are no gaps. I already took care of this, so here it is waiting for primer. I also glued the mirrors and the headlight bases prior to paint. The kit gives you the option to position the headlights in the "up" position, but I always found them weird looking on the real car when on, so I left them at "off".

[mrm]

Slight change of plans. No nail polish monkey business. This baby will be a Ferrari tri-coat Rosso Fuoco.

[hjracing]

Nice start, i'll keep an eye on this one!

[mrm]

Ok, so my lack of patience got the better of me.

An hour and a half after I sprayed the poly primer, I decided to spray the base coat for the Rosso Fuoco. This wasn't that great of a deal, because the primer was pretty well set. The fact that I got too lazy to sand the primer did not help however. This is the base coat

Then I decided that instead of waiting the minimum of 2 hours, I could just clean my airbrush and spray the second coat.

This is what it looked like this morning in the sun.

It is an OK color, but not what it was supposed to be and the finish was horrible. Everything was perfectly dry but not smooth. To clear coat this and then polish it to be perfect it would have taken so much clear that it would have washed out all panel lines. So I sanded everything smooth and now I am going to do it the way I should have the first time.

Edited April 26, 2014 by mrm

[Belugawrx]

Been there,....Awful feeling,...Hang in there

Cheers

[mrm]

Thank you guys. Just like with the Alumacoupe, I am waiting to do the clear coats on three models together.

[geetee66]

Ouch!

I feel your pain(t)!

Keep at it, mate. This is gonna be killer!

[mrm]

The body was repainted and cleared together with three others. I wet-sanded it tonight. Will take pictures tomorrow.

The interior is also done. I had to make backs for the seats, as the kit does not provide them.

Then everything was sprayed with SEM "Light Buckskin" and the interior was flocked with red matching the Rosso Fuoco. I love working with SEM paint. It is designed to stick to anything. Requires very little prep work. It can handle hot lacquer on top of it. But best part is that it looks and feels like leather and it cures in minutes. The only downside is that it only comes in spray cans.

[mrm]

Here is the body repainted, wet sanded and after rubbing compound. I washed it really well and now it will get the black around the windows, then it will be polished.

It has water on it on the pictures.

[Kennyboy]

Color and body work are beautiful Michael!

Keep it going!

[mrm]

Thank you Ken.

I masked the whole body to make the window seals…..

….and had a senior moment and forgot the mirrors. So I had a blast sanding that black off and polishing them.

Painted all the clear parts with Tamiya transparent paints and foiled all the lights back spaces.

[kruleworld]

Holy smoke, you sure got that smooth (last pic)

[slusher]

Great color and rebound from the first paint. I really like the interior color as well. Your doing some super work..

[Kennyboy]

That last photo is the "money shot"! Flawless finish!

Good god this is gonna be a beauty when it is done!!

[mrm]

Well, this kit fought me in quite few areas, but it is finally done. I will post pictures in "under glass"

THANK YOU EVERYONE FOR THE GREAT COMMENTS AND FOLLOWING THE BUILD.