DocRob

Thank you Yves, we discussed the bottles on LargeScaleModeler as well and I like them the way they are. The bottles are all squeezed and showing no caps, which means they are empty. PE bottles have a longevity, which exceeds the lifespan of the pilot by far. When I´m surfing or swimming, I sometime find presumably old bottles in the water or on the beach, which look almost new. This aspect was a side aspect while developing the scenery, it should show how long plastic lasts in nature, by far longer than a human live lasts. The color could be less brighter, but I wanted them to be a point of focus. Cheers Rob

Thank you Mike, I have not followed F1 very closely, but the 80´s races, which I had seen, I liked a lot. Modern F1 is meh to me, but that´s only my personal view. Cheers Rob

Thank you for sharing your Memories, Ken. I know the livery only from TV footage and photos, which may not be true to color. Finally the McLaren is done and is a bright spot in the shelf with it´s vivid colors and I can always blame the camera for getting it wrong Cheers Rob

The Kampfanzug´s pilot has bitten the dust and the medical Neuspotter drone can´t help it. My Sanbox group build entry over on LargeScaleModeller is buried under the sand now. I wanted to do something different and when I found the MaK Friedrich battle suit in my stash, I formed a picture of a pilot tormented by a sandstorm and died for thirst, after all his PE bottles were empty. The Neuspotter drone was added later to the scenario with it´s sinister looks and I wanted a bit of black humor seeping out of my little dio. The AI driven drone was probably smart enough to wait for the storm to cease, where the high tech equipped pilot died, because there was not enough water left for him. Some final pics, this time in my photo box with better lighting. Cheers Rob

Thank you Alan. The paintjob of the McLaren is nearly burning the eyes in the display shelf. I wonder, what is the real thing looking like to the human eye. I´ve seen many photos of course, but the red seems to let the metering of cameras go crazy and the color rendition ranges from deep red to my fluorescent orange. My camera can be easily fooled as well with these vivid colors. Cheers Rob I should have de-chromed them with oven cleaner, as I often do, when the chrome looks too toyish, but I thought with overpainting everything in black, I could get away, wrong . I use CA glue for these parts and on many more occasions with plastic kits. Classic plastic cement, I use for the basic unpainted construction. As I prefer to ready paint and finish as many sub assemblies as possible and then use CA, to put everything together. Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig and Mark. I´m happy to continue with other projects, but finally, I had enough perseverance to finish the McLaren and that feels good to. The kit itself is not bad, besides some strange decisions, like metal plating the engine parts, which leads to fit issues, even more loco as the engine is black and other issues of the kit have the plastic in black. I shot myself into the foot with too much aftermarket for this build, often having five manuals in front of me and loosing track. Like the real ones, F1 cars are delicate affairs with a maximum of technology packed in as minimal space as possible and then streamlined for aerodynamics. Cheers Rob

Thank you Chris, Gary, Tim and OC. The kit was a test of patience at times and I´m happy, it´s finished now, but I´m also satisfied, that I pulled through. I don´t like unfinished business in general and I like the shape and colors of the MP4/6. Like you said Gary, the McLaren is from an era, where I occasional followed F1 racing. I learned so many things through MSW and LSM, it´s a pleasure to give back my experiences, Tim. To me a modeling forum is a two way story and I profited so much from the knowledge of others here, often encouraging me to try new techniques, which are now in my repertoire. Cheers Rob

I call the McLaren done. The build got me some grieve, in fact, more than expected, but from the distance, the vibrant paintjob hides some shortcomings . Assembly of all the components was not so easy due to the fragile character of the subassemblies, paired with the also fragile carbon fiber decals. I used mainly CA glue for the job, as it doesn´t attack the decals. The Goodyear branding of the tyres was a bit different, as they were "negative" decals. You had to peel away a protective sheet, than the decal from the base layer and place it on the rubber. Then, a wet cotton swab was used to loose the backing layer and the decals were tattooed on. I brush painted the tyre walls with acrylic matte, to hide carrier film residues. I also sanded the tyres, to get rid of the moulding seam. I don´t dare to re-open the body, as I suspect, there will be some loose parts. Anyway, I made some photos without the body in the final stage. With wheels ....And finished Cheers Rob

Thank you Alan, it´s not perfect, but will do. I hope, I can conclude this unruly kit soon and have an eye catcher at least from the distance . I learned a lot about car body finishes through this build, which was the main goal Cheers Rob

After some elbow grease, I call the body done and I´m 95 percent satisfied with the outcome. There are tiny imperfections, but they are barely visible to the human eye. I wet sanded the body parts with 6000 grit, followed by 8000 grit and then worked my way through the Tamiya polishing compounds from coarse to finish and finally used the Tamiya modeling wax. I could have gone further, but the McLaren will not be perfect in any way, so I took the easy way and tried to learn as much as possible. I didn´t polish the rear wing due to it´s fragile character and I didn´t want too much contrast between the wings and body as well. Lessons learned: I should have added one or two more wet coats of clear, even heavier thinned with leveling thinner and use a plastic container for the drying time, as there are some tiny dust particles in the clear. Cheers Rob

Thank you Ken, I like it too, even though I don´t like the product and never smoked one, even in my times as a smoker. It´s a classic, like you said, simple, effective, catchy. Cheers Rob

Some little mock up shots after decaling and clear coating, but before that, it was necessary to assemble the wings. The rear wing gave me some resistance, as it was very difficult to glue all parts together, without destroying carbon fiber surfaces. All assemblies of painted parts were done with CA glue. I didn´t want to destroy my finish or decals with plastic cement. Clear coating was done with two misted coats of pure Zero lacquer clear, with about 2,0 bar air pressure and a 0,4 mm nozzle. This was only to seal the decals without harming them with a heavy coat of clear. I tested the process on a paint and decal mule, prepared with exactly the same sequence of steps. Then, after a drying time of about half an hour between coats, I sprayed two heavier "wet" coats on, which had about thirty percent of leveling thinner added for a better finish. Cheers Rob

I sanded the body with 8000 grit sanding sponges again, cleaned it and gave it another coat of Zero lacquer clear, this time with about 20% leveling thinner in the mix. After drying, I started to apply carbon fiber decals to the wings and air baffles. This is very time consuming and at first, I always think, the decals will never settle around the delicate shapes, but with patience, lots of strong decal solvent and applied heat from a hairdryer, they start to melt in place slowly. It took two days in total and still need a lot of touch up, but they are on. Next was the branding. The TB Decals went on perfectly, with matching colors, not too thin, not too thick, what can I say, it took only two hours, what a relief after the delicate carbon fiber decals Cheers Rob

The first coat of gloss is on and will be the base for decaling. I used Zero paints lacquer clear for the first time and liked it, besides the horrible smell. I may sand and spray a second layer, but this I will decide after everything dried. The gloss looks actually better than on the picture. I used the same process of painting and glossing on a spare external fuel tank from an airplane kit as a mule. There I can test everything first, before I work on the McLaren body. This will be especially welcome, when it comes to clear coating after decaling, always a risk with the hot stuff. Cheers Rob

Next will be the fluorescent red on the body and rear wing (not shown) parts. Again Zero paints will be used, but before, I need to mask off the white areas. There is a template included in the kit, which I took as a guide for my own masking strips. I adhered 16mm wide Tamiya Kabuki tape on top of the templates contour and cut it, following the lines and then applied the tape carefully onto the body, masked the front red section with 3mm wide Kabuki tape and sealed the rest of the body off. I double checked the border lines, pressing with a toothpick to hinder color bleeding. On with the fluorescent red. Like with white, I started to mist on three coats, followed by a pause of about 15 minutes between each. The next three coats went on a bit heavier. I now need sunglasses , because of the intense color. With the last coats, I checked with the decals, if I had the right tone. I removed the masks very carefully after only a few minutes, because I like to do that without the colors fully cured and hope for the last bit of leveling effect on the color borders. Luckily, there is no bleeding or overspray to be found. Cheers Rob

Better now, phew, thanks for all your help and recommendations. This time, I applied a very faint layer, which only lightened the background grey of the underlying Mr, Surfacer 1500 grey primer. This was followed by three more misted layers with a drying time of at least 15 minutes between each. I raised the air pressure at about 2,0 bar and used the paint without leveling thinner. No orange peel and no attacked plastic, luckily. After a pause of two hours, I added four more layers, the last being a bit more rich, with a half hour between applications. Now it looks good. I also sprayed all parts in white, which will later painted fluorescent red, because on the body, these areas are also painted white down under and I didn´t want another hue in the red. Cheers Rob

Thank you Craig, I will dig a bit deeper into the videos. I didn´t know, that my usual primers should not work with resin bodies and am wondering a bit about it. I used Mr. Surfacer on smaller resin kits and resin aftermarket a lot, without any issues. Cheers Rob

It seems, I underestimated the hotness of the Zero paint, Craig. Thank you for letting me know your experiences. I hope, my next application in said faint layers with higher air pressure setting will lead to better results. I have to master these type of colors, as I have quite a lot stashed for certain projects. The MP4/6 is now officially a test mule with only slim hopes for a better outcome. Cheers Rob

Thank you Alan, I learned so much through MSW and LSM, that it is a pleasure for me to give a bit of my experiences back. With the McLaren. it is like I stepped a Voodoo on the foot, but some projects are like that. If it will be finished, it will not be a show stopper, but I hope to learn a lot out of it for future car building projects. Cheers Rob

A while ago, the McLaren was shelved, because I couldn´t mount the body onto the floorpan, without having a gap of 1-2 mm between them. I wanted to keep the body removable and because, I had no idea how to tackle this without the gap, the MP4/6 got benched. Then I had an idea. When I bought my MFH Brabham lately, I also ordered some aluminum rivets and when I saw these, I thought, I could drill tiny holes into the overlapping parts of body and floorpan and insert the rivets, which locks the parts in the correct position. Done and almost invisible, when painted later. I caught some fresh wind on that project and started the bodyworks with priming. Mr. Surfacer 1500 went on super smooth. I wanted to accomplish a bit more practice with paints like Zero or Number 5, before I continue with my Cobra Coupe. Good that I´ve done so, because... ... then disaster struck. I sprayed Zero Paints MP White on in a light but covering layer and all looked good for a minute or two. Then, grey shadows loomed through the paint, followed by the late forming of orange peel. Somehow the paint must have reacted with the plastic through the primer. Normally, that would have been the point to bin the kit, but like I said, I´d like to get a better feel for these kind of colors and finishes, so I stripped and sanded the parts for some hours and will redo everything. I found a video abut how to apply Zero Paints best. It states, that you only mist a tiny bit of color onto the primer wait for ten to fifteen minutes for the next layer and so on. You should use 1,5 bar for that. I usually spray low pressure highly thinned for best results, but these colors seem to need instant drying through the air pressure, because they are so hot. Lets see, how the next try works out. Cheers Rob

Thank you Ken, I will post some better pictures when completely finished and will add some of my thoughts about the project. Cheers Rob

Thank you Phil and Alan. This projects theme came instantly to my mind, when the "Sandbox" group build started over on Large Scale Modeller. The Neuspotter drone was no part of the initial idea, but when I saw it, it reminded me, that I wanted to build one since my teen age, when it first came out. What better than to grab the 40th anniversary edition and add it to the scene, where it supports the sinister atmosphere. I wanted a bit of black humor or irony seep out of this little dio and hope to have done so. Cheers Rob

Almost done with the project. I added lots of details to my main acts, like a syringe made from clear plastic sprue and metal rods and a tiny push disc, dipped into clear green. The mask of the pilot was hanging out of his cockpit by it´s tube made from an old guitar string and many more. The threaded rod, holding the Neuspotter was painted in sand color and surrounded by dry grass from my garden to hide it a bit and simulate a hovering effect. Then I glued the Kampfanzug in place on it´s stone and used AK´s desert sand paste to design the ground. With a wet brush, I formed the typical sand ripples and amassed the sand on the front right side, where the blasting storm came from. Next, I pressed the weapons, the pilots helmet and all the empty squeezed water bottles into the paste and added very fine real sand on top. I used the sunny day to get some really harsh lighted outdoor shots, but will later add some from the photo box, when finished. Cheers Rob

Today, I finished the basic setting. The main components of the Neuspotter were airbrushed with chalky white color (washable white) and then weathered with a stiff brush, but only slightly, as the rescue drone didn´t suffer that much. This was followed by a DAK wash with pigments, dotted onto the white color. After drying and manipulating a bit with a flat brush, I assembled the main components of the Neuspotter and added some wires and coils to arms and "body". Then I threaded the drone on it´s mount and the angle, it was hovering was like I desired. The backrest of the deceased pilots Kampfanzug was made from two lava stones from my garden. I liked the bubbly appearance, as it looks a bit strange. Next, I have to add the various bits and pieces, like water bottles, weapons, helmet, etc. and design the dio with sand baste and sand. Cheers Rob

Glad you pulled through this demanding build, Alan, if not only for showing us a beautiful rendition of that not often kitted bird. With the NMF you captured the retro futuristic look of the Yak perfectly. Cheers Rob