Jakko’s Tyrrell P34, Tamiya 1/20

[Jim R]

Thanks, and I’ll keep the advice on the setting solution in mind :smiling3:

The only reason I mentioned it was due to a bad experience. Humbrol enamel gloss, beautiful finish, left for 24+hrs and decalled. The VMS decal solution just ate into the paint and left a matt, slightly milky area. Being gloss I couldn't touch up easily and although I tried to mask the decal and respray it didn't work.

[Guest]

I haven’t applied the decals yet, but the blue is now no longer tacky, so I painted areas of the upper body that need to be aluminium or black. I think I’ll give it another day, if not a few more, before doing the decals, just to be on the safe side.

[Guest]

Not done any modelling for a few days after painting the aluminium and black bits on the parts I sprayed, but today I began putting on the decals. Not all in one go, because I doubt you could without disturbing ones that are still drying, but here’s where I am now:

[ATTACH]512580[/ATTACH]

I put them on straight from the sheet, no Micro Set under it (it beads up on the gloss paint), but with Micro Sol over them to help them settle down.

[minitnkr]

I use 'set' to clean the surface as well, allowing no oils/dust/hair to possibly interfere w/decal placement.

[Stefee]

Very nice.

[Jim R]

Decals certainly look good.

[Guest]

Thanks :smiling3: They’re now all on:

[ATTACH]512594[/ATTACH]

More than your average tank, but less than your average aircraft What I find most notable, though, is that these decals seem to be thinner than what you get in Tamiya armour and aircraft kits. So why, if they can do it for F1 kits, can’t they do it for those?

BTW, as this is a P.34 from the Japanese GP, they added Japanese transliterations of the names: たりれ (“ta-ri-re”, /ta.ɾi.ɾe/) and しえくたあ (“shi-e-ku-ta-a”, /ɕi.e.ku.ta.a/). Oddly (to me, anyway), these are in hiragana characters rather than katakana, when the latter is normally the one used to spell foreign words.

[Guest]

I use 'set' to clean the surface as well, allowing no oils/dust/hair to possibly interfere w/decal placement.

Forgot to reply half an hour ago, but: am I a bad car modeller for not bothering to do any of that? I didn’t clean the parts before I sprayed them (any of the three times I did), I sprayed them in a dusty shed (three times), and I didn’t bother cleaning anything either before applying the decals

[minitnkr]

Lucky man.

[Andy T]

What I find most notable, though, is that these decals seem to be thinner than what you get in Tamiya armour and aircraft kits. So why, if they can do it for F1 kits, can’t they do it for those?

I think they may have learned their lesson with that. The Tamiya kits I've done (aircraft & tanks) that were released in the last couple of years had much thinner decals than the few older ones I've done.

[colin m]

Looking great Jackko. That paint went down well.

[HAWKERHUNTER]

Coming together really nicely Jacko. This is going to look impressive.

[Guest]

I think they may have learned their lesson with that. The Tamiya kits I've done (aircraft & tanks) that were released in the last couple of years had much thinner decals than the few older ones I've done.

I sometimes have the impression that Tamiya did one print run of decals for each kit, enough for a hundred years’ production of it, so you still get ancient decals even with new issues of it

[Stefee]

Really looking the part now.

[Guest]

Fitting the body to the chassis, I discovered that the hoses didn’t want to go to the radiators as they should.

[ATTACH]512830[/ATTACH]

It’s hard to see here, but I discovered by studying the instructions very carefully that I had gotten them wrong after all. They shouldn’t run to the bottom of the engine, but come out on the sides between the tie rods that run from the rear wall to the suspension. I managed to pull them off with pointy pliers, and re-install them in a more correct position:

[ATTACH]512832[/ATTACH][ATTACH]512833[/ATTACH]

I then superglued the body to the chassis:

[ATTACH]512834[/ATTACH]

… and then found that those pipes were clearly too long, even though I had cut them to the 35 mm Tamiya told me to. I held them up to where they should connect and snipped the exces off, then added the bottom hoses as well, ignoring the length from the instructions and just fitting them to the kit parts instead:

[ATTACH]512835[/ATTACH]

Both still have kinks in them that shouldn’t be there, but I don’t really see how I could not have those. Probably lack of experience with this sort of thing

I also did the tyres the other day. I had put them into the fridge for a day and a half, but still couldn’t get most of the seam off. Tough luck, I put enough effort into them that I’m not going to try for better anymore Here they are on the wheels:

[ATTACH]512831[/ATTACH]

Those are not painted, other than the hub bits. The instructions say they need to be semi-gloss black, and the plastic is just that already.

And then the inspector dropped by:

[ATTACH]512836[/ATTACH]