Tamiya 1/24 Impreza WRC 2001 with engine build

[Schwarz-Brot]

Ashley, thank you again for the hints. Did not find anything fitting at Colorado decals, but may drop the a line! It helps a lot being pointed to the small manufacturers one would hardly ever find when new to the hobby!

 

Have been a bit distracted by the landing of The Others: Seven Sins and have much to do all the time, but haven't been totally lazy. The turrets which cover the dampers (What are these called in English?) were much too small if compared to photos, so I took some profiles and started to add some material. The idiot I am I bought a whole lot of profiles, but did not notice they were ABS. So no easy glueing. I used some thinner to weld them in place. Have to get some Acetone, should work as well and smells not as bad. Then started to fill the gaps with some modelling paste. Still lots to do but the size looks about right so I am confident it will work out in the end.

 

I also took the Factory 81 engine and tried what to do with it. Not sure yet if I will use a single part of that kit... I probably will scratch on top of the existing underside of the engine.

 

Next I estimated the size of the airbox by comparing it to known sizes in the pictures of real cars. Then took some 8mm ABS tube and some 6mm. Filled the big one with cheap modelling compound and pushed the smaller one in to aid creating the intake side cone. For the outlet side I bent 3mm rod with heat and flattened its end with a hot blade to simulate the flange. This is what I have now:

 

Not too shabby for a first try. Remember, I never scratch built anything before.

I will redo this with Greenstuff and have to find a way of heating my ABS in a way that avoids bubbles. When done the top will be flattened and filed into its final shape.

 

Next thing I am thinking about is how to cut open the intakes in an accurate way.

 

 

[Hamden]

 

Nice progress

With regards the over thick bonnet could you thin the edges by scrapping with a modelling knife to give a more scale look. Aircraft modelers do this a lot when opening panels on the airframe to give a scale look to the opening.

 

  Roger 

[MetroRacing]

Rally plates for the 2001 Finland and New Zealand rally

http://www.coloradodecals.com/detalhe.asp?Grup=3&prod=661

 

Looking good so far mate.

 

Ashley

 

PS Turrets is the correct name. Sometimes called towers as well.

[Schwarz-Brot]

@Hamden: Roger, thank you for that tip though it doesn't really help in this case. The edges are pretty sharp and simulate thin material quite well. But the bonnet as a whole is of a quite thick material which is obvious when seen from the underside. Would I start adding on details, it would look out of size very easily. Scraping the whole underside would lead to a very uneven surface and probably destroy the integrity of the part.

I may at one point try to form the bonnet from very thin sheet metal and build the supporting structure from the underside.

 

@MetroRacing: Thank you for digging these up, Ashley. Your help is much appreciated. I somehow missed these when browsing the site.

 

Yesterday I redid the airbox, this time with genuine Greenstuff. Let it dry over night. Today cut and filed into the shape as it can be seen in some pictures and in the prodrive document upped a few posts before. Not perfect but as close as I can get right now. The inlet side is not angular to anything, but I don't care as the intake hose will be attached there and cover up everything.I may very well have another go at it in the future, but for now it is good enough. I'll leave this for now until more things are ready for priming. Also, this is made from carbon on the real cars. So I'll have to get me some decals to finish it.

 

 

Look what else landed... Couldn't resist. Spent probably way more than I should have. It's like they say: Nothing is as expensive as hobbies and women...

 

I will probably build the truck OOB to see some rapid progress in a kit while spending endless hours fiddling on the Impreza.

Edited November 15, 2016 by Schwarz-Brot

[shood23]

Damn I wish I'd seen this update before seeing it on the what have you bought thread lol but I stand by what I said, a fully decked out trailer with a few mechanics walking round with the obligatory pop tent over the car would look great 

 

Shaun 

[MetroRacing]

Glad you managed to get the truck you wanted. like I mentioned previously the engine is wrong but that can be ignored really as it won't be seen. But the truck really should be right hand drive and there is a conversion set avaliable. I understand you wanting to build it oob though. The reason mines still in the box is because I found out about the dash and my ocd won't let me build it unless it's right haha.

 

Here's some things from Renaissance that might be of use if you're planning a service diorama.

Subaru service tent (no picture unfortunately but their is a pic of the Ford one they do on the last link of this post to give you an idea lol

http://www.renaissance-models.com/ter/index.php/autos-toutes-echelles/echelle-1-24/accessoires/produits/193-tente-d-assistance-rallye-subaru

 

Banners

http://www.renaissance-models.com/ter/index.php/autos-toutes-echelles/echelle-1-24/accessoires/produits/226-barriere-publicitaire-pour-assistance-subaru

 

Service ramps

http://www.renaissance-models.com/ter/index.php/autos-toutes-echelles/echelle-1-24/accessoires/produits/174-rampes-d-assistance

 

Stands

http://www.renaissance-models.com/ter/index.php/autos-toutes-echelles/echelle-1-24/accessoires/produits/239-chandelles-d-assistance-rallye

 

How the ramps and stands work is that the cars drive up onto the ramps to give clearance for the jacks to slide underneath. Ground clearance isn't the best on tarmac events lol.

Once the car was jacked up the stands would be inserted into the holes in the cars sills to support it.

 

If you want to look at what else Renaissance do in their accessories range. Here's the link

http://www.renaissance-models.com/ter/index.php/autos-toutes-echelles/echelle-1-24/accessoires?limit=0&limitstart=

 

Keep up the progress. You're basically building my planned diorama except I was going to use the Rally GB car. Much of the accessory stuff I've been posting was part of my research, so I'm very up on what's out there for it lol.

 

Ashley

Edited November 15, 2016 by MetroRacing

[Schwarz-Brot]

Don't you worry, I wasn't lazy. But time is a luxury good this season. While the Impreza is a bit on hold because I waited for some stuff I couldn't resist to start the Truck. This is the quality I know from old Revell kits with large moldlines, sinking holes and generally not the best fitting parts. Still I enjoy the build and kind of rushed through the first steps. No colour yet, though. Will have to paint some parts pretty soon. Not sure if I should open a new topic or not for this one. This is not chaos nor madness. This is creativity

 

 

Some parts for the Impreza arrived in the meantime from Hiroboy. Pretty expensive shipping when ordering from germany, so I had to keep it small. Carbon and Kevlar decals and PE saws. Wish I had these when I cut out the air-inlets. Which I did with a very fine blade of a coping saw, cut to size and spanned into one of my drilling grips. But this was too wobbly and a pain to use. I managed to get the cutouts, no pictures yet, though. The impreza is in its box, no intention of mixing up truck and car parts...

 

 

@MetroRacing Ashley, I am not sure about the Renaissance stuff. Seems to be too expensive while pretty easy to diy. Detailling a possible diorama is far in the future. Working on my master thesis these days and switching jobs keeps me very busy. Christmas season and family don't help much. Take this as a excuse for not answering sooner. Simply forgot to do so.

[MetroRacing]

Yes a couple of things from Renaissance would be easy to scratch yourself. I just linked everything they had haha.

 

Be interesting to see what colour you decide to paint the truck? I'm sort of leaning towards the brighter shade of Subaru 53c used on the commemorative Road cars, rather than the darker, purplish shade used on the Rally cars.

 

Ashley

[Schwarz-Brot]

I ordered Zero Colours 02c for the Impreza which should be the Rally colour from 2001 onwards. This should last me a while, so the truck may get it as well. Or Vallejo Model Air Arctic Blue (041) over white. Or a mixed up blue without metallic effect. I might very well pick out a RAL colour for the truck and mix it up with Schmincke Colours (They have a RAL mixing table). I'll do some spoon-testing when my order arrives AND I find a free hour.

 

Greetings,

Jan

[MetroRacing]

The truck isn't the same colour as the rally cars. The truck is an M reg if I remember right. So was new in 1995. That's the reason behind my thinking the colour is a shade of the Subaru colour used at the time, which is 53c.

 

Here's a pic of the actual truck.

 

[Schwarz-Brot]

Yeah, I knew the truck wasn't the same. But I don't really care in this case. The model has so many inaccuracies, one might as well take any random truck and paint some subaru markings on there. I build it OOB and will chose a colour a unrelated observer would believe. Choosing the same colour for car and truck bonds it together and is somehow expected these days. Changing the colour might be more realistic, but is pointless regarding realism with so many flaws in the model.

 

We'll see. It is not decided yet.

[MetroRacing]

I did find this collage of pics on an old post here on Britmodeller.

The colour here looks a little lighter and looks metallic too.

Maybe Tamiya TS50 would be a good match?

 

Ashley 

 

[shood23]

Just a heads up on the zeros subaru rally blue 02c, it's a very thin paint and requires many light coats (more than normal with zero paints) to build up the colour. If you rush it and go heavy it wrinkles.

 

Shaun 

[Schwarz-Brot]

Ashley, I have no idea about the tamiya colours, sorry. I wouldn't start yet another paint range as I have my ultra high quality Schmincke Aeros. The whole range! And the whole Vallejo Game Color range as well. I am pretty much an acrylics fan and would stick with these. Only thing I am going to add is specialist colours like colourmatched zero paints or Alclad chrome and their respective thinners, cleaners and stuff.

I found that thread as well and already bookmarked it

 

Shaun, thank you for the heads up! I would have shot some testpieces, as I never before worked with zero paints. Hard to find around here and not what I'd usually use. Good to get some informed input!

Edited November 30, 2016 by Schwarz-Brot

[pau10wen]

Loving the build pics, great work so far!

I've got x2 Subaru kits in the stash and x2 more at least that i'm interested in getting hold of

 

I've been trying to get hold of this engine kit for one of them (Tamiya 2003 impreza WRC) which I've already disassembled almost completely (doors, boot and bonnet), then moved on to another project as I couldn't get hold of the engine kit.

I was starting to scratch build one, maybe I should keep going with that method using the engine kit pics as a guide?

 

 

[Schwarz-Brot]

Hi Paul (?),

thank you for digging this one up.

 

The engine kit is more suitable for road cars than for the customized rally machines. It is of acceptable quality and not too expensive. Detail is quite good and small. You'll have to decide for yourself if you'd rather live with a too small but detailed engine or if you want it to look more accurate. I ordered the kit directly from http://www.eightyone81.com/ Communication was a bit sparse, but everything arrived after a few weeks and was nicely packed.

 

Anyone, if you wonder what happened:

I finished my master thesis, switched jobs, am full time employed now and got me a house to rebuild to a modern standard. Not much model building going on anytime soon. Planning on kids we might speak of years without any modelling. I'll eventually return to the Impreza and the truck, but for now both are tucked away.

[Schwarz-Brot]

A little teasing... I still have not much time for modelling, still working on the house which will keep me buisy for probably about one more year, maybe more.

 

The Subaru isn't dead, though. I recently ordered some literature to get some more input on all the oily bits that need to be scratched and superdetailed.

First there is Brian Long - Subaru Impreza, ISBN 1904788351. This is on the whole Impreza story with many valuable insights regarding model history and all that stuff. Some helpful cutaway graphics of some engines and frame layouts, but not much about the WRCs, only short results about the respective seasons the cars competed. Managed to get it for a reasonable 14€ in heavily used condition. It is well written and looks quite complete, but only really worth the usual prices if you are interested in the complete Impreza history.

 

The second hasn't landed yet, speaking of Haynes Subaru Impreza WRC Rally Car Owners' Workshop Manual. This should give some more insight, I hope. I'll keep you posted!

[Schwarz-Brot]

The Haynes "Owners' Workshop Manual" has landed. Let me tell you, this is not what the title promises to be! This is actually an Impreza Rally history, and then especially of those Group A workhorses up to 1996. The title is clearly indicating all rally Imprezas up to 2008. In fact these are only part of a short subchapter. Therefore I'd call this book a double ripoff. Very disapointed by this! On Amazon.de it was advertised as Impreza WRC Manual, which was additionally misleading.

 

A few mildly helpful pictures can be found, but not much on the bug-eye.

If you'd like to superdetail a Group A Impreza, this book might be very helpful, but then again often it is not clear which season is shown.

 

To be fair it seems to be a good read in general, just not what was promised.

Meh.