Koenig Specials Porsche 911 BiTurbo

[Alan R]

Hello All,

Another one rescued from the dungeon of despondency!

I bought this little beastie a long while back, probably over 25 years ago, and it languished it its box for a long time.

Again, it was one that I got out more recently, did some more work, then put away again, probably due to the issues with my eyesight.

Anyway, too much waffle. This week after I had completed the 288 GTO, I happened upon this box in my garage (The previously mentioned Dungeon of Despondency), and thought "Why not this one?", So, here we are again:

The box:

Typical Koenig 'over the top' conversion, I think...

The body, previously painted with Humbrol Red (Hu 19). I was really pleased with the finish. Applied from a spray can, I think. No great amount of orange-peel to be seen.

The nose. Slightly fuzzy. I think the camera moved while I took the picture

...

The rear. Again, a really nice finish...

The underside. I think that the steering looks a bit strange, but it's the way the model was made. I suspect that it's a normal Fujimi 911 floor pan moulding that has had extras added, so the wheel offsets are a bit 'wide' to fit the wider body-shell, if that makes sense...

It sits on all four wheels 'four-square', which is always a bonus.

I had to make replacement tail pipes, as one of the 'chromed' ones pinged off into the wild, never to be seen again. A bit of 1/8^th inch 'evergreen' styrene tubing, with the end routed out to simulate the tail-pipe and hey-presto, new tail-pipes.

So that's where we have got to. A promising start...

 

Thanks for looking, Alan.

Edited March 17, 2018 by Alan R
Silly typo errors...

[AngstROM]

Certainly an interesting looking beast -to a non-petrolhead, it resembles the outcome of an unholy union between a Porsche and a Ferrari...yet looks extraordinarily cool, despite (or because of?) that!

 

Looking forward to seeing this progress. 

 

*Edit*: Bet it was an utter witch to drive!

Edited May 7, 2017 by AngstROM

[Alan R]

2 minutes ago, AngstROM said:

Bet it was an utter witch to drive!

I wouldn't be surprised. 911s were always 'interesting' with less than 200 BHP. A friend of mine had a 1972 911. 2.4 litres, I think. And he said that it could be a handful in the wet.

This was reputed to produce 480 BHP. I image that was a handful in the dry!

Cheers, Alan.

 

P.S. More updates on the way, as I am running between here and the work-shop working on it, and other models.

 

[AngstROM]

1 minute ago, Alan R said:

A friend of mine had a 1972 911. 2.4 litres, I think. And he said that it could be a handful in the wet.

 

Indeed. Folklore has it that owners of '70s/'80s Nine-One-Ones,when venturing to buy new tyres, would be asked by the fitter if front or rear were required, and would often answer "Well, it depends..."!

[Alan R]

Hello All,

I have decided to do this in smaller bites. This stage which will be more than one post, even though the updates are coming thick and fast (ish!).

I'm calling this stage - 'Rescue and Paint'. But of a mouthful, but I hope you will see what I mean as I go along...

Remember that I had said that the paint finish was near flawless. Well that wasn't quite what I said, but the paint finish was very good.

When I took a closer look at the body shell, I notice a serious omission on my part. I hadn't sanded out the seam-lines.

Now, in my defence, I had started this some years ago, and was less critical of such things. Sometimes I did scrape/sand out mould lines, sometimes I didn't.

This one was originally just going to be a quick build, so I wasn't so bothered, I think. Anyway, they were a glaring 'eye-sore' to me when I started again the other day!

These pictures show what I mean, I hope...

I have out-lined the areas on the body shell where the seam-lines are rather obvious. It's perhaps not so obvious on these 600 x 400 images, but they are very definitely there and they bother me now, where previously they wouldn't have.

You can just see them here, I think. Some people might dismiss them, but I can't now I know they are there.

I think that I would have been even more disappointed had I left them until I had finished it.

Again, it's there, but these pictures don't do the lines justice!

Anyway, out came my various grades of wet-n-dry, 240, 600, 1200 grit, and this is the result...

Having sanded the seam lines out, I needed to check that they were truly gone.

Previously, I have carefully painted grey primer with a hairy stick, and of course, you end up with brush marks. I thought that I would try my latest purchase. Mr Levelling thinner. It only works with some acrylics, namely Mr Color and Tamiya acrylics. These use a lacquer carrier for the acrylic pigment, rather than a more aqueous carrier. At least that's what I have been led to believe.

Anyway, if you try using it with Citadel paints, you get a sludge, which is no use to anyone! It seems a bit better with Humbrol acrylics, but you get a grainy result. With Tamiya, you get a great result, and when sprayed, it really does level. So, I mixed some Tamiya grey with the levelling thinner, and carefully hand painted over the affected areas, thus:

So, it may not be obvious here, but the brush-marks were just not there. Once I had left the paint to cure for about 3 to 4 hours, all I needed to do was lightly sand with 1200 grit w&d to remove the edges.

Next stage, starting to re-paint the red...

 

Thanks for looking, Alan.

Edited March 17, 2018 by Alan R
Photobucket!

[shood23]

Nice topic Alan I for one quite like the conversions of the the out of house tuners plus it's always a bonus when it's a "super" class car. 

 

Shame about the seem lines but good fixing. Also I like the little rig thing your using to hold the body. 

 

Shaun

[Alan R]

Hello All,

Another update. Having decided that the body shell needed a bit of re-painting, see last post. I needed a lot of red. I wasn't confident that I could paint the shell with Humbrol Hu19 acrylic as the thinners that I have previously used didn't give me a good finish, and it clogs up the air-brush!

So, I thought I would use Tamiya X7 red. However, I realised quickly that I didn't have any. What I did have though was three pots of XF-7 and some X22 clear gloss.

So, my reasoning was, paint it matt and gloss over it when fully cured. This is not dissimilar to using Zero Paints base coat and ZP clear lacquer.

So, that's what I have done. I thinned the XF7 with Mr Levelling thinner and sprayed it on the body shell. The two reds are very similar in shade and I don't think that the difference between the body and the floor pan will be noticeable.. Only time will tell.

So here are the pictures:

As you can see, the grey primer hasn't quite disappeared, and I believe that I will have to put many more coats on before it disappears completely.

I think that I will need more red...

 

Thanks for looking, Alan.

 

Edited March 17, 2018 by Alan R
Photobucket!

[Alan R]

9 minutes ago, shood23 said:

Also I like the little rig thing your using to hold the body

Thanks Shaun.

The rig is something I put together using various lengths of sprue.

I thought that I could do with a better rig than I had before, which was a long piece of 30 Amp earth core bent roughly into shape.

The biggest thing was finding suitably long enough bits of sprue, then removing all the junction points so that the rod was smooth. After all, being the 'perfectionist' (Read anally retentive...) that I am, I want it to look right as well as function well.

It went through several iterations to get where it is in these pictures. I have a feeling I could do with another couple of these. A pair of smaller trestles could be quite useful. I think.

 

Cheers, Alan.

[Hamden]

 

 

Nice er.........restart. Love the 911 in red

Great work on the repaint

 

   Roger

[Alan R]

6 hours ago, Hamden said:

Great work on the repaint

Hi Roger,

A lot more red paint is needed, just to cover the grey. Since I took the pictures, I have sprayed more red on it, but probably need as much again!

I fear a trip to Hobbycraft...

 

Cheers, Alan.

[Stu_davros]

This is a great looking Porsche, I really like the look of the Keonig specials.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Alan R]

More XF-7 arrived from Hiroboy!

'Red'-y for painting...  

 

[Maximum warp]

Hey Alan, just some tips here. No matter what quantity of red paint you spray, this difference will always show through. You're much better off either sanding the grey coat off down to bare plastic again, alternatively spray the whole car in pink primer. Tamiya does a pink primer especially to use under red paint as it makes the red more vibrant. In any case the undercoat needs to be uniform in order not to have color variations show through in the final coat especially with light coloured topcoats. Enjoy the build, it's a nice car!

[Alan R]

Hi Maximum Warp,

I have taken a look at the Porsche paintwork and agree. No amount of red was going to hide the grey bands. So, I decided to remove the grey and...

I removed all the areas with grey underneath, as best as I could.

I then painted on some more of the red:

This is the result.

To be honest, I'm not happy that any further coats of the red will hide the blotches!

I think that the best approach, despite the time and cost, is to strip the whole body back to the plastic and start again.

1. Prime with a pink primer

2. Re-coat with the red over the uniform pink coat.

 

It's a bit of a pain, but I think that I wouldn't be happy with the result.

 

Thanks for looking, Alan.

 

 

Edited March 17, 2018 by Alan R
Photobucket!

[silver911]

If I may....your problem is that the paint is reacting to the plastic where you have sanded back to it....Tamiya will not work without a primer.

 

Reds can be primed with several different colours of primer....and each will have an effect on the final colour....i.e. warmer or colder depending on your choice.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Ron 

[Alan R]

Hi All,

I have decided to re-start this. I have plunged the body into my usual caustic-soda bath to remove the many layers of 'incompatible' paints, and to hopefully re-prime the shell and start all over again.

I'm not sure what will happen, I have had mixed results with Tamiya acrylics and caustic-soda. Only time will tell.

 

Cheers, Alan.

[Alan R]

5 hours ago, silver911 said:

Reds can be primed with several different colours of primer....and each will have an effect on the final colour

Hi Ron,

Thanks for the advice.

My plan is to prime the shell with ZP grey primer first. That should protect the shell and show any more flaws in the finish.

Then I will spray a pink layer over the top, followed by the red top-coat.

 

Cheers, Alan

[silver911]

Hi Alan,

bear in mind that pink has no 'depth'!

That is to say, it will be almost neutral to the red so, if you want more of a deep red, use a lacquer based paint such as 'Zero".

 

Look forward to seeing what you do with it mate

 

Best

 

Ron

[Mumbly]

If caustic soda don't shift the Tamiya then try surgical spirit

[Alan R]

1 hour ago, Mumbly said:

If caustic soda don't shift the Tamiya then try surgical spirit

Hi Mumbly,

The caustic-soda did the trick. Apart from a small amount of surface staining, it all came off completely.

A quick gentle sand with fine grade wet 'n' dry, and the shell is white again.

 

Cheers, Alan.

[Alan R]

Hi All.

It's been a bit of a while since I last updated this thread, so I'm doing a 'bulk' update on this and another couple of builds I have been working on.

Life has got a bit busy lately and I haven't been able to get to my work-bench or the computer due to other commitments.

So, here we are with the Porsche.

 

I decided that I was never going to get the paint finish I wanted, so I dropped the body into a bath of caustic-soda, as I mentioned in previous post, and this is the outcome:

Apart from some minor staining all of the old paint has been removed.

Next stage, re-priming followed by  the colour coats.

 

Thanks for looking, Alan.

 

Edited March 17, 2018 by Alan R
Photobucket!

[Alan R]

Hi All,

I have made some progress on this model.

After my Badger air-brush finally met the grim reaper, I bought a new Iwata dual-action airbrush.

I thought that I would start on this model. In a previous post, I said that I would prime the shell with Zero Paints primer, and then put on a pink layer before adding the red top coat.

Well, in the end, I decided to re-prime as I had said, but when it came to putting on the top coat, I had forgotten that I was going to pre-coat with pink, so I just went ahead with the red coat.

I am really pleased with the result so far.

I really love the Iwata air-brush. The dual action takes a little getting used to, but as I get to know how it works better, I think that it will improve my results.

I painted the shell using Tamiya XF-7 thinned with Mr Color Levelling thinners.

I didn't take any pictures of the primed body, so no images of that. So, here are the pictures of the body in red.

 

It's almost there! I did notice that there isn't quite enough red paint around the headlamps, so I'll have to apply a little more there.

Otherwise, I really happy with the outcome so far.

 

Thanks for looking,

Alan.

[Alan R]

Hi All,

I have just realised that I have done much more on this without taking any pictures. I have completed the cock-pit and attached it to the floor pan. I'll take some pictures tomorrow and post them here then.

Anyway, I have completed the body (well, nearly). I have installed the glazing and prepped the reflectors for adding the lights and indicators.

I used the Molotow chrome pen again. I am going to need to get another one soon...

 

I am going to install this on the floor pan before attaching all the ancillaries.

 

More soon.

 

Thanks for looking,

Alan.

[Hamden]

 

This looks stunning now Alan, can't wait to see it completed

 

         Roger 

[Homerlovesbeer]

Great job Alan. I'm really impressed that you preservered getting the body and paint correct. I'd be tearing my hair out

 

Can't wait to see it finished.