DocRob
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Everything posted by DocRob
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Beautiful memories, Craig. One reason, I chose the Cobra Coupe was, it´s from the year, I was born and mine (CSX 2286 #9) raced more or less on my birthday. By the time, I was a kid, everything in West Berlin was about Volkswagen Golf or equally boring cars. My father was a taxi driver and always had a Mercedes, which I usually liked. I also own a 36 year old Mercedes, which is still in Berlin as our sons ride. A perfectly robust cruiser. Here on my island, I own a Jeep, which is perfectly handy for our off road pistas. Cheers Rob -
I think, MFH kits, specially of full bodied road cars take some effort to put together. The alignment of all the body pars is critical and rushing this part of the build could be fatal. Like you said Craig, MFH often offers kits of subjects, not covered by other companies and then it´s them or bust. I found a 1/8 replica from the Cobra Coupe, but it´s not a kit, but well detail and allegedly very pricey. Michel Stassart Creation - CSX 2299 Cheers Rob
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Nice little video. These sounds, I usually connect with surfing, one of my other hobbies. Unfortunately it´s the wrong type of Cobra, mine is a bit larger beast, but very inspiring anyway. Cheers Rob
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Happy New Year to everyone, may it be a good one. In my sparse hours of bench time, I continued with the body preparation of the Cobra Coupe. Dozens of holes got drilled, often not through the body, which is rather difficult. The dreaded hinges for doors and rear hatch were screwed into place. For the doors, I had to refill the holes with CA and re drill for better fit. There are only tiny 1,4 mm screws, holding in the resin body, how long, I don´t know. The doors and hatch need to be removed for painting and further assembly and I hob the threads hold up. There is a lot of sanding involved as well and every adjoined part needs to be checked and prepared. Mynext goal is to partly paint the interior and then add the body parts to the chassis, to finally check the fit. Cheers Rob
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The tiny Kittyhawk loos fantastic, Andy. Neat paintjob, especially in that small scale. Cheers Rob
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Looking good so far, Dave. You may try to get rid of the wrinkles with some decal softener and some applied heat afterwards. I use a hairdryer (test on a dummy part first) for that and usually have no wrinkles with Aviattic decals. The hairdryer also makes it easier to manipulate the decals around the edges. I always start with the lower side, applied with a tiny bit of overlap and then the upper side and have a good transition as a result. Cheers Rob
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Thank you for mentioning my log, Bob, but you are ahead of me with rigging. I only rigged the bowsprit so far and am afraid to do more. Thank you for reminding me of unfinished business, though . The build went so smooth and fast, but the rigging..., it will take some time and cojones to get it done with my build. I will use your fine work and experiences as a guideline then . Cheers Rob
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I hope the magnets will keep the doors and bonnet closed and aligned when finished, Craig. I will build up all the doors and hatches before painting and evaluate the fit on the chassis. There are tiny 1,4 mm screws, keeping all the hinges in place and I don´t know, how much strain to continuous disassembling they can take, as are only screwed into the resin body parts. Anyway, I permanently find places, which needs my attention during this process. Cheers Rob
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The Cobra Coupe is not forgotten and got some love lately. There is not a lot to show, but a lot of work has been done in advance to painting the body. Numerous sub assemblies has to be finished and you have to browse through the entire manual, to see, what connects to what and with which diameter the what´s need to be drilled. Alignment of doors, bonnet and rear hatch has to be taken in consideration, as well as fitting everything to the chassis. I think, this is the most critical sequence in the build and I want to do it properly. I also think about adding some 2 mm magnets to hold the closed doors and hatches secure in place. Cheers Rob
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Whew, crazy stuff. I would never set my foot into one of these boats and I´m a surfer. Right now, I´m completely broken after four days of surfing with our son with some great waves here, but the boat thing is (positively?) crazy. Cheers Rob
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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