Spiny

Always good to do a car which you have some sort of connection to, which is why my stash contains a Nissan Micra... You're braver than me attacking the number plate so I wish you all the best with it. I hope you get the paint colour sorted well from mixing the ones you have - if it doesn't work out and if you know the colour code Halfords or another shop selling car paint could mix it for you but in that case the flakes are likely to be a bit big.

Looks dfecent progress with the paint. I'm guessing from your edit comment you're struggling with getting the photos. To be honest, Google only works for showing photos quite intermittently, better to use a photohost if you can, The link below describes how to use Flickr (first 1000 photos are free), although there are other sites:

Excellent work on this, it's ended up looking very nice despite the battles you had with it. And it's also photographed well too. Time for the next one!

Depends on whether it's a fairly recent kit, but try the UK link on here. If it's available you should be able to buy a sprue from them. https://www.tamiya.com/english/agent/agent.htm

Saw this over in the 'what have you see today' thread. Funnily enough, it's a dead ringer for the only one I've seen in the flesh which was also yellow. One thing your photo has flagged up to me is that the front strip isn't gloss - I had to check other images and it seems that's standard. So I will have to remove the kit chrome from that and give it a spray when the weather gets better for painting. Fortunatley that isn't needed until near the end of the build so it should be warmer by then

There's at least one around as I passed it on the A1 a couple of years ago. Then again, it was raining at the time so....

I can't really give any tips on airbrushing, or on getting a good finish straight out of the rattlecan, but you can improve the finish with some very fine grits (6000-12,000) sanding pads and/or polishing compounds if used with care and making sure you don't burn through. The propped up half-worked deck lid in the pic below gives an idea of the difference you can make - before on the left. Obviously, this is much easier on a flat surface than a build with lots of compound curves and edges. Your build looks very good, partifularly for a first build. The 300SL looks a great kit, but if you want to practice on a car first there are a number Tamiya and Revell kits around for under £20 if you wanted to try a cheaper, simpler car first.

It could just be the angle, but to my eyes the spring looks much better with the wash. Looks like a lot of precision painting has gone on with those door cards too.

Definitely looks better to my eyes with the lining done. I know what you mean about black sometimes giving a cartoon appearance when used for panel lines. In my opinion, it depends a lot on the colour of the car - on a dark car black works well but on a lighter colour, or white, a lighter colour such as grey works much better.

Nicely done, particularly around the wheel arches which I expect are quite tricky. And with white and black together, you had to get that right as every little mistake would have really shown. Good work. Incidentally, what's with the ghost cars on the box? They're drawn as if at speed, but no drivers EDIT: Oh wait, there's some mysterious ninja like figures in there discuised as seats...

Very nicely done (as usual). Not sure how people do 1/43 - I have to magnify 1/24 enough to see what I'm doing let alone something where each dimension is half of that. Good luck with the house move - if I can find somewhere nice within price range (big if there) I hope to go through the same hell this year too.

Tiny progress is progress, and priming and smoothing is definitely not 'tiny progress'. Looks good so far, I'm particularly looking forward to seeing what you make of the 2000GTR - it's a good kit so have fun with it.

Finally did something other than the engine on this. But first... trying to get rid of the warp on the chassis. After no luck with heating/twisting/cooling or with leaving for an hour with a twist in, I resorted to somewhat desperate measures. Soaked for a few minutes in hot water, then dried off the thickest of the water and clamped to the desk with the cutting mat and pencil case to twist it the other way: It was left like this overnight, so it had every chance to straighten out. And the result? Not straight, but I'd say I got rid of about 2/3 of the warp - fingers crossed that the rest of the straightening out can be taken up by the body (which feels pretty sturdy). Meanwhile I started on the rear end. The diff/propshaft assembly is made up of three parts, all stuck together before painting so quite easy. Everything except the exhaust is down as being painted satin black, but I decided to at least liven up the springs (not easy to see but located between the beam axle and ladder frame) so they were done gloss black with matt black between the coils of the springs. Not very visible even at this stage, so will probably be completely invisible once built. There's a bit of fiddling around with the scissor spring (instructions say it's the rear track bar) and exhaust as they're close to sharing space, but so far I'd have to say that this kit is going together very well. In some ways it's quite simple (solid metal rear axle anyone?) but the detailing seems to be elsewhere - this is still a 100+ piece kit. The hubs, dampers and ARB are just starting to be painted, so I guess they'll be going on next weekend with a bit of luck. Thanks for looking.

How are you getting the Flickr URL? The best way is to click on the photo you want to upload and open it in Flickr. At the bottom right, there is an arrow curving to the right, click that and a pop-up will open. Select 'BBCode' from the top right of the pop-up, then select what size you want to display your photo (800 or 1024 for the first figure is best) from dropdown list. Once that it done, right click on the code above the dropdown and select copy. Then you can just paste it into your thread.

I just wish on my builds it would still fit together so easily at the end of the build... Car is looking great, especially for being only a week into it.

Very sorry to hear that. 96 is a 'good innings' but still sad when the time comes. Condolences incoming from me too.

That engine in particular is looking very good. Just a thought for the springs, but do you have any black wash. It might be tricky now you've fixed them to the car, but adding a wash between coils might make them looks a tad better.

Happily, (and in no small part due to watching @Windy37 build this, I bought one which arrived today. And I'm pleased to say that not only the box but also the decals have been updated with the correct name.

Got to agree, that fan is looking very impressive. A good way to start your first 'work in progress' thread.

"Here's some money (£50) for your birthday. Get something you want." Hmmm, what can I get that costs about £50 The observant of you will notice from the box that Nigel Harris has kicked his sister Angel out of the co-driver's seat. After taking the photo, I opened it up and they've updated the decals too.

I'd second trying this, particularly if you already have a pin-vice. Any wire of suitable thickness should do the trick in terms of holding it in place and will give it extra strength compared to just creating a butt joint.

Don't envy you the thought of polishing the paint on that one without burning through!

Just a suggestion, but it may make sense to extend to 1973 as that is when everything shrunk due to the oil shock - there's still quite a few from the early '70s which most would consider classics. Can't really argue with your four choices ('59 Cadillac is the one with the huge fins), but other than the 68/69 Charger I suspect you'll struggle to see much agreement on what else is in there. I'd also think the '57 T-Bird and '64 Pontiac GTO (for starting the muscle car trend) should be in there.

Very sorry to hear that. Silence is understandable as some things are just more important than sticking bits of plastic together. All the best.

Lucky to get those two kits for a reasonable price - thought I was on for one about a year ago then got outbid. Not a disaster though as the money went on a very well priced Simil'R Focus instead Looks like you've made a good start here. I can very much sympathise with you on sanding all those curves - psyching myself up for a similar job at the moment as well.