Air Cooled GB: Porsche GT2 Club Sport

[MPWR]

So one day, many years ago, I started a Tamiya Porsche GT2 Club Sport.

And got nowhere at all with it. Can't really say why, but it just didn't work. I painted it, built the sub assemblies, had it 90% there, and knew that I was just never going to finish it.

I just didn't like the color- I painted it in Gunze bright blue. Which is a really sweet color, and it should have been stunning on the GT2 body. But it wasn't. So I stripped it, and repainted it in the same color just to be sure. Still wrong. And really with bright blue not working, I couldn't think of any color at all that would look good on this body. Nothing I could think of seemed like it would work better. Any and every metallic seemed wrong- just doesn't work with the body shape. Red seemed cliche, black was boring, and yellow not quite it. So it sat....

I didn't even take any pics of the body. But I did get some of the chassis.





A couple evenings in the freezer finally freed the usable parts from the chassis. And so they wait....



Waiting, waiting...

The body at one point spent four months in the alcohol bath stripping- waiting until I could bother to take it out.

But it's out now. Stripped bare of it's former color.

It even has a fresh coat of primer, and new paint now. After months/years of occasional contemplation, I finally concluded that it could look good in white. After all, it looks quite decent that way on the box top! So white it is.




And it's feeling much better now.

Strange that I should have so much trouble with this one- because I really dig the car. Sure it was kind of a cheap marketing trick for Tamiya to put out the GT2 Club Sport, which has only a dozen new parts from their racing GT2 kits. But to me, this is what a car should be. No bling, no flash, just simple speed and performance.

So that's what I'm going to do with this one- a simple trackday toy. Mostly out of the box, as I really want to finish this one. But not strictly out of the box.





Paint is PPG acrylic lacquer white, from the remnants of my stash of CobraColors. It's been clearcoated, and is ready for polish. My wife has decided that the GT2 in white looks alot like a Beluga whale. Can't say I disagree. So I gave it a blowhole.

Like most 911s, the 993 GT2 has its fuel tank up front. On racing/track cars, a dry brake fuel filler could be mounted in the center of the bonnet. The Tamiya kit has the outline of a hinged flap covering the refueling receptacle. I decided that cutting it open would give alot of visual interest to the body.



This is the look I'm going for. But of course with the flap cut open, something has to be put into the hole.



Something like that thingie there. So off to the machine shop...!

I started with a small block of aluminum, and drilled a bunch of holes in it.





Then, something had to be done with those square corners. So I step cut them off- same way I make oval air cleaners.





Lots of math so far, but it serves a purpose. If all goes well I simply file down the steps and come out with the oval shape I want for the part.





Filed and polished. So far so good.

Next I wanted to add the sill and flange around it. I decided to go with plastic strip, shaped around the part.



This is Evergreen styrene strip, wrapped and clamped to shape. Of course styrene has the useful property that it can be heat shaped. Dip the strip in boiling water, and it will hold the shape it's formed in.



I made two, one for the sill and one for the flange.



The part was painted with clear smoke, to give it an anodized look.





And fifteen small brass pins and two aluminum plugs fit into the drilled holes.







Ready for mounting. Time to polish the body and see how it will look in place!

[tonioseven]

Cool! I loved the pictorial! I almost want to find my GT2 kit and work on it (we all know that won't happen anytime soon )

[robrex]

Nice to see another WIP. This looks superb as usual!

[quadzero]

The chassis pieces are excellent, the making of the machined part was really interesting. I think white suits this car well, glad you went with it. Really great project so far.

[Mojo_stevo]

*Bookmarked*

Your methods are very good. As an amateur I can't thank you enough for posting your tips and tricks.

The 933 is my favorite 911. I am glad that they went back to that style with the 997.

Oh question: What mm. styrene did you use?

[slk320]

Beautiful work on the machining - You are really making full use of that lathe. Can't way to see it all together.

[rockinanko]

Good job andy...
there's simply nothing in any models that you can't figure out what that can be machined! hehe...

i must say your application on metallic paints are awesome...i just can't figure out what metalizers are best used in what areas. so i'm looking forward to learn this art from you.

as for the machining parts, man...i just gotta be contented on this, with the effective use of alclads & metallic paints that i subsequently learn from here...

i can't be good in everything...

cheers!

[klutz_100]

Good Lord! He's building something!



Lovely machine work and it DOES look good in white.
(BTW white is the new black )

[MidMazar]

I would kill for a lathe, your metal parts look so real. Thanks for sharing, very useful, even the freezer method. Im going to have to try it. As far as the color, i don't see anything wrong with the blue thats on the chasis.

Any Progress on the 850?

[MPWR]

Yeah, pretty novel to see me building something, isn't it?

I'm liking it more and more in white. Polishing has started, and I'll update soon as it's shiny.

Mojo- Right, I'll remember to include tips and tricks (if I use any ). The styrene strip is 0.010", or about 0.25mm. I would have used 0.020" if I had on hand, but the thin stuff will work, and it's easier to form.

rockinanko- Would you believe the engine, tranny, and rotors are painted in nothing more exotic than Tamiya acrylics? There's an oil wash applied to them which helps the detail. I used these pics in my wash How-to, which is the only reason I have any old pics of this build at all. I like Alclad chrome specifically for chromed parts, but for everything else I haven't found a real difference between one metallic and another. I use whatever is easiest for me to put on, because I'm rather convinced they all look the same. Maybe if you're a military modeler and you're buiding shiny metal airplanes theres some subtle difference- but not on 1/24 automotive components.

MidMazar- The 850 hasn't seen any real progress recently, but it's ready to. Honestly it's been stalled for at least the last 6 months because I haven't gotten to machining a set of brakes for it. But I think I know what I'm going to do for it now, and really its the research and decisions that are the slow part.

There was nothing at all wrong with the blue on the underside. Honestly I was very happy with how the chassis came out, and it hurt to strip it. But I couldn't convince myself that I liked it on the body. Fortunately the chassis is looking good now in white, too.

tonioseven- Come on, break it out- you know you want to build something aircooled. Besides, it's already lowered! But it's not quite the right 911 for the Wangan Blackbird.

[BVC500]

White is cool, but the 911 GT3 green (can't think of the name right now) might have worked.

I just bought a Revell 993 coupe on eBay (well, I paid for it, but haven't received any contact from the seller...errrrrrgh!) and plan to paint in the bright blue that was featured on the car when it was first introduced, if I wasn't scammed and it actually comes in the mail.

[rockinanko]

my only wish, is that the machining shop & you are just next door to me.

well i'm gonna go through all your 'how-to' to brush up my metalic skills.
can't believe the paint strip is so cleanly done, as compared to my brake fluid method...

keep going!

[MPWR]

Polished and waxed!



Of course I still can't manage to take a decent pic of it, but I've convinced myself that the GT2 really will work in white.



I polished it up with my usual method. After giving the clearcoat a week or so to outgas, I rubbed the whole body with Tamiya Coarse compound. This takes of any texture from spraying the clearcoat. It's the most important step in polishing, and it usually takes me three or so sessions (washing and inspecting in between) just to make sure that no spots have been left unpolished. Next the whole body is rubbed out with McGuire's ScratchX (OK, I know it's not spelled McGuire's- it's something alot closer to Maqirye's, but I can never remember what, and 'McGuire' passes the spellcheck ). Then comes Tamiya Finish, and finally wax. The paint and clearcoat have never been touched with Micromesh (personally, I hate the stuff). This gives two advantages- the nearly impossible to remove haze of fine sanding scratches never appears to begin with, and there's much less chance of sanding through the paint/clearcoat. But of course if the paint and clearcoat go on well, it doesn't take much work to shine the body.



I've discovered my favorite thing about painting bodies white- getting polishing compound out of panel lines is no trouble at all! I scraped it out with my usual sharpened bamboo toothpick (holds a point much better than wood, but not so hard as to be a large risk for scratching the clearcoat). But it really doesn't seem to matter if the panel lines are spotlessly clean or not.

I've always considered white to be a terminally boring color to paint a car- not as bad as gold or brown, but close. But as this one seems to be turning out, I might just reconsider....



The chassis is just about done with clearcoating. It doesn't get polished, so I should get to detailing it soon.

Thanks for the comments everyone!

[gionc]

Fantastic, superb in white!

[rockinanko]

nothing wrong with the camera andy, i can see clearly the glossy paintwork here!

pardon me, you said this was in white...but i kept seeing a light greenish cream paint on the body. or is my eyes playing tricks on me!?