diablo rsv

Thanks Mark, that's very kind of you. I'm hoping to make a start on it soon, fingers crossed I haven't bitten off more than I can chew. They are lovely, I ordered them direct from Copper State, although they're not cheap I feel they will make a big difference to the finished model. Wayne

Excellent work as usual Ed, it's really looking the business. I think the rivet thing is due to the limitations of the injection moulding process. It would make it difficult to remove the part if they include the rivets on the curved surfaces. Meng included them on the Roll Royce but it meant the rivets were elongated so I had to replace them anyway. Wayne

Whilst I was pondering on how to tackle the paintwork I thought I would have a look at the wheels. I had originally planed to use the wheels supplied by Meng on the 1920 car but I was a little concerned by their use of rubber for the tyre. The detail itself isn't too bad but they are flexible and I'm not sure how well they would take paint plus they also seem to attract dust. The other problem is that there is no way to give the impression of the weight of the car by flattening or bulging the bottom of the tyre. I wanted to get a set of the DEF Model wheels but unfortunately nobody in the UK seems to have stock of them so I ordered the FC Model Trend wheels. I have to say I am really unimpressed with the quality of this set and would say it was a complete waste of £20. Not the first time I have been disappointed with their products. The detail on the front face is fine but large sections of the tread pattern is completely missing and the surface has quite a rough texture to it. The inside of the hubs have no detail at all. I felt my only option was to order the DEF wheels from Europe, I'm so glad I did as these wheels are superb. Although they are the same price as the FC Model Trend wheels there really is no comparison.. For the 1914 car Meng provide two halves of a plastic tyre and a photoetched set of spokes which is sandwiched between them. @Bertie McBoatface made an excellent tutorial on how to assemble them in his build log HERE . They do look great but looking at photos of the actual car I felt that the tyres look a little too chunky and the spokes could be finer. It just so happened that I had the Copper State Lanchester sitting on my bench and the wheels look very similar to the Rolls Royce ones and size wise they are exactly the same. Definitely an improvement but I had ordered a set of Copper State Models replacement wheels for the Lanchester and these are fantastic. Not cheap but when you see them you can see why. They are soo delicate, I just hope I can adapt them to fit. Here they are all together for comparison. Hopefully next update will show some paint on the cars. Wayne

Once again, thank you all for your help and encouragement. It's very much appreciated. Wayne.

I have started to add some of the details to the front of the cars although the lights and radiator covers will be left off until after the painting, as will the fenders for the 1914 car. There is an armoured plate that covers the front axle. I felt that Meng's were too thick so replaced them with some thinner card. One of the more noticeable differences between the 1914 & 1920 cars is the position of the vision slots on the drivers visor. The slots on the 1914 car are at the same level where as the right hand slot on the 1920 car has been raised up. Again I felt that the plastic used for these was too thick and as Meng only provide the later style of visor I cut two new ones from card. On this particular 1914 car it looks like the crew have added some thicker plate, or possibly timber, for added protection. Looking at the above photo I see that I have forgotten to add the hinges to the top of the visor. Now onto the turrets. The 1920 cars turret was built without any modifications apart from replacing some of the rivets. The rivets on the front and back of the curved surfaces are somewhat elongated, I guess this due to the way the parts have to be removed from the moulds, so I punched out some .5mm discs and replaced the worst effected ones. Another of the main differences between the 1914 & 20 cars is the height of the turrets. The 1914 turret is noticeably lower than that of the 1920 cars. The photo below shows the different styles side by side. Sadly Meng only provides the later taller turret. I thought I had found the answer to the problem with an after market turret from Friendship models. This resin turret also comes with the earlier drivers visor. I can't comment on the quality of the product though as, after a month of waiting, it never arrived. So my only option was to modify the kit turret. This, unfortunately, isn't just a case of taking a couple of mm off of the bottom of the turret. The overall height isn't that much less however the angle of the slope is greater. I couldn't find any reliable plans so the best I could do was to get approximate dimensions from photos. I had the diameter of the kit turret so I enlarged or reduced the photos to match that. I could then work out the rest of the dimensions using a digital Vernier caliper. Probably not the best way to do it but I think it's close enough. The aperture for the Vickers MG appears to be squarer on the earlier turret but that may be unique to these particular cars. Another modification my subject car had was the addition of a box on the roof section. Presumably headroom was a problem with the lower turret and I guess that is why the height was raised on the later ones. I can't tell from the photos I have whether this box was hinged, had a hatch in it or was just fixed. I suspect the later. One other addition on these cars was the fitting of a hook assembly to the front of the chassis. I believe this was to enable the removal of barbed wire. The image below is the clearest I can find of it but I was wondering if this was fitted to any other vehicles or was it a local addition. Maybe Peter @Kingsman could shed some light on it and the raised turret roof. I decided I could fit the fenders and running boards to the 1920 car before painting. They did have quite a nasty ejection pin mark inside them that could possibly be seen on the finished model, so these were removed with a bur and whilst I was at it I thinned down the edges as well. I was getting to the point where I needed to think about getting some paint on them. Firstly I gave the modified turret a coat of Mr Surfacer 1000 to get rid of any sanding, glue and file marks and then both cars were primed with Mr Finishing Surfacer 1500 The colours for the Caunter Scheme of the 1920 car are fairly well documented. I just need to check if the base colour would be Light Stone or Portland Stone and see if I can get the correct pattern from @Mike Starmer There are patterns in his book for cars but not specifically the Rolls Royce. The 1914 car is a different matter. I doubt there is a documented account of the colours used on these . These cars were photographed in Arras in April 1917 and these seem to be the only two photographed in this scheme. There could be more of course but by this time trench warfare meant that there was limited uses for armoured cars on the Western Front so they were a rarity. The pattern on these cars isn't dissimilar to the Solomon Scheme that was seen on Mk.I Tanks in August/ September 1916. The toned down version of this was most likely Ochre, Brown and Green over the base Grey and often each colour was separated by a thin black line. I really must finish that kit. However there only seems to be three colours used on these cars and the scheme was phased out by December in favour of a 'mud brown colour'. These cars have also been given a coating of a mineral substance known as Uralite which was believed to absorb the impact of bullets. Not something I had heard of before and I'm not sure how this would affect colours or lustre. Looks like I will need to do some more research or ask Peter @Kingsman again. Wayne

Those paint schemes certainly look interesting, you don't mind a challenge do you? What is the quality of that figure like Bertie? I think I'm going to have to put one in my 1920 car, that's quite a large opening to fill. I'm not very experienced with figure painting though, so a tarp may be the answer. Wayne

Best wishes for Scoobie Darryl. It never ceases to amaze me how dropped or pinged parts perform that magic disappearing act, every session I recon I spend half my time crawling around the floor. The engines looking good, will much of it be seen on the completed model? Wayne

Coming together nicely Kris, You're definitely right there, it think that's a must do job at this scale. Wayne

Great to see another RR being built. I'm really enjoying my build, it's a nice kit as it is but there is plenty of scope for improvements. You are going for the same scheme as one of mine so it will be interesting to see how you go about painting it. I'm still trying to think of the best way and which colours to use. Your wheel looks good, I haven't attempted mine yet but you made the process look pretty straight forward. Wayne

Thank you very much, that's very kind of you, but to be honest I think I'm still in beginners class compared to some of the scratch building skills displayed on these pages. For one example check out the build by @Model Mate HERE. I do quite enjoy that side of it but I don't think I would have the patience scratch a complete model. I just use these tools and various sanding sticks, plus you don't get to see the ones that don't make it. Thanks Guys, that's really appreciated. Wayne

The chassis and engine looks great Ed, As for which way to go re the floor, I think I would be tempted to get the basic painting done before fitting. I hate masking up and would worry about damaging any delicate parts. I would think any weathering would cover up any damage to the paint work. Wayne.

For some reason I can't see your photos either on my phone or pc. Wayne

Impressive detailing work MD, this is going to be a cracker. Wayne

No problem with that John, quite flattered really. I managed to find a couple of clearer photos of the 1914 car that I am trying to replicate. The first thing I noticed is that I have gone with the wrong style of storage box under the rear fender, in fact there doesn't appear to be one at all on the left hand side, however I decided that maybe there was one at some point. So I removed the boxes that I built earlier and scratched two new ones. The door flap is made from some pewter sheet. As with the lower boxes the upper ones appear to come in a variety of styles and sizes. The ones that Meng provide are quite poorly moulded and need a lot of sanding to make them usable. On this particular 1914 car the boxes seem to be longer than the Meng ones ( which are really only suitable for the 1920 vehicles) but are they similar in section. So once again I made some new ones out of plastic card. I left this one partially open and will have a tarp or something poking out. I also decided to replace the front of the mudguard as Meng's depicts the construction as three quite thick planks but looking at the photos of the actual car it looks as though it is one sheet of ply. For the 1920 car I used the Meng boxes as a base. After sanding them to remove the moulding issues a plastic strip was glued along the top edge to represent the lip around the lid. It appears that the hinges are inside the lid and fixed through the lid into some wooden blocks, so some plastic strip was glued to represent those. I have some work to do at the front and then I can move onto the turrets. Wayne

Thanks everyone, I really appreciate your comments. Thanks Scrapiron, that would be an easier method, I toyed with a couple of methods, including drilling out and a similar method to yours, however the Meng moulding isn't great. Not sure if it shows clearly in the photo but the left of the exhaust tapers down to about 1.5mm so it really needed reshaping anyway. After looking at my reference photo the Meng exhaust looks a little long, on the 1914 car, so it maybe a wasted effort as it won't really be seen if I cut it back. Wayne