WIP: 1/43 22B and 94 Monte Carlo

[jla]

The 22b is from the heller kit which is supposed to build into the #3 Argentina car shown. The roof scoop was shaved and the hood vents were redone in styrene.


The front bumper was also cut to match some reference pics.

Rear seats, front seats, door panels and dash will be scratch built. I've tried to make the correct bbs for the car but failed miserably, so until I figure out a solution, I'll will probably have to used wheels I've cast from a Maisto CLK GTR but they unfortunately have the wrong spoke count.



The wheels will need a bit more clean up, it was my first time casting resin so it was a bit of a headache with all the spokes. You can see the side mirrors have been carved from Tamiya quick type epoxy.

The 94 car is from Racing43, the kit overall is pretty nice. I thought I'd try to be cool and solder up the white metal cage but that backfired on me as well. Who knew white metal melts just as fast as solder?


So a styrene cage has been built in place of the original.

Does any one have any reference pics for the 94 car, besides the ones on the swrt site?

By the way these were shot with a really old Nikon Coolpix, but I should have a new camera sometime next week, so hopefully I can post better pics then.


Threw in Solbergs car just for fun.

[jla]

Front and rear seats for the 22b have been roughed out.



Painted and decaled the seats in the other car as well.

[Murray Kish]

Originally Posted by jla

Who knew white metal melts just as fast as solder?

Oops... I didn't know that, so thanks at least for the info. Now we all know.

Nice job on the styrene one though. Good save.

I built one of those little heller kits a while back (the ford focus), and thought it was pretty decent for the low $ they cost.

You're doing a great job. Keep it up!

Thanks

Murray

[jla]

I really like the Heller kits, I mean where can you find a kit for $6. Plus there's plenty of room for improvement with some scratch building.

So I started work on the 94 cars dash, but it looks a little flat in comparison to a reference pic im working from.


So I traced the gauge cluster decal, making sure to do a few extra passes so there's left over graphite on the trace. Then I flipped the paper onto a chunk of Tamiya putty and burnished the outline on top of it.


The outline is actually a lot clearer than what the pic shows.


It still needs a bit of clean up, but I think it gives the dash a lot more depth. The dash is also missing a bunch of vents but I haven't decided on how to fix that. I could probably engrave vent's or probably try making decals for it.

I also decaled the front skid plate.


Does anyone have any reference pics for the 94 Impreza?

[MidMazar]

Wow, i still can't believe how people add so muchdetail to such a small model. Keep us posted, looks nice.

[malscar]

Here are some shots of both McRae and Sainz

[jla]

Thanks for the pics malscar, you wouldn't happen to have any of the brakes or interior would you? I tried mcklein image database which had like 3 shots of the interior that should be pretty helpful, but I didn't see much else I could use.


Not much of an update, but I think the wheels are close enough. I only cast a pair last time so I won't get the other 2 until I cast the front seat. Too much waste resin from making the small parts. In the mean time I'll be working on the wheels and brakes for the 94 car.

[klutz_100]

Great thread!

I love following 1/43 builds and you are doing a great job. I am really impressed with how you went about modifying the dash - a nice idea that I will store away for future use.

Looking forward to more soon

[jla]

I figured I steal so much info from the forum that I need to give back everyonce in a while, incidentally I took that tracing paper idea from a designer

So a little more progress, did the wheels for the rally car.

The brakes are just little disc with a really shallow cast of the calipers decent enough but there wasn't any way to mount them and keep the calipers from rotating with the wheels. I ended up just making spacers from styrene tubing that will control the offset of the wheels and keep the brake disc stationary.


The back wheel gap is no good at all, the wheel rubs on just about everything back there and doesn't spin freely at all.



Also worked on the dash again a tiny bit.
Another side shot of the stock dash for reference:


I shaved away some white metal around the hub area and applied putty to the area, while it was still soft I engraved in concentric circles to simulate the hub. Once it hardens I can sharpen up the details.



I also decided to try to engrave a vent into the dash:

Not the most square cuts I ever made but hey i can all ways throw some filler on it and re scribe my lines.

I'll be adding a wiper and turn signal stalk to the column as well.

Hopefully it will eventually look closer to this:

[malscar]

These may help. second last is from a book. One thing you will need to change is that the 4 door imprezas had 5 stud wheels not 4.







I wonder how long it will take

[jla]

Hey I can't thank you enough for these pics! Shouldn't be too long.... unless you have more reference pics lol.

So first off here's my poor excuse of a 5 lug setup:



I realize the center section of the wheel is totally incorrect, but I couldn't think of any good solution to correct it. Any suggestions?

And thanks to those reference pics here's the dash painted in TS-4:



It looks a bit darker than the pics, but I figured those were shot with a lot of light, all the other shots I've seen make it look close to black, so this is probably a good compromise. CF is 1/43 scale motorsports decal. Still a lot of missing components, like the switches on the center console and what not. That "F" was a ridiculous test of patience as was the cf part of the gauge cluster.

[jla]

Well I take back my last post this will probably take a while lol. Originally I planned to build it pretty close to out of the box, but I always ended up finding things that I wanted to improve or add detail to, in addition to a long work related break, I finally have an update.

First off were the very poorly modified 5 lug, the previous revision was something I rushed out before my business trip. Pretty laughable attempt anyways.

2nd revision:


I cut away at the hub center to try to match the reference pic, then added a beveled piece of styrene tube for the hub center. That resulted in a pretty shallow center, and didn't look very good to me.

3rd revision:

decided to try using styrene rod for the axel and even smaller rod for the lug nuts. The image makes it look worse than it really is, but should be pretty passable in person.

Still not really satisfied with the result, but I can't really think of a better way of doing it. Plus with the parts so tiny I'm finding it pretty hard to get decent castings of it, so most likely any changes will have to be repeated another 3 times. Any suggestions?


On to the body...

The body was recast in resin, just in case I fubar anything on the original. The cage should be pretty close to finished, I accidentally dropped it a few times from my desk and it held up well so the structural rigidity is definately there

In the foreground the doors are currently getting shaped up, the white styrene next to the chassis is the base for the door panels. Still need to build up the door jams and the hinges. I have a couple ideas on the hinges but if it fails it will end up being shown with doors open.

The really small rectangular styrene piece in front of the dash is another component thats getting built up. No clue what it really is though, something for the co driver for sure

The 22b is getting lonely though so I'll have to start doing the door panels and interior on that too. Hopefully I'll have another update soon.

[pawlie]

Really good progress so far, I'm amazed how much detail you can get into a 1/43 car!

[jla]

Another small update...

Driver side door panel...

Still need to tidy up the interior gaps a bit.


Driver side door jamb...

Fake hinges back there since the rear doors wont be opened....
Still need to add the striker for the front door and its hinges.

That's it for now. Once I finish the left side the door panel I'll be casting and tweaking them to match the late model Impreza so that I can use it in the 22b.

[klutz_100]

It is really amazing what you are achieving with a crappy Heller 1/43. Kudos! :