ScanmanDan

Thank you gentlemen for your encouragement. I'm happy to see that the little Terminator was well received. He was a ton of fun to paint, quick too. I did pop into a gaming store during the week and picked up a little box set of Gretchen that were very reasonably priced considering they have ten albeit small figures for $25 Aus. which was about a third the cost of most of the sets. I have an idea for a little vignette that I want to do with them. A neat little excursion into 28mm figure painting.

The good lady wife saw one of those magazines that have plastic figures packaged with them in the newsagent the other day. And given all her hard worn years with me knows a thing or two about Warhammer and Space Marines so out of her limitless well of goodness bought the magazine for me as a weekend treat after antique shopping. Now I don't have much truck with Games Workshops way of doing business but do appreciate their kits, sooo. I went home and cut everything from the sprues and had a go. Now at first glance you'd think there were enough parts for two figures on the sprue but no, you need to buy a second further issue of the magazine to get enough parts to finish of the second figure, sigh. Not deterred I pressed forward and finished construction without incident. Painting was attempted and I bashed out a little base. All up it was a bit of fun and I think it came out alright. Though the thought of painting dozens of these little guys seems awfully daunting for the young teens this is supposed to be aimed at. I might try some more if I can source them at less than the exorbitant prices I see in the shops. Thanks for dropping by.

Getting toward the final stages on this little bust. I'm not much for this kind of thing but encouraged to give it a go. Certainly a change from building models. All painted in acrylics. Lots more smoothing and pushing highlights/shadows but the gist is there. Most importantly I'm having fun and pushing myself to try new things. Thanks for looking in. Dan

It said it was the '04 one and I think that's the right one? Not very informed on motorcycles but they sure look neat. and I'm having a blast building the kits. I have been working on getting the cowlings painted. Mistakingly primed black for overall silver with red stripes when I should have primed white for overall red, sigh. ( Next time I'll read the straight forward instructions.) Not broken but added a bunch more paint layers and steps. Everything is 'resting' with a nice three coats of TS-49 Bright Red. I will give it a few days to cure before tackling the provided masking. Scary stuff for me as I'm not good with the two tone painting schemes. The Tamiya spray cans flash off and dry pretty quickly but I don't want to mess it up by rushing. Plenty more to do with the rear suspension and wheels. Speaking of the wheels. Does anyone have any tips for putting on the thin red stripe decals to the outer edges of the wheels? They look intimidating as heck and Tamiya decals are okay on glossy flat surfaces but around the rims looks fraught with danger. I can't seem to get any of the decal 'softeners' to do much with the Tamiya decals. Only heat from a cotton bud dipped in a cup off almost boiling water pressed down onto the decal gets much in the way of conforming. I have tried a hair dryer but it seems a blunt tool for the job and just makes it harder to work on the part. Any ideas? Thanks for looking in and sending me encouragement. Dan

A bit of feedback on the Tamiya cement for anyone thinking about it's use. The cement is tube like, clear and a bit rubbery. Acts much like a clear drying contact cement. Short working life, grabs okay and any squeeze out removes fairly easily. The more I use it the more niche it becomes. I think for major assembly of painted subassemblies I'll stick with five minute epoxy or slow super glues. but for tiny non load bearing bits like adding photo etched bolt heads to cowls and such this stuff shines. I'll stick with gloss Mod Podge for canopies and other clear parts too as I feel it's a stronger joint. Progress; Frame done and motor installed. Kind of a shame all that hard work on the intakes and such is hidden under the airbox, sigh. I've lashed out and ordered the seperate Tamiya fork details set ( with turned forks) and a 3D printed chain for this kit. The kit parts are really quite nice but I want to see what the aftermarket has to offer. I have some generic photo etched bolts and bits ( Top Studio) that I'll add to this to see if they make a difference. At the end of the day it's a balance between added bling and having fun. No sense making this into a work chore. Next up is starting to assemble and paint the cowls. I'm trying to figure out what order to prime/paint the sliver /red paint scheme. Usually I'd prime black to paint the overall silver mask and then shoot the red. But I don't think the red will cover enough without a white/pink primer. If I do that I'm going to end up with a ridge at the edge of the red/silver. Might need to do a mock up first. Off to do some gardening now before SWMBO catches me slacking off. Dan

Just finishing up my other little Yamaha and awaiting a second copy of that kit coming in the mail I picked up this little guy. Racing brother of the street bike I just finished. On looking over the kit there is lots that is different but I thought it looked cool and was reduced at my local shop. I jumped right in and started work on the engine as per the instructions. Added a few styrene bolt heads and a few resin bolts where the exhaust pipes attach. Played around with some silver tape hose pipe clamps and some Tamiya enamel washes and called it a day. I doubt much of this will show on the final bike as it's all under the cowlings but a fun project that was pretty quick and easy to do. I did order some replacement decals from overseas to add the cigarette advertisements that Tamiya had to remove. Hopefully that will make the kit look a bit different. I'm having a blast building these bikes as working neat is a challenge. Trying new things and materials. Bought some Tamiya multipurpose cement for attaching the painted subassemblies. Will see how it holds up to handling. An interesting cement, not sure I like it but giving it a chance. Thanks for looking in. Dan

Progress; I always get a bit stressed this near the finish line as I'm just waiting for the big screw up to ruin the finish. I've had kittens keeping everything clean and tidy and working on the paint ob, decals etc. The saving grace is these Tamiya kits fit so well together you shouldn't get any gaps.... But I must have put one of the front cowl pieces on just a tiny bit low and ended up with a gap on one side. ( It's perfect on the other side) Now I have two options. One, just suck it up and put that side towards the back of the cabinet and never think of it again( and try better next time.). Or, pull the front cowl off and try and wrangle the piece into a better position. No danger there?!!! What could possibly go wrong? I'm going to have to think this one over as I'm so pleased with my first results that I don't want to ruin the whole thing to get a final one percent better result. I do really like this build and kit. So much so that I'm seriously thinking of getting another of the same kit to try and improve ( I have a list of bits and ideas to do better ) With the advantage of the kit having three more different colour schemes to ring the changes and keep it from being a boring do over. So send me good thoughts and we'll see what I can do. Dan

Thank you to all for your kind comments. Slow Progress; All the sub assemblies are just put together and need tweaking before the final glueing but she's getting there. I don'y like the exhaust holding but have gotten over it enough to push through and get this one finished. Lots of little things to do but I can now get a sense of how it will look in the end. Thanks for looking in. Dan

Pleased you like it. I unmasked my side cowls this morning to find I didn't think to mask the cooling holes and got a bit of red overspray. DOH! I think I've managed to use some polishing compound to get it back to an okay shape. I have started to wear coat so I can tackle the decaling. Not my favourite task but I'm getting a bit better as I go. I just find the Tamiya decals pretty much impervious to any setting solution I through at them. Only Hot water and hairdryer heat seems to have any effect. Onwards and upwards.

A little progress; Mostly just getting all the painted sub assemblies cleanly put together. I did break down and buy some Tamiya 0.05mm black cable which was easier to work with. Just made little boots with the thinner supplied tubing and slipped the ends of the cable in to attach. Worked a treat. I also bought some different Tamiya polishing compounds and wax and stared to rub out the paint a bit. It's a bit better but I think needs a lot more work to get it smoother/shiny. This will have to do for this build. I'm working on the cowls and they are going to take a bit as I have to let the paint dry before I decal and clear coat them. I did mess up the turn indicators, not horrible but not my best work. They will have to wait till the end or I knock them off for sure. Learning as I go and I'm having fun. Thanks for looking in. Dan

Thanks RossFMJ - I can't take any credit for the stand I saw it on a YouTube video and made one from bits I had laying around. It sure helps as these kits are hard to hold onto once they get about half finished and you don't want fingerprints on everything. I'm finding not a lot on line about building motorcycles but YouTube has quite a few good videos. Spent the last bit prepping and priming the cowling panels for paint and decals. Lots on little bits to paint for all the lights and handlebars too. More pics once I have some progress. Dan

I have been lucky enough to have an extended year end holiday an so have't had much time for modelling. During my break I did spend an inordinate amount of time and money on the sink hole of an Academy 1/48 scale F-111c. The darn thing was an absolute bear and in the end has defeated me. In trying to recover I thought I'd try a kit from a manufacture I knew wouldn't give me any assembly problems, namely Tamiya. I decided on an 1/12 scale motorcycle just to do something different. I'd last built A Tamiya Motorcycle some forty years ago but have kept an eye on them ever since. Big, shiny and mean looking, just the kind of kit to get some MoJo back. To keep me on track I limited myself to what's in the box and to use only Tamiya rattle cans. The plan is to keep it simple and try and enjoy the process. This Yamaha looked interesting and was available at the local shop for a very reasonable price. I'm pretty far into the build and so far so good. The kit fits perfectly and just clicks together. ( Fact is I'm finding I use glue to put parts together that don't need it. Often the parts click together and then a screw is used to hold everything together.) Typical Tamiya engineering. It's a lot more 'fiddly' than I'm used to as everything has to be painted before assembly but I'm beginning to get a handle on the best ways to proceed. Keeping everything clean and not scratching paintwork is a challenge for ham fisted me but I'm coping. The body work is just sitting on the frame at this point as I have much still to do to get it to fit the frame tightly. Decaling, something I'm not good at, is going well. The high gloss paints help. I marvel at some of the fantastic results you can see in on line builds. These are no doubt the reward of countless hours of trial and error. I'm experimenting with assembly with 5 minute epoxy to get neater joins with repainted parts. This allows for more time than superglue and is way less nerve raking to get the parts just right. The Tamiya rattle cans are performing extremely well but the cost is steep. Though the ease of not having to set up and clean the airbrush offsets this considerably. Just nice to have a bit of fun after the nightmare of the F-111c. If you have any hints or advise on assembling these motorcycles please let me know as they sure are a different animal than the 1/48 scale tanks and planes I usually build. Thanks for looking in. Dan Dan

My good lady purchased this kit for me as a gift to get me to make something other than a tank or "Something with out pointy bits." Not one to refuse a lady I have been slowly building away and now have a little to show for my efforts. I limited myself to only rattle cans and then only for the 'chrome' ( stripped with bleach and painted Tamiya Silver Leaf) and the body in Tamiya Blue. Everything else was painted with a hairy stick. It's an older Revel kit that was originally a snap tight and therefore a little simplified but not too badly detailed. Now I know nothing of these trucks but it has been fun to just plop down and sand/paint/glue a kit without going nuts modifying it all to heck. I did add a tiny sliver of plastic card to the rear edge of the bonnet as the hood didn't fit too well straight from the box. Other than that its been a neat little kit. Progress; Not too much more to do but the exhausts look a touch tricky. So we'll have to see how they come out. Thanks for looking in. Dan

It's 1/48th scale. I don't build in the bigger scales. ( Though I did get a 1/16th scale SdKfz 251/22 Pakwagen for Christmas; You have to love family that know you build tank models but nothing else about your hobby 😃 ) I like 1/48th as it's a quick build and I can spend more time painting and weathering which is what I like to do. These days there are a plenty of kits, figures and aftermarket if you look around. Least wise my to do pile will keep me going for a bit. Glad you like my little efforts. Dan

To be honest Tamiya have added most things you'd want to add. I did add the three tubular support braces that are missing from each of the external fuel tank holders and I'm thinking of adding the eight small hand holds that run along the edge of the rear deck but other than that I can only see a few hoses, cables and bolt heads that are neither here nor there missing. I will replace the black decals provided for the periscopes with something red/pink and reflective ( I've used cut down sequins in the past but I looking into alternatives.) I'm going to add the rolled up tarps to the edges of the upper hull and an orange air recognition panel to the turret top. Those and messing with some form of worn paint effect should keep it interesting and not so, well, yellow over all. Lots still to do but it's mostly all on me now as Tamiya did their part soo well.