Fujimi Ferrari F2003-GA

[23skyline]

After seeing Booch post his Tamiya Ferrari's I decided to do my first WIP using Fujimi's F2003-GA

[23skyline]

It has been a while since I built and FINISHED a F1 car, hopefully posting it here will help.

I'm doing a curbside build of Fujimi's F2003-GA -Monza GP. I'm using the following extras: Topstudio Antenna, Driveshaft and Wheel nuts, Studio 27 Carbon template decals(very nice) and tobacco decals from Tabu.



Attached are some pics of my progress up to now. My first order of business was to get the intake trunking assembled and blended smooth. Next I attached the trunking to the side of the monocoque followed by the side pod intake fairings.




This all had to blended in and while I was waiting for the putty to dry I assembled the main bargeboard components. These are a mixture of red and black parts which have to be painted white!.
I also had a look at the wheels and tires. Fujimi's tires have very obvious sagging and where replaced by tires from an Tamiya F2001-much better.



I'll hopefully get the monocoque primed and the inside of the intakes painted over the weekend. With some luck I'll add the engine cowling also.

[Shunter]

Looks like you are off and running, watching with interest.

[23skyline]

So the weekend came and went, I didn't get to everything I planned but I did make some progress.
I've worked on the intakes and managed to get it blended in OK. After that I primed most of the car including the front & rear wing components(not shown)



I started blending the engine air intake into the monocoque and getting the "gills" on the engine cover to fit. As you can see I still have some work to do



I also started decaling the various suspension arms with the awesome S27 carbon set. The decals are high quality and goes on nicely without any issues. As you can see the decals fit perfectly-almost to perfect in the sense that there is no decal overlapping the edges of the suspension arm. The pictures magnify the bare black edges of these parts but in reality I can live with it.







The last picture shows the rear arm with the drive shafts as one piece. This will change once I receive my Top Studio replacements.
Next I hope to paint and decal the radiator intake trunking and gluing the engine cowling to the monocoque-wish me luck, I"ll need it

[lezdep]

Looking great. Good luck with the rest of it !

[23skyline]

Hello,
Over the weekend I had some time to get the intake trunking painted-finally, and I also glued the engine cowl to the body.



As you can see from the photo above there a quite big gaps where the panel lines are suppose to be, this will get filled and rescribed. The profile of the cowling also needs some sanding to blend into the side pods as you'll see below.



Fujimi gives you the bottom part of the engine fairing that's mounts onto the floor as 2 separate pieces, I managed to get it glued and blended into the floor OK.



After I had had enough of filling and sanding I decided to start painting some bits. The various wing end plates and elements received it's first coats of paint-nice to have some parts in colour as opposed to grey primer .



I'll be using Tamiya TS-49 Bright red and TS-13 clear on this kit(and the rest of my early Schumacher collection). Tamiya paints have never let me down so it shouldn't be a issue -touch wood.

I have some serious carbon fibre decal work to do but there are some holidays coming up later this week so maybe I'll get thru that whole task soon.

[23skyline]

Hello all,

I've done some more work in past few days. I focused on getting the body ready for paint and I managed to get it primed in white after 5 tries. I'm using Tamiya fine surface primer white. I have never had any issues with Tamiya products in the past, but getting the white primer to go on smoothly was a pain. The primer just would not go on smoothly, I always decant the sprays and use my airbrush so I tried thinning the paint, adjusting the air pressure, swapping airbrushes and needles-all without any luck. Then it dawned on me-maybe the ambient temp. is too high!!! So I swore a bit and sanded the car, again, and waited for the sun to set. This did the trick-the paint went on beautifully.



While I was waiting in between primer coats and sanding sessions on the body, I did some more carbon decalling.
The template decals from Studio 27 all have silver borders, as you can see on the seat, it is strange and probably not correct but I decided I could live with it. For some reason the templates for the bargeboards are the wrong shape. I made my own using Hobby Design Hi Definition carbon fibre (SuperSmall). I'm very impressed with the HD decals, they just need a lot of heat (hairdryer) and carefull trimming as it tends to tear.



I also did the steering wheel and "dash", really looks good and the S27 decals fit very well



That's it for now-in the week I'll try and finish the wings and hopefully by the weekend the primer would've cured well enough for me to get the car painted red.

[23skyline]

Hello again.

I finally managed to get this car painted red. I decided to spray the TS-49 out of the can, but first I sprayed all the nooks and crannies with my airbrush. It feels like I've been busy with this for years and to see it in red is a good change. I'll let it cure for a couple of days, then flat it back and give it a light clear coat before the decaling starts.



I've also managed to get the seatbelts 90% ready for installation, only the orange medical "extraction" belts and seatbelt "release" left to do.



The wing elements also received decals, clear coat is next.



I gave the Fujimi tyres another go with no luck-the rear tyres still have a pronounced dip in the middle of the wheel. I used strips of high density foam inserted into the tyre to try and force the middle up. This worked OK and then I tried the front wheel/tyre combination. there is no sag but the one tyre fits the rim OK-ish but the other fits terribly?!?!?! VERY anoying.

I don't want to waste more time on these tyres and I'm seriously considering using tyres from my F2001. The Tamiya tyres look slightly different, if anyone can tell me if the tyre "shape" changed considerably between the 2001 and 2003 seasons I'd really appreciate it.

[23skyline]

Hello,

The build is finally picking up some pace. I decaled the car and found that the standard kit decals are not quite opaque. I got another set of kit decals from a friend and after I clear coated the car again, I decaled it again.

Here you can see the difference between the first and second decal application.



I also completed the rest of the decal work-this particular scheme is one of my favourites.





I also managed to get the seatbelts installed.



During the weekend I'd like to get the wheels done. This will be some task but it has to get done...
Hopefully I'll also get the final clear coat on the car so this baby can get finished.

[Shunter]

Looks great with the colour and decals on, nice work.

[69*Goat]

Looking good!

Nice paintwork!

[gtziaf]

Following this with great interest.
Great job mate.
PS. Top studio announced a super detail set about it, if you interest...

[nugundam93]

great work! nice remedy on the decals, being less opaque than expected.

[ZEQUIELLE]

Great modelling!I´ll be wainting for more updates!

[23skyline]

Originally Posted by gtziaf

Following this with great interest.
Great job mate.
PS. Top studio announced a super detail set about it, if you interest...

Thanks, and yes I saw the set from Top Studio.
I am not a fan of open F1 cars as it breaks the shape of the car. If I knew this car would be so much work to close up, I'd probably make an exception and built it opened up LOL