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Caterham R500 Custom Build - 1/12


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14 hours ago, Codger said:

Serious question; where do you Iron Men go potty during 12 hour marshalling?? :phew:

At the BDC meets I marshalled at there was always a break for lunch. Very civilised, the Bentley crowd!

They usually shared their meets with the AC Owners Club and Morgan Owners Club. Made for some great racing, and very interesting vehicles in the pits! Seeing an old Morgan 3 wheeler racing around the outside of a bloody great 6 litre Bentley in a corner was a very odd sight, with the Morgan driver's head about level with the top of the Bentley wheel! 

Not to mention the w-18 Napier engined beast, smoking his tyres up the start straight and belching flames when he eased off the throttle! 😁

 

Ian

 

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Triplicate post!

I have no idea what happened there! I posted and it told me to wait as I couldn't post within a certain time frame, but I hadn't posted anything! I waited, tried again, and it told me to wait again! Looks as though all 3 posted! Oops!

 

Ian

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19 hours ago, Codger said:

Serious question; where do you Iron Men go potty during 12 hour marshalling?? :phew:

 

Most of my marshalling was on forest stage rallies or middle of the night road rallies - and on those events there's always a tree around when you need one! :)

 

Keith

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  • 2 weeks later...

IMG_1339.jpg

 

Right - almost there with these..so some more details:

Kit comes with a large steering wheel - JPE version comes with a MOMO but not the right one, and I need 2 anyway - so back to Solidworks and the 3D printer!

 

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..end result:

 

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I also made some numberplate lights for the rear of both cars...

 

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One of the last big jobs - seat belts.
The kit comes with a set of harnesses, with some sticky-backed, satin finish material, printed - but red. And not great detail - so I have to make my own. Standard practice is to use ribbon - I did play around with using 'lead' sheet - as found round the top of fancy fizzy wine bottles :) - used by the scale WWII plane makers - it is great because you can shape it really easily - but better on smaller scales I think - a bit thin for my purposes....

 

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So I bought some black ribbon - 4, 5 and 6mm covered it.

I needed lots of buckles and clips, so I redrew them in 3D and printed a variety - advantage of this printing is that if you fill the bed completely, it takes no longer to process - so may as well make some spairs/some to lose/some to try different finishes with...

 

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Testing...

 

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I wanted this 'crease' at the top buckle...

 

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I din't want them all the same in all 4 seats, so I varied which buckles were connected and which would be 'loose'.

 

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Fiddly little buggers to make though - folded the ribbon and glued with super-glue.

 

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Trying different glues for the paper printed 'Caterham' logos...

 

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...and completed:

 

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Applied logo's to the seats - each car was different - particularly important for the customer! I think one of the cars was perhaps the first with a particular branding (Tillet or Caterham)

 

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Exhausts next - I have been playing with the best way to draw/print these - I had some sagging in some prints when done on their side:

 

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(Note, these black test pieces were printed at a lower resolution to speed up the printing time!)

 - I tried 2 halves, but just adding work to actually join and fill/smooth - so the vertically printed ones work best - print takes a LOT longer because of the much larger number of 0.01mm layers! - not figuring out the pipe run - again a bit of a bugger to do!
Of course each car has a different can!!

 

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Making the exhaust system in separate parts lets me play with the angles more easily - so end pipe, can, long bent piece into collector, and then the 4 pipes that disappear into the side skin - engine-bay side pipes were done years ago as part of the engine.

Once this is done, the last 'big' job is the clear 'windscreen' wind deflectors...
 

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23 hours ago, caterhamnut said:

cheers all

 

Can't say enough good things about your work 'Nut. Especially your drawing skills with decal and 3D softwares. You raise this car to another level. But I can ask some questions because I notice particularly fine work and your skills provide leadership.

A. Both paint jobs; you say you used a 1:1 spray bomb for each but got a beautifully even gloss and 'thin' coat on the skin - especially evident on the louvers and nose . What helped you achieve that?

B. The semi-black on areas like the fenders especially nice. What brand was that?

C. Observation - both cars look terrific without clunky Tammy muffler hung on side. Are those little fours deafening with just an open header collector? Like mine?

COBRA-1200.png

D. Ever a thought to lower the chassis by cutting one coil from each spring unit?

E. Why headlights and fog lights on race cars? A class requirement?

F. What is black finish on floor and rear bulkhead? - it's beautiful.

If I've exceeded my allotment of polite questions - I apologize. Please don't ban me from the thread........:chair:

 

 

 

 

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Quote

 

Can't say enough good things about your work 'Nut. Especially your drawing skills with decal and 3D softwares. You raise this car to another level. But I can ask some questions because I notice particularly fine work and your skills provide leadership.

A. Both paint jobs; you say you used a 1:1 spray bomb for each but got a beautifully even gloss and 'thin' coat on the skin - especially evident on the louvers and nose . What helped you achieve that?

B. The semi-black on areas like the fenders especially nice. What brand was that?

C. Observation - both cars look terrific without clunky Tammy muffler hung on side. Are those little fours deafening with just an open header collector? Like mine?

D. Ever a thought to lower the chassis by cutting one coil from each spring unit?

E. Why headlights and fog lights on race cars? A class requirement?

F. What is black finish on floor and rear bulkhead? - it's beautiful.

If I've exceeded my allotment of polite questions - I apologize. Please don't ban me from the thread........

 

lol - don't be silly, happy to answer anything and waffle cars all day (or night, as it is 2am here - should really have caught up with you Codger when I was in NYC - oh well, next time! I'll try and answer some questions...

 

a) I sprayed the bodywork of both these cars back in 2003 - before I had an airbrush - using rattle cans from the local car autofactors in the UK, Halfords - matching the colour as close as I could by eye - I mustn't cock anything up and scratch the bodywork now, as I have no idea what colours I selected back then - I think the blue was an Audi colour....can't even remember if I used any clear on top. I need to add some clear over the red decal on the blue nose cone, as the decal is a bit crap (home made - long story) - but I am scared it may go wrong at this late stage!

b)  Tamiya acrylic, just regular black with some Tamiya clear coat on top - had to do it a few times as kept mucking it up - running, some cracking as I didn't wait long enough to clear coat - I'm a freaking amateur!!

c) As you can see below - I am now adding the clunky 'angus' mufflers! Matching the real race cars - each different of course - we use larger cans than 'normal' to keep the noise at a sensible level - trackdays often now have noise limits (98db usually) so as not to offend the people who bought houses on 'Graham Hill Drive' and then complain about the noise! - even with the bigger silencers they are still pretty loud - but not the same noise as the yank V8 - your car must sound incredible with your pipe - I doubt that would pass many regs here!! lol Never seen an exhaust that short on any Caterham - until just recently, where a mate has fitted a Ford Ecoboost with a turbo - turbo means much quieter exhaust, so it looks just like yours...

 

Have to say your car looks amazing....

d) Lower!?! My car has about 2" clearance under the sump - so no lol - you are probably looking at the gap above the front wheels before the wing - this is often because we all fit 13" wheels, the wings are designed to fit over up to 16" wheels, hence the gap - however, the wings are attached to the wishbones, so they move with the wheels - so no difference to ride height etc by lowering the wings (which you can do)

You really won't get a better handling car than a well-sorted Caterham.

Look - here is me spinning (just an excuse to post a vid :) ) - you will notice that I have different wings!!

 

 

 

e) Depends on the class - all but the top ones all seem to have headlights etc - as they can be driven on the road (and many are) - The yellow car as photographed was road legal - as was the yellow Radical that my friend also had...

f) Can't remember lol - probably also an auto can of satin black, as I had no airbrush back then....90% of any paint I now use is Tamiya acrylic though...

 

...open to any questions mate!! :)

 

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Exhausts:

 

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I drew up a selection of pipes for the exhaust system - printer had a fit in the first print so I ended up with a solid lump halfway up the pipes - be good for a space craft panel in the future!

 

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Re-setting the level of the printer plate solved the issue and I printed the pipes...

 

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Lots of trimming and sanding later, I had a 'kit' of parts.

 

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A slow process of offering the exhaust up to the car and cutting each pipe to size and length so it fitted through the skin - just as much of a pain as when you fit the 1:1 'real' pipes - believe me! But everything fitted together fairly well...

 

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Of course there are two of them.

 

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I added some details, such as exhaust clamps and tabs. I wanted to paint everything in one go, rather than add after - on the real exhaust everything is pretty much the same colour...

 

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Pretty chuffed how these came out - again the 3D printer saved a lot of work with trying to bend plastic tube - you still have to put the work in drawing the parts, and a lot of finishing...

 

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Primed and ready to paint...

 

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The holes on one can are for the rivets - fitted after painting.

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I am modelling these cars 'as-is' so the exhausts need to look like the 'used' ones on the real cars (see last post) - not all polished and shiny - although I would start at that point. 
I'm winging all this, but it has worked so far!

 

As I was going to use Alclad Chrome, I applied gloss black 'undercoat' - used to make the chrome shine - as it was, I ended up going over most of this, but it gave a suitable shiny 'under' surface - most of the pipes are oxidised and dirty. The cans are aluminium or titanium, so a different colour.

 

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The I basically free-formed the build up of colour using Alclad Chrome, duraluminum, pale gold etc etc - I mixed a few together to try and get the correct tint, with the aim of using oils later...

 

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I then mixed up some tamiya acylics to airbrush, dry brush and stipple on, to represent the cruddy look of the real pipes...

 

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I still need to add some washes and highlights, and I want to try some of that graphite powder to get back some of the metallic look - but overall I am actually quite chuffed how these came out, considering I didn't 'practice' and made it up as I went along!! 

Not fixed in place (have to make the mounts!!)....

 

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Not finished yet - add rivets and wash, more painting - but not bad so far!

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13 hours ago, caterhamnut said:

 

lol - don't be silly, happy to answer anything and waffle cars all day (or night, as it is 2am here - should really have caught up with you Codger when I was in NYC - oh well, next time! I'll try and answer some questions...We might have killed a few wine bottles...:devil:  See below:

 

a) I sprayed the bodywork of both these cars back in 2003 - before I had an airbrush - using rattle cans from the local car autofactors in the UK, Halfords - matching the colour as close as I could by eye - I mustn't cock anything up and scratch the bodywork now, as I have no idea what colours I selected back then - I think the blue was an Audi colour....can't even remember if I used any clear on top. I need to add some clear over the red decal on the blue nose cone, as the decal is a bit crap (home made - long story) - but I am scared it may go wrong at this late stage! It all layed-down remarkably well.

b)  Tamiya acrylic, just regular black with some Tamiya clear coat on top - had to do it a few times as kept mucking it up - running, some cracking as I didn't wait long enough to clear coat - I'm a freaking amateur!! :D

c) As you can see below - I am now adding the clunky 'angus' mufflers! Matching the real race cars - each different of course - we use larger cans than 'normal' to keep the noise at a sensible level - trackdays often now have noise limits (98db usually) so as not to offend the people who bought houses on 'Graham Hill Drive' and then complain about the noise! - even with the bigger silencers they are still pretty loud - but not the same noise as the yank V8 - your car must sound incredible with your pipe - I doubt that would pass many regs here!! lol Never seen an exhaust that short on any Caterham - until just recently, where a mate has fitted a Ford Ecoboost with a turbo - turbo means much quieter exhaust, so it looks just like yours...There are limits and regs here too. The drag strip was the only 'wild-and-wooly' place left to run just the collectors (105dB at 2500 RPM, heartstopping going to 6200) - although my full pipes were just tube-in-tube with no packing. Totally obnoxious and set off car alarms. The dyno determined the optimum collector length for mine, seen here. 550 was max with these.

 

Have to say your car looks amazing....:worthy:

d) Lower!?! My car has about 2" clearance under the sump - so no lol - you are probably looking at the gap above the front wheels before the wing - this is often because we all fit 13" wheels, the wings are designed to fit over up to 16" wheels, hence the gap - however, the wings are attached to the wishbones, so they move with the wheels - so no difference to ride height etc by lowering the wings (which you can do) Excellent explanation - appreciated. I have wondered why all the front cycle fenders end at or above the half way point of the tire.? Looks like they don't give stone protection being so short but look cool on the car.

You really won't get a better handling car than a well-sorted Caterham. Agreed - the vid gives smiles galore. The Cat seems like form-fitting garment and extension of your own body. The Cobra, being 1000 pounds heavier requires totally different techniques. But power-to-weight matches the hottest Cats - in mine anyway.

Look - here is me spinning (just an excuse to post a vid :) ) - you will notice that I have different wings!!

 

 

 

e) Depends on the class - all but the top ones all seem to have headlights etc - as they can be driven on the road (and many are) - The yellow car as photographed was road legal - as was the yellow Radical that my friend also had...

f) Can't remember lol - probably also an auto can of satin black, as I had no airbrush back then....90% of any paint I now use is Tamiya acrylic though...

 

...open to any questions mate!! :) Most kind of you to tolerate and answer my harassment. Wish I had built me a 1:1 of these too....

 

 

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More exhaust details - added the rivets!

 

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I used some graphite from a pencil to add back some of the metallic look in certain areas...

 

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I glued the exhaust in at the front end (2-part epoxy this time) in the engine bay - rear exhaust mounts would come later...

 

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Of course the second, blue car had a different exhaust mount, with an extra strengthening hanger - it is common for the rear exhaust mount to snap as it hold such a long length of pipe and silencer...

 

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The white plate is for behind the drivers seat - brass pipe is exhaust support...

 

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Next big job which I had put off was the 4 clear race screens. These are quite scrappy in real life - bent ali strip along the bottom, cut perspex screens. The only way to make these was exactly like the 'real' ones - so cut some acetate sheet, cut some ali sheet and rivet them together (glued) then rivet them to the cars...great!

 

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At this point I was trying to be clever with the clear screens - there is a very small lip at the top on the real cars - I figured I could make this by using a section cut from a water bottle - I reckon you could find any canopy, headlight cover or curved window 'somewhere' on some of these curvy bottles...anyway, I found my section - but when I came to cleaning up the edges I discovered that these bottles and laminated - 2 layers! Same thickness (as opposed to the graphic sleeve some use) - and these were separating - so I dumped that idea and went back to flat - the compound curve would have made bending the corners round much more difficult, so all ok...

 

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More rivets!

 

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Scary bit - I painted these cars back in 2003 - no idea what auto paint colour I used, so no touch up later!!

 

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I glued them onto the car, but used rivets to provide a mechanical join as well...

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At this point with the seatbelts and screens done, I could finally glue the cages in place!

 

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Another part of the cage that I had almost forgotten about was the drivers side-impact protection...

 

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Getting close now - all these little tiny 'quick' details take waaaaay longer than you think they will take...starting with the 28 poppers to fit to the boot covers. I painted plastic rivets and then cut just the heads off to stick directly to the 'rubber' covers. Pins would have also worked, but more of a pain to cut and glue...

 

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Some poppers on the scuttles...

 

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Noticed a small bracket on the yellow roll cage - so that had to go on, complete with cable ties!

 

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Rear number plate and light on the blue car...

 

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And front plate on the yellow...I had also added tape to the front and rear lights, as race cars tend to do...

 

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And.....FINISHED!!!!!! omg - only taken 17 years!! 


I'll take some 'proper' finished pictures at the weekend - but well chuffed with the results.

 

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8 hours ago, caterhamnut said:

- but well chuffed with the results.

 

….And so you should be, 'Nut. Both cars look stunning. Congrats on finally reaching the finish line.

I doff my cap in your direction, Sir.

 

Cheers, H

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An EPIC build Mr Nut.  Been following in the wings for all this time and have to say the end results of your hard work are clear to see, well done and thanks for sharing your work.  

 

Strange to think the build has taken this long that modelling has evolved during its build to incorporate 3D printing as a practical part of modern modelling.  I too have just bought an ANYCUBIC printer and your results are an inspiration.  Of the few prints I've done it seems the build plate requires leveling after every print, is that right?

 

Cheers

 

Doc 

Edited by Dr_Fester
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On 8/24/2019 at 10:13 AM, Dr_Fester said:

An EPIC build Mr Nut.  Been following in the wings for all this time and have to say the end results of your hard work are clear to see, well done and thanks for sharing your work.  

 

Strange to think the build has taken this long that modelling has evolved during its build to incorporate 3D printing as a practical part of modern modelling.  I too have just bought an ANYCUBIC printer and your results are an inspiration.  Of the few prints I've done it seems the build plate requires leveling after every print, is that right?

 

Cheers Doc - very much appreciated.

You are correct about modelling progression! The 3D printer opens up so many possibilities.

Even the internet has progressed! When I started I had no idea what accessories and detail bits were available - such as carbon decal sheet, tiny nuts and bolts etc - and I have learnt SO much from forums such as this...

 

In terms of the Anycubic - yes, I tend to level my plate with a piece of paper quite regularly, and have very very few issues. If I am sure that I have been able to remove the printed parts from the plate without moving it in any way (hold the plate itself when you scrape parts off, not the bracket/ball joint part) then I have not bothered re-setting and not had any issues.

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