Porsche 917LH - Le Mans 1970 - Ahrens/Elford - MFH - 1/24

Recently I started the Model Factory Hiro Porsche 917 LH. It represents the car driven by Vic Elford and Kurt Ahrens during the 1970 24 houres of Le Mans.This one to be more precise:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_01.jpg

Before I start, a bit of history on this car. This is the so called “Lang Heck” or “Long Tail” verion of the 917 and we're talknig about chassis #042. The LH verion was designed to produce less drag en was therefor very effictive on the long straights of Le Mans (at that time without the chicanes on the Hunaudières. It was powered by a 4.9 liter 12 cylinder engine, the most powerful Porsche had at that time. During 1970 the car was used by Porsche Salzburg (basically the 2nd factory team next to John Wyer's Gulf team. The 1970 Le Mans race was the first for this chassis and it started out well, taking pole position in a time of 3m.19.08s.Vic and Kurt led the race for a 225 laps before they had to retire with engine problems. They also managed to set the fastes race lap.
During the remainder of that year the car was used for testing as well as being “lend” to one Steve McQueen who was shooting the movie “Le Mans” (but only Porsche driver Herbert Linge was allowed to drive it).

For the 1971 Le Mans this car was rebuild to the newer specification Lang Heck and was only entered for that race. Again it took pole position. (this car is also made by MFH). Since 2009 this chassis can be seen in the Porsche museum.

On to the kit! It's a typical MFH kit with a lot of white-metal and PE combined with a very nice 3D printed body. With so many parts I always check if everything is there beforehand. I'm glad I did because the rear torsion-bar was missing.Luckily MFH's customer support is top notch and the missing part was on it's way the next day! In the meantime I did a glued the big white-metal and PE-parts to see if there would be any fitting problem. After concluding there were none, I simply put the parts in acetone to dissolve the CA glue again (don't try this on plastic as that will dissolve!!).
Eventually the time came to actually start the build. I usually ignore the order of construction in the manual, so I started with the cockpit. The chassis and the firewall were glued and screwed together.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_02.jpg

Next I assembled the frame and made sure it fit correctly into the chassis:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_03.jpg

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_04.jpg

I then seperated the top and bottom of the frame to make further building easier. I did this by putting it in a thin layer of acetone. The result is this:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_05.jpg

After that the lower part of the frame was glued onto the chassis and the sides of the chassis (indicated by the “1” and “2” in the picture) were added:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_06.jpg

Just for fun I made a dry fit of the bigger parts and made a picture:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_07.jpg

This is an awesome kit of an awesome car from the most awesome race ever, so hopefully this will be a... wait for it... awesome build! ;)

subscribed and eagerly awaiting more!

ianc

This should be good. Awaiting more.

On with some smaller parts; the pedals and the brake-cylinders. First pictures shows the pedals as they are now. What you see here is made up of 6 parts already.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_08.jpg

Next are the brake cylinders. I put a 1 cent coin next to them to show the size. The ends will be bored so a small rod can be attached. This rod will be connected to the brake pedal. As you can see, I put one rod in place to show what i mean.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_09.jpg

I've been wanting to try a airbrush “technique” which is widely used in aircraft-modelling; pre shading. The interior of this kit seems a good place to start. First thing is to give the parts where usually the most shade will be a black spray. Eventually it all looks like this:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_14.jpg

Basically just a few quick lines with the smallest needle in my airbrush. Note I didn't do the part between the smalles part of the cockpit. As this will be covered later I left it untouched so the difference with the rest of the paint job would be recognisable.
Next I loaded up the airbrush with Tamiya XF-20 Medium Grey and started spraying from the inside of the surfaces, slowly moving to the outside, always making sure I don't cover the black completely. After that I added a bit of white to the XF-20 and again started spraying from inside to out on the surfaces and again making sure I don't get to the edges. The result is very suble en hard to see in the picture. A friend of mine suggested I could go even lighter with the grey as most of the inside will be hard to seen anyway. Perhaps I'll do that, need to think about that a bit ;)

For comparison, the green arrows indicates the part that was simply sprayed grey.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_15.jpg

Interesting results. I too have read about preshading; primarily used with military models. The results always seem too subtle to be worth it though, but perhaps it's just the pictures. What are your feelings? Was it worth the effort? Is it really visible?

ianc

Interesting results. I too have read about preshading; primarily used with military models. The results always seem too subtle to be worth it though, but perhaps it's just the pictures. What are your feelings? Was it worth the effort? Is it really visible?

The result is indeed very subtle and hard to capture on camera. Although I might do another run with even lighter gray to make it more noticable. I probably will use this more often, but only on interiors and underside's of cars as I don't think it will work on the body.

Beside the cockpit I've started work on the engine as well. We all know by know Hiro sometime adds “crazy” details to some of his kits and this one is no exception. The first picture shows the inside of one of the cylinder heads. The green arrow on the left points to one of the valves whereas the one on right points to a spark plug.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_13.jpg

Sadly these details disappear on step 1 of the manual....

On the the building of the engine then. Below all the main components have been glued together. On the left side the PE which represents the cooling ribs has been added already.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_10.jpg

The entire block was then primered and painted black. After drying I drybrushed it with Tamiya XF-16. Again most of what you see here will be covered later on:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_11.jpg

Some other parts recieved a coat of Alclad burnt iron. I dryfitted these for the next picture. You can already see the main block disappear...

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_12.jpg

Looking good. Will you paint or texture the fiberglass shrouding, or leave it as is?

ianc

Looking good. Will you paint or texture the fiberglass shrouding, or leave it as is?

It will not be left as is. I'll explain all in my next update, hopefully later this week.

looking forward to this, especially for the next update where you'll be explaining the fiberglass texturing :)

Cant wait to see more of this build. Thank you for sharing your pre-shading technique, I had never heard of it before. I am going to research it.

Time for a long awaited update.

I changed the front suspension a bit to make it easier to bolt onto the car. Instead of having to use the small screws I can now use bolts:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_16.jpg

And this is what it looks like on the car (without bolts):
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_17.jpg

I then turned my attention to the interior. The kit comes with a white metal part for the foot rest, which is lumpy and doesn' look right to me. So I made a new one from sheet metal. This was done by hammering the sheet over the white metal part and then cutting off the edges.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_18.jpg

And this is how it looks like in the cockpit:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_19.jpg

Finally I added the front shock-absorbers:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_23.jpg

Onto the engine then. I added the small triangular PE parts for the exhaust on the bottom of the engine. The clutch was addded as well. Mind you, this will disappear forever when the gearbox is "bolted" onto the engine.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_20.jpg

Next up is the fiberglass shroud which will be placed over most of the engine. To get the desired effect I sanded it with 400 grid Tamiya sanding paper and then washed (not painted!) it on the inside(!) with a combination of oil paints (black and a bit of raw umber). Because the part had been sanded the oil kind of sticks a bit better. I put the round part in the foreground as a reference as that had not been done yet.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_22.jpg

Another sub-assembly is the ventilator on top of the engine. This piece alone consists of 11 parts.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_24.jpg

Then it was time to put all of it together and start adding the ignition wiring. In the picture all of these have been added; a total of 24 wires which took me 2 evenings... Only 12 more fuel-lines to go now :naughty:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_25.jpg

Nice work; the treatment of the fiberglass shrouding looks very good. A really beautiful model from MFH...

ianc

Excellent build so far...Keep it coming!

I'm sure the wiring was a nightmare, but it turned out very nice!

In the last update you could see I added the 24 ignition wires, but they're not very usefull without air and fuel added into the mixture :wink: So first I assembled the air intakes and treated them the same way I did all the other "fibreglass" parts. In the first picture you see the finished right side trumpets in the background and a lightly sanded left side in the foreground.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_27.jpg

When they were done I added the fuel lines. The blow-up in the lower-right corner shows how there are 2 PE rings added for detailing.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_28.jpg

Then the right-hand side was mounted on the engine and the fuel lines were routed to the other side.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_29.jpg

After that I added the left side and spend most part of an evening shortening and then fixing the fuel lines in place. I also added some more PE detail-parts. The engine is now almost completed, I only need to fix a couple of tubes at the front of it. Here are 2 pictures showing it as it is now:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_30.jpg
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_31.jpg

Engine is really looking fantastic! Keep up the great work,

ianc

Keep up the good work! The wiring looks great.

Great work looking forward to more.

I had completely forgotten I had also made a thread here :rolleyes: So here comes a BIG update with the work I did since November last year...

First the engine, which was only missing a couple of hoses at the front end (see green arrow):
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_32.jpg

The exhaust manifold was sprayed flat white (just used Tamiya white primer) and were then glued into place. A combination of oil paints was used to make them look a bit worn and dirty.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_33.jpg

Then the gearbox was assembled, primered and sprayed Alclad steel. After drying the recesses were treated with a wash. At the time this picture was taken I hadn't done a drybrush yet.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_35.jpg

And finally one of the most important steps; the frame around which the entire back end will be build. After cleaning it up it was primered and given a coat of Alclad aluminium. Next step will be to shoehorn the engine into the frame and attach the gearbox to it.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_36.jpg

I installed the engine and gearbox into the rear-frame. The first picture shows this clearly. To get to this point the engine had to be "shoehorned" into the frame after which the gearbox was glued to the back of it. Then the gearbox was screwed from the bottom to the frame.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_37.jpg

The second picture looks a lot like the first but there quite a few differences. First there is the exhausts which were put into place. Also some of the top parts of the frame were attached as well as the rear anti-rollbar and a few other small parts.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_38.jpg

Before mating the engine and the cockpit I wanted a few things done on the inside of the cockpit, because it would be more accessible to me. So first I added the mounting points for the seat belts ("1" in the picture). Then I added what seem to be electrical components ("2"). There are 4 of them and each one consists of 5 PE-parts and a white-metal part in the centre. As an extra detail some wires were addded as well.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_39.jpg

For the rear of the cockpit I made some heatshielding from cigarette foil.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_40.jpg

Then it was time for the little window between the cockpit and engine compartment. At the first attempt I used the clear plastic provided by MFH in the kit but found that to be too thick. So for the second attempt I used some clear plastic I had left over from some other transkit but I made a mistake while cutting and it was crooked... On the third attempt I was sattisfied and got the result shown in the picture. The 2 parts were bonded by drilling holes through both parts and pushing a stretched clear sprue through it (check here (http://forum.depaddock.net/showpost.php?p=277821&postcount=37) for some pictures of the process. In Dutch!).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_41.jpg

Next step was to glue the window in place:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_42.jpg

And then the big moment, the marriage of the engine and cockpit! They are screwed together with 2 screws and it is quit firm. The weight is also considerable! The green arrow in the picture shows the shift-rod which was also added.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_43.jpg

It took a bit longer to add some improvements to the cockpit than expected. As all the work is done in this area I only made 1 picture showing what I did.

Just follow the numbers in the pic:
1. The battery was detailled with some cables and put into place. Of course you won't see most if it after the seat has been installed... :?
2. The ignition coils for the left row of cylinders were glued into place and the cables were attached.
3. The fire extinguisher was painted, decalled and a metal bracket attached.

And finally the pedals (no number :roll:). The blow-up shows the result at the moment. I actually hooked the brake cylinders upto the brake-pedal for starters (wasn't in the kit) with some metal wiring. The brake lines were added as well and the cable from the clutch-pedal to the clutch was attached as well. Only thing to be done is to add the throttle cable.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_44.jpg

The it was time to put the front suspension in. First I cleaned all the parts, then gave them a primer-coat before spraying them in several shades of metal (Alclad). The result is 2 completed uprights with brake assembly and 2 upper wishbones. I also" washed" the parts with artists oil paints to give a bit more depth.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_47.jpg

And this is what it looks like when the uprights and wishbones are attached to the front of the car:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_48.jpg

Daarna moesten er nog enkele zaken aan het binnenzijde gedaan worden alvorens verder te kunnen met het definitief plaatsen van de buizenconstructie van de cockpit. Als eerste werden de luchtbuizen voor de remmen zwart gespoten waarna ze werdern gedrybrushed met een aantal tinten grijs (nee, geen 50...).

Then it was time to finish some work on the interior before I would be able to finally put in the front part of the "rollcage". First thing was to spray the cooling ducts for the front brakes black, which was followed by a drybrush with a few shades of grey.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_49.jpg

Second thing was to finish the footrest. Somewhere on page 2 of this thread I showed you how I'd made a new footrest from thin sheet metal:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_18.jpg

I had already primed this part but after putting in the pedals I had to resize it a bit resulting in damage to the primer. So I started the painting process all over and the result is shown below. Basically I sprayed it with dark grey after which I added more layers of ligher grey (like on the rest of the inside of the cockpit panels, see page 1 for details). To make this part look a bit "used" I used MIG-pigments to add a bit of dirt/rust.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_50.jpg

Another thing that had to be done was the brakefluid-reservoirs. These are made of a clearish resin which was painted with brownish oil paint to simulate the brake fluid inside. I also added the lines that will be attached to the brake-cylinders.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_51.jpg

And when you put everything together for a dryfit you get this:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_52.jpg

I also started work on the fuel tank. The kit-part had these little holes to represent bolt-heads... which simply doesn't look right, so I replaced them by scale bolts:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_46.jpg

Looking great! I wondered what had happened to this car,

ianc

It does look great - more pictures please!

A bit more progress on this classic Porsche. First the steering wheel. This was assembled using several white-metal, parts, a metal rod and small PE "washer". It was then primed and subsequently painted black. I tried to make the leather part look a bit more used with some subtle shades of brownish oil-paints.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_53.jpg

And then it was time to attach it to the rollcage:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_54.jpg

With the steer attached it was finally time to glue the rollcage into place for good. Next thing was to attach the cooling ducts which were tied down with some tie-raps (arrow #3). THe steering arms (arrow #1) and anti-rollbar (#2) were glued into place as well.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_55.jpg

With the interior closing in on completion I started work on the dash. Dit was assembled, primered and then given several coats of Scale Fabric. At the front of the dash there were some knobs which looked horrible, so I removed them and drilled holes in their place to put better looking ones in later.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_56.jpg

Finally I started work on the engine-cover as well:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_57.jpg

Looking good!

ianc

After seeing all the wonderful 1/12 builds of the MFH 917LH on another forum I remembered I had completely forgotten to update this thread. So here goes :iceslolan

Wasn't to happy with the side panel inside the cockpit, so I detailed the original part a bit.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_59.jpg

After primer and paint it was glued into place:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_62.jpg

The radiator was assembled and protected with a coat of Tamiya clear metal primer:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_34.jpg

It was then mounted at the front of the cockpit and the cooling ducts were attached:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_63.jpg

The dash was finished as well.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_58.jpg

A few days after glueing the steering column and dash in the cockpit I felt something wasn't right. After careful measuring the angle of the wheel and comparing those with drawings from the excellent 917 book by Näher I decided it was plain wrong. Luckily I managed to get the column out again without breaking anything and reattach it at a more realistic angle. The red line shows the the angle at wich the wheel used to be, the green after correcting it.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_66.jpg

I also corrected the shape of the lower part of the radiator opening. The green part was discarded:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_65.jpg

The seats were also finshed. According to the building plan they should be painted black, but I've got pretty sound proof they were actually red (like almost every factory 917 I heard).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_67.jpg

The rear was finished with the material used for tea-bags (a thin paper) and then painted with several colors of brown (oil)paint:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_68.jpg

And this is what they look like when glued into place with the seatbelts:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_69.jpg

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_70.jpg

At the rear of the car I attached what looks like cooling ducts for the gearbox. They were hollowed before being washed with brown oil-paints.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_71.jpg


Next on the list was to cut out one of the doors. Carefully I managed it without breaking the small rear part which is very flimsy so to speak:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_64.jpg

I then made 2 attachment points on the chassis...
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_72.jpg

... and on the door (only one shown).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_73.jpg

And when dry fit it looks like this. Eventually the upper hinge (1) will be fasted with a small rivet.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_74.jpg

Looking very good now. Such a lot of work these Hiro kits are!

ianc

It took a while, but here's some progress. I thought long and hard about how to do the inside of the body so that's why there haven't been any updates lately :wink:

But let's first take a look at the outside. This was sprayed white followed by a clear coat. The headlight units were then painted black.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_75.jpg

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_76.jpg

Now that the outside is nice and white (and a bit of black) I started working on the "inside" of the body. The cockpit-inside was painted with gray with a brush. This was done quite sloppy as to get a bit of roughness or structure of you like. After that the "higher" parts were drybrushed with a lighter gray and the "deeper" parts got a wash with heavily thinned oilpaints. In th picture (and in real life as well) it looks a bit overdone, but that's with reason. This way you'll be able to see a bit of the details after the body is placed onto the chassis and becomes a relatively dark place :wink:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_77.jpg

Then the 3 parts which caused me a bit of a headache to figure out a suitable solution. These were covered by a product called "scale-weave" by Tenco. This "cloth" was applied by brushing water-diluted woodglue to the inside of the body and then placing this "cloth" on top of, working from the inside out to the edges. After the glue had dried I cut away the excess with a sharp knife.

After that I brush painted the lot with desert yellow (Tamiya XF59). To make it look more like bare fibreglass I then applied several shades of brown oilpaints (diluted with white spirit), mainly on the "deeper" parts around the edges and around the air-intakes for the brake cooling.

At the moment this is what it looks like:

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_78.jpg

Glad we've got a new update on this one! These Hiro kits can become a handful; I had to take a little hiatus from the one I'm working on now.

Everything is still looking great so far. I'd be interested to see some close-ups of the 'Scale-weave' you've used on the inside of the engine room to get a better look the texture?

Great work!

ianc

Everything is still looking great so far. I'd be interested to see some close-ups of the 'Scale-weave' you've used on the inside of the engine room to get a better look the texture?


Here's a part of the picture above from the original:
http://www.automotiveforums.com/vbulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=51778&stc=1&d=1417634244

Great progress. Maybe I also use the scale-weave in mine. Thanks for sharing

Yes, looks very good. I'll have to look into that for the engine lid of my Hiro 903/3 when I take it up again.

I especially like the looks of the cockpit interior as well. Great work!

ianc

Last couple of weeks I've finally started decalling the body.

Big sigh of releaf when the red "striping" went on just fine. Note that each side is only 1 decal!
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_79.jpg

The rest was pretty easy after that and here's the result:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_80.jpg

and with the rear bodywork:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_81.jpg

Nice detail MFH put in is the "glow-in-the-dark" decal which is placed under the #25 on the right side door. This was also used on the real car so the car would be identifiable while passing the pits during the night.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_82.jpg

Long time before this update, but worth the wait. Looks great!

ianc

Exxxcellent...I will try to do all this in the 1/43 version of the Hiro 1971 917 lh Martini car I will start in a couple of weeks..

Looks great!

This is such a great build. Real museum quality model. Lots to learn.
Thanks a lot for sharing.

Managed to fix the "floor" body parts to the chassis. It really starts to look like a proper racing car now :biggrin: I placed he top body-part there just for the picture. Last picture is a bit of playing around with Photoshop.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_83.jpg

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_84.jpg

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_85.jpg

Top class, high quality work. Looks amazing.

Looking through this thread makes me want to buy this kit....stunning work and presentation.

Good progress, looks fantastic!

ianc

>>Last picture is a bit of playing around with Photoshop.<<

Nice playing!

After the "bottom" bodyparts were attached I could install the last 2 parts of the tubular frame (behind the rear wheel wells). Then the spare "wheel" was put into place. It's held there by straps attached to the frame.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_86.jpg

And then the last part to be installed on the inside of the car, an overflow tank (see green arrow).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_87.jpg

And then I ran into a bit of an issue. I didn't quite follow the instructions and hadn't installed the drive shafts in step 18 of the instructions, figuring I could put them in after the bodywork was on.... But as it turned out it was impossible to install the completed driveshafts because of the wheel wells. Luckily they're made up of 3 parts which I managed to get in 1-by-1. In the first picture I combined two shots of the left-hand side drive shaft after it was installed (made green in Photoshop so they stand out a bit). It clearly shows how the "roundish" middle part would never have fit through the opening between the frame and the wheel well...
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_88.jpg

And finally a picture showing one of the drive shafts in it's original colour:
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_89.jpg

Interesting build. you made great progress. whats that scale wave is? looks really nice

Hi Tim.
Great Work so far.
Nice WIP, it inspire me to start my 71 LH very soon.
Greets
Michael

Comes out great !!

The past couple of days I've worked on added the small details to the rear cover. On the outside I added the lights for the startnumber (see "1"), the quick releases at the rear (see "2") and what apparently is a big light for identification at night (see "3"). All that remains now are the rear lights and of course the wing. More on that in a next update.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_92.jpg

On the inside I added some cables. The white one on the right leads to the id-light. The black ones feed the rear-lights and number lights on top. I have no clue wether I laid out the cables in the correct way as I wasn't able to find any pictures. So I guestimated it a bit on the base of a picture of the 1971 LH.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_93.jpg

In the meanwhile I attached the rear suspension. A bit of a challenge as it had to slot into place at 4 points at the same time. Perhaps my own fault because I deviated from the instructions (again). Anyway, I got them in! First picture shows the left-hand side. The only thing to do is the connector the anti-rollbar (drew that in green).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_90.jpg

I then attached all the wheels and checked for an even ride. It required only a little correction on the left front to make it sit nice and level.

http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_91.jpg

awesome!

Love your work. Bravo!

Hi Tim,
I just saw the real model, and I have to say wow to your skills.

Simply beautiful.

joka-1

Fantastic work! :thumbsup:

Emil

Super nice!

Great job!!

Thanks for all the positive reactions!!:)

Another small update. First the doors. Both windows were finished. First I masked them and sprayed the edges white. Then each one got 3 PE parts and after that I dipped them completely in Future.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_94.jpg

Next picture shows the finished righ-hand side door. On the inside I added a cable for the light for the startnumber, this was then taped off (see green arrow).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_95.jpg

The wheels are almost done now as well. The GY decals were added. These will have to be sprayed over with a matt clear as they are too shiny. The rims were also detailed with a valve (included in kit). If you look very closely you will notice a light drybrush of the rims as well.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_96.jpg

And at the front all the light units were glued into place.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_97.jpg

I think you are SICK!!

How did you recreate the material on the inside of the rear cover? Looks super!

How did you recreate the material on the inside of the rear cover? Looks super!

Check my last post on page 2 of this thread.

This will probably one of the last updates before this one is finished :D But before I can call it done there are a couple of small things to finish.

The rearwing was mounted between the 2 fins. It's held in place with 4 rivets (see inset for detail).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_98.jpg

Next in line were the headlight covers. They were cut and sanded in shape a while ago so it was just a matter of glueing them into position. Also note the emergency kill switch which I added (viewable just above the left-side headlight).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_99.jpg

The windscreenwiper was a bit of a hassle. It's build up of only 3 PE pieces; the 2 small wipers and the entire "arm". That last one had to be bent in no fewer than 8 places(!).
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_100.jpg

And finally the left-hand side window was glued into place.
http://photos.keepturningleft.com/albums/1_24/porsche_917lh/porsche_917lh_101.jpg