Lotus 72D by gsdpic - FINISHED - Tamiya - 1/12

[DocRob]

5 hours ago, gsdpic said:

One other quick note today...I like the seat belts from Model Factory Hiro (like docrob used on the Renault) and could not find a US supplier.  So, I ordered some of them and a few other things that seem difficult to source in the US from Spot Model in Spain.  I ordered them on September 15th and they arrived by US mail today.  So that was not too bad at all.

The Model Factory Hiro belts are a very nice addition and more detailed than the ones Tamiya supplies.

 

Interestingly, it takes about the same time for the Spot Model parcels to arrive on my doorstep, but I live in Spain. The Canary Islands always need some extra effort, to ship goods here .

 

Your engine looks busy and sports fantastic details. The exhausts are great.

 

Cheers Rob 

[gsdpic]

12 hours ago, DocRob said:

The Model Factory Hiro belts are a very nice addition and more detailed than the ones Tamiya supplies.

 

Interestingly, it takes about the same time for the Spot Model parcels to arrive on my doorstep, but I live in Spain. The Canary Islands always need some extra effort, to ship goods here .

 

Your engine looks busy and sports fantastic details. The exhausts are great.

 

Cheers Rob 

That's funny about the shipping to the Canary Islands taking almost as long.  The Spot Model web site said it would be 10 to 30 days for delivery to the US, and it was at the very low end of that range.

 

On the older version of the kit like I have, the only seat belts supplied by Tamiya are molded into the supplied driver figurine, which I plan to not use.  They did not provide any seat belts to use if you are leaving the driver out.   I found some other 1/12th scale seat belts by another brand but they did not look as good as the MFH ones.

[gsdpic]

Bit of a milestone today as I joined the front suspension assembly and the drivetrain/rear suspension to the tub.   I still have some coolant pipes and hoses to join the radiators to the engine and then some oil hoses to join the engine to the oil tank and cooler which also serves as the base of the rear wing.  In the cockpit area, I need to do the dashboard and a few other bits including roll bar between the cockpit and engine, and then attach the rear wing, front cowl, and wheels and I am done.

[Old Collingwood]

Superb work   -  looks  like a  real  F1 car.

 

OC.

[gsdpic]

I have been working on a lot of little details, but I am getting close to wrapping up this project.  I might even complete it today, we'll see.   I believe that all that remains are the seat belts, attaching the rear wing/oil tank including attaching 3 oil lines, and attaching the wheels.   Below are pictures of some of the details.

 

Unidentified important bits between the seat and engine.  I thought about adding more lines between these bits and the engine but really should have done it before attaching the roll bar.  And I should have done a better job with the mold lines on the roll bar

Dashboard front and back.   Yes, I purchased some tiny turned metal toggle switches to replace the molded in ones.   And again, I could have created more wires to the back of the dashboard for those switches, but did not.  I put two on there but they are not really visible in the pictures, behind the hoses that go to the gauges.  Oh, and I realized too late that the left dashboard instrument decal is on upside down.  🙃

Main cockpit upper cowl.

Wheel and tire with hand painted Firestone logo on the tire.  I should get some better quality tiny brushes for such work, though it looks ok.  Oh, I forgot I also bought some tiny valve stems and have not put those on the wheels yet.

[Danstream]

Outstanding build.

I have a suggestion, if I may. The transparent part is somehow spoiled by internal reflections of light on the plastic edge. It is possible to suppress them by painting with matt black the thickness of the edge of the transparent part in contact with the car body.

Best regards,

Dan

[gsdpic]

52 minutes ago, Danstream said:

Outstanding build.

I have a suggestion, if I may. The transparent part is somehow spoiled by internal reflections of light on the plastic edge. It is possible to suppress them by painting with matt black the thickness of the edge of the transparent part in contact with the car body.

Best regards,

Dan

Thanks.  You and anyone else certainly may provide suggestions.  And this sounds like a good one.  I'll have to try it out.  I definitely agree that the thin clear part sort of spoils the whole look of the model, so any improvement will be welcome. 

[mtaylor]

Looks fantastic.   Don't sweat the tach being rotated as often times the drivers get them turned such that max rev position is at a place they don't have to look for like at the top, bottom or on to the side.  If for example, max revs is set for 0 degrees (vertically) they just do a quick glance to set that it's there (or close).

[king derelict]

Really stunning work. Those black and gold Lotus were great looking and your model captures it all

Alan

[gsdpic]

3 hours ago, mtaylor said:

Looks fantastic.   Don't sweat the tach being rotated as often times the drivers get them turned such that max rev position is at a place they don't have to look for like at the top, bottom or on to the side.  If for example, max revs is set for 0 degrees (vertically) they just do a quick glance to set that it's there (or close).

Thanks, though I think the tach is the large central gauge.  Can't really see it in this photo, but the main needle on that gauge is in the 4 o'clock position at 0, and 10, 11, 12 thousand RPM are straight up, just as you describe.  So that one is the correct orientation.   The gauges to the left are something more minor like oil pressure or temperature or something.   Oh well.

 

2 hours ago, king derelict said:

Really stunning work. Those black and gold Lotus were great looking and your model captures it all

Alan

Thank you.  Really glad that the metallic gold decals still worked ok.  I learned that this iteration of lotus was the only one that actually had metallic gold....the lotus 78 and 79 that had similar "John Player Special" livery actually just used a non-metallic yellowish tan color.   Furthermore, I learned that at least some of the third party decals available for this car are also non-metallic.

 

[gsdpic]

Thanks as always for the likes and wows and comments.  I appreciate it.

 

I am done except for attaching the oil lines to the oil cooler (seen here draped over the rear tire) and doing the rest of the flat black paint on the clear part.  I did just a small section and it is an improvement, so I'll do the rest more carefully.  As for the oil lines, I want to let the glue holding the wing cure a bit more, as that is a rather large piece hung off the back with four fairly small attachment points.   So tomorrow I'll wrap that up and then do a more extensive photo shoot.  But for now here is one teaser picture.

 

Under the car, you may also see a little bit of one of two clear plastic disks on the underside of the car, supporting some of the weight of the model.  I guess they did not trust the suspension pieces to hold the car indefinitely.  Probably a good thing.

 

I am also debating gluing the air induction scoop or not.  The instructions indicate to glue it but it will cover up some of the engine.  But if you don't glue it, the slightest bump will knock it off.  The front cowl and the upper part of the cockpit both snap on and will be ok unglued.  The cockpit part was a bit warped, and still is a tiny bit, so I thought I might have to glue it down as well.  But I think it is close enough that it will stay on without the seams/gaps being too unsightly.

 

 

[Old Collingwood]

!Wow!

 

OC.

[gsdpic]

I am now declaring this one complete.   For the first time for a plastic car model, I feel like I should get/make a case for this one.

 

Thanks to everyone for following along, hitting the like button, providing comments and suggestions, I appreciate it.  Below are pictures of the finished model.   This model is quite large....almost too big for my homemade macro photo booth which is basically a cube of 18 inch PVC pipes.  In a few cases I used (for the first time) the Photoshop "generative fill" to fill in corners and edges of the white background where the real thing was not large enough, revealing the wall behind it.  That's kind of like using a sledgehammer on a fly I think.   I also had to switch away from my 180mm macro lens for the overall shots because I could not get far enough from the model to include the whole thing in the frame.

 

 

[Old Collingwood]

That  looks  so Superb.

 

OC.

[kgstakes]

Quote

Very very nice work!!  I can only hope that I can be that good of a modeler some day.  Great job !!!  You even have the tires detailed like they been on track for a while nice touch.

 

Edited October 3, 2023 by kgstakes

[king derelict]

Beautiful work. You've made a spectacular model. It prompted me to look for my copy of A Very Special Year. The 1972 F1 season. But I can't find it. One house move too many. All I could find was the 1974 John Player Yearbook

Alan

[Landlubber Mike]

Wow Gary, looks like the real deal, amazing job!  Your paint and decal work is flawless.

[gsdpic]

Thanks to everyone for the comments and likes/wows.  

 

@kgstakes the "wear" on the tires was mostly my marginally successful effort to remove the mold line running the circumference of the tires in the middle.   Being an old kit, the tires felt a little squishy and fragile so I did not want to push it too far.

 

When cleaning up, I also found one part that did not make it on to the model.  Not sure if I can retrofit it now.  The shift rod to control the transmission is shown in step 35 with a note saying not to actually put it in place until step 43.  Of course by the time I got to step 43 I forgot about it.  Not clear if I can get it in place now with the model complete.  Oh well.

 

I am also still undecided about the hand painted lotus logo at the front of the nose.  There was a small, molded in raised circle there but no decal provided for it.  Looking on the web, the car seemed to either have a lotus logo there or a gold "JPS" logo.  I chose to try to replicate the yellow and green lotus logo but I sometimes think it looks a bit out of place.  I guess I'll leave it but I've been tempted to try to change it at the risk of screwing it up.

[kgstakes]

I’d leave it the way it is.  The only people that will notice or comment on that small part of the car,  are the people you point it out to 😀.   Honestly, never noticed it till you pointed that out to me.  Had to go back and see what you were talking about.  As for the extra part oops but don’t worry about it.  Looks great the way it is.  I’ve found that if I go back to fix something I make it worse than if I never touched it.  Leave it the way it is.
 

we all know where we could of done better but man that car is perfect in my mind.  Again, great job !!  Impressed to say the least.