Trumpeter Ford GT40 1/12 Scale, Part 20, Completed!

Done!

The end result looks pretty good overall. There were some issues with this kit, and a few things I did badly, but the best bits distract enough.

This "US Sports Car" kit certainly appears to be, as far as I can tell from what I see online, identical to the Trumpeter branded GT40 in 1/12th scale. This just doesn't say Ford anywhere on it. And it is significantly less expensive if you can find it.

The extra detail kit I found cost an arm and a leg, but makes a huge difference in the result.

I am particularly happy with the interior.

This kit built out of the box would be weird. First of all, there are way, way, WAY too many chrome parts. They chromed everything that should be even remotely metal, plus many other other parts that are not at all silver, I suppose just because those parts landed on a chromed sprue.

Another strange thing was the conspicuous lack of detail in many specific areas. The engine in particularly bad in this regard. I added quite a lot of PE and fabricated extras. The model didn't even have a distributor, much less wires. Pretty strange for 1/12th scale...

Random parts of the model came pre-painted, such as the gold wheels. I went ahead and used them that way.

Most of the model is quite well detailed. Some of it was quite challenging, and looks great.

There's a lot of detail under the front as well as the back. I did leave the front section of the body removable, and it still stays in place well with a nice fit.

The decals were very good I thought, even over curves and contours (using various decal solutions of course).

See all the posts on this project here.

Check out the entire album of photos for this project here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/mPG6HjxnZXht24L37

Generations

 

Trumpeter Ford GT40 1/12 Scale, Part 19, Side Windows

It seems you just can't do enough sanding and polishing on the clear coat. Well, I guess you can if you get down to the decals and ruin them. But fortunately, I did not.

Sanded down to 3000 grit... I followed up after this photo with a polish. I'll save that for later photos.

On to the side windows, which I had been putting of. I couldn't decide if I should go to the trouble of detailing the hinges and latches for the inner window, which opens on the real car. I have PE for these parts, but it gets close to overkill. In addition, you have to start by grinding off the molded in details in the clear plastic, which is very risky. One slip and it's ruined.

Went for it anyway...

First I masked off the part to protect it. This proved to be a really good idea as I still ended up with a few small scratches. It could have been worse.

I used a grinding rotary tool to slowly take down the plastic, under magnification. This went pretty well all things concidered.

The PE for these details is some of the smallest I've seen.

Here are the latches assembled and installed.

In all there's a fairly crazy 15 PE parts on each window.

Turned out well in the end. It was a lot of work though.

See all the posts on this project here.

Harlan at Five

It's been five years since Harlan came to live with us! 

Young Harlan hadn't learned to fly, couldn't say a word, and didn't even know what was food. All black eyes and baby fluff. So much to learn for her, and for us too. It's been a lot of work, and completely worth it.

 

Trumpeter Ford GT40 1/12 Scale, Part 18, Body On

Mistake number two... 

One of the last steps for the engine bay was a couple of struts that connect from the top of the suspension to some part of the frame near the front of the engine. I couldn't tell were they were supposed to attach. I finally realized that I had left out a pair of frame elements that were supposed to attach down under and to each side of the front of the engine. These were way back in the instructions. There no way to get them in now, and I am sure not taking all this apart to get the engine out again at this point.

In my defense it isn't hard to miss something on this model. There are a large number of parts, which is good, and so they put quite a lot on each page to keep the instructions from being 100 pages. It's also mostly in Chinese.

Anyway, it's on to the rear body section.

Oh, here one funny thing about the decals. This kit is unlicensed. It does not say "Ford" or "GT40" anyplace on it. For the word Ford that should appear on the body just behind the front wheel the decal sheet include the four letters to spell Ford as separate elements, not even near each other on the sheet. The instructions show where to put these 4 letters, but still don't show the letters in order to avoid printing Ford.

At any rate, I am leaving off the lower body silver stripe as I described in my previous post, and the letters are all black, so I won't be using them.

The decals provided work very well, even over curved areas with the use of decal setting solutions.

Some PE gives it a nice look. I still have to put the air foil on.

Fitting the rear body section on was a headache. It would have been hard enough as is, but I found I had the extra problem of the "trunk" containers in the back being significantly too high - at least 3 or 4mm. The body section would not go on and sit down.

I had to break things apart, clean off the glue, and reassemble the bins lower. I had done everything right, but these are after market PE. The indicated mounting points for the brackets that hold these bins in place were just to lower causing the bins to sit too high.

That fixed, it looks pretty good.

Still many details, and all the glass, to put in place.

The rear body section can open and close, but this is the bast fit I could get (note the gap on the far side of this image). I am pretty sure it's not hitting anything under there. It just seems like the body section's shape is a little off. It I had tested this before painting it all up I could probably have fixed this.

It's not terrible. But I could just seal it all up. A tiny bit of glue would easily hold it down. Do I want to permanently hide all that detail in there like the engine in a Wingnut Wings? We'll see.

See all the posts on this project here.

Trumpeter Ford GT40 1/12 Scale, Part 17

Here's a huge mistake made months ago, mentioned here. I put the upper half of the '2' on first. But the lower half is part of the silver stripe. So the location of the upper half is critical. The lower half and stripe have to go on first. But that makes assembly and gloss coat really awkward.

So I cut the lower part of the '2' away from the stripe. No one will ever know....

See all the posts on this project here.

Hudsucker Proxy

 New year's eve viewing...