Monogram 1970 Buick GSX

[TonyW]

One from the tail end of the US Muscle Car era, Buicks mighty GSX by Monogram.

 

Buick had a bit of an old mans car image back in the sixties, with their massive Electra's more in peoples minds than the sporty stuff. Their intermediate range had a Chevelle/Le Mans sized fastback that had a so so tough image, the GS. For 1970 they pulled out all the stops though, with the incredible GSX. 455 cubic inches and a poke your eyes out paintjob made sure you saw and heard this one coming. Saturn Yellow or Apollo White were the only two colors available and both carried less than subtle stripe and hood blackout packages. The impact this car must have made at the time would be similar to Rover bringing out a bright yellow, vastly overpowered semi race car.

 

Monograms version pushes all the right buttons for me and is a pleasure to build. I've gone for Saturn Yellow, straight out of a rattle can. It took a few coats over Tamiya white primer to get good coverage but it's on now and hardening up for a good polish later.

 

The engine has been nearly finished, with starter, alternator and a few other bits yet to do. I'm undecided on fitting the motor or displaying it alongside the car. I find that the hood seldom fits well enough loose on any model vs gluing it tightly shut. That and the lack of accurate hinges that work hold me back here. A Dealer type display with the motor on a stand next to the car with the hood shut might work. A second car sat alongside with its hood open to show the motor would be a good compromise and would also give me an opportunity to build an Apollo White car. It would also double the cost of the build! The thought of a scale 1970 Buick Showroom display won't go away though.

 

The bumper and front end has had the yellow bits painted on around the lights and the first of a few black washes have gone on the grill. Tamiya orange has been added to the sidelight areas, the hood has been masked and the black areas added followed by the outline decals. The rear wing has also had its decals added. Everything went on well.

 

 

Wheels and tires next followed by the chassis and interior. The side stripes look to be a bit of a challenge, especially around the door handles but I'm looking forward to getting stuck in.

 

Tony.

Edited November 1, 2019 by TonyW

[TonyW]

I got a bit more done on the Buick today. Add todays efforts to a couple of hours work at my local model club on Wednesday evening and things have moved on quite nicely.

 

The wheels had their tiny centre cap badge decals applied and fixed with a dab of clear glue and the recessed areas painted black. They look very smart. The tires had their inner raised areas removed so I could fit the wheels deeper into the tire recess. I don't like a gap at the tire to wheel join.

 

The front and rear axle assemblies and the exhaust system were fitted, with the rear axle getting a couple of plastic card blocks fitted under the coil springs as it looked like the car would sit too low at the back straight out the box. Only a couple of  mm here, but it will make a difference to the sit of the car.

 

The side stripes are now fitted to the drivers side and as expected, they gave problems. I cut the strip into four pieces and started with the back bit, lining up the upswept bit with the rear wing location. That went well. The next piece ran into the door lock and handle and won't fit as Monogram provide. There's no way the decal would draw down around the door handle. I cut away the black inner area of the stripe, leaving just the pinstripe. Fitting was a bit fiddly but it eventually lined up. The next section was a reverse of that, lining up a cut and shut pair of pinstripes with the rear ones. The now missing black area around the door handle will need to be touched in. The front spear tip gave no problems although there is a very slight dip over the length of the whole stripe. It's slight enough for it to be bearable. A far better method would have been to cut off the door handle completely and do away with the need for cutting and slicing in that area. I should have thought of that before I painted the body. The stripes are still too long straight off the sheet but I could have picked an easier area to do the cutting, a door jam for instance. The handle could be hollowed out and refixed once the stripes are fitted.

 

 

A quick prop up to see how things look so far has me smiling.  It's more to check out the sit really and it looks right to me, very slightly raised at the rear. Straight out the box it would sit slightly tail down and that won't do on a Muscle Car!

 

 

The door mirrors and rear wing have both been drilled to take fixing pins, both need all the help they can get to stay fixed to the body.

 

 

More later.

 

Tony.

Edited November 1, 2019 by TonyW

[TonyW]

Further back in the thread I mention building another GSX and making a showroom type of display. Foolishly looking around the internet see's everything I need available. Hmmm... better hit that button!

Ordered yesterday, turned up this morning! Sometimes the Post Office are quite outstanding. The same seller on Ebay listed a GSX at what passes for a reasonable price these days, he also had some photoetch hood hinges. It was destiny I tell you.

 

 

This one will be in Apollo White and will have its hood open.  Both cars now need a showroom floor as well. I'll be having a think about how that can be done.

 

There's two sets of hinges in the set, hopefully that gives me two car lots rather than one set to learn on before getting it right on the actual car. I can also use this build to try out cutting the door handles off and running the side stripes in a more logical way. 

 

I'll add the second car to this thread and will make a start on Project Buick Dealer this week.

 

Tony.

Edited November 2, 2019 by TonyW

[TonyW]

The Saturn Yellow build moved forwards a bit and then promptly fell way back!  The culprit was a can of clear lacquer bought from Lidle. £3.99 looked a good deal for a big spray can and when I painted the Buick body with it I was very impressed indeed. The gloss was outstanding and it didn't shrink back either, it held its wet look. I left the car overnight to dry and when I came back to it I was less than amused to see tiny dark bits in the clear coat. A quick test on a bit of white card showed the clear to be contaminated! Not good. I've made a start on polishing the affected areas with T Cut to remove the clear. It's going to be a long job by the look of it. Curses.

 

To cheer me up a bit I made a couple of bases, not necessarily for the Buick, but it got tried out on them anyway. Both are picture frames, the wooden one got the glass area filled with a piece of MDF which then had railway scenic material added. The black and gold one had the glass removed from the frame, painted black and then mounted on top of the frame with the paint side down. A perfectly flat and glossy surface is the result and it suits car models just fine. The frame itself got spray painted gold.

 

 

 

[Pete in Lincs]

That looks very nice on both bases. Shame about the clear, hope it gets better.

[TonyW]

I've polished the roof so far, the rest will get done whenever the mood takes. It's such a shame as the gloss really is outstanding. I bought two cans, I'll try the second tomorrow and hope it's OK.

 

I made a third base, using railway scenic 'tarmac' that comes on a roll. It's far too big a grain for the intended 1.72 scale runways I wanted it for, but it looks pretty good as a 1.24 scale bit of road. The pictures I took were a bit out of focus though. I'll take a few more tomorrow and add them here.

[MR2Don]

Aha, T Cut. I've wondered about using it to polish out any orange peel, be interested in how you get on with it.

[TonyW]

Orange peel can be removed with very fine wet and dry paper, use the finest you can get away with. The paint needs to be properly dry. I got papers down to 7000 grit off the internet but 2000 is usually good enough. Flat off the orange peel, then finish with T cut or a really fine cutting compound like Farecla or 3M Ultrafine. A couple of applications of a decent wax after that and jobs done.

[Pete in Lincs]

Or just cheap toothpaste. It's an abrasive just the same as T cut. And your model will smell minty fresh too.

BTW, give the clear parts a polish with toothpaste anyway, they will sparkle.

[TonyW]

I'm not sure if this counts as forward progress or a step back, but here we go...

 

The second Buick has been sprayed in Gloss White for the Apollo White version. The paint on the body has gone on well, very glossy and with minimal orange peel needing attention. The hood has been a disaster! The gloss coat has reacted badly with the undercoat. I can't remember exactly, but I think the hood got a Tamiya white primer. Whatever I used didn't like the top coat though, it crazed like, er, crazy.

 

 

 

I've rubbed it back down and re- primered it in line for top coat tomorrow.

 

I'm not having a lot of luck with my model car painting at the moment, a '56 Chevy I was building for the 'Year I was born' GB failed on the paintwork. All kinds of problems stalled that build. After that one, this Buick is small change as far as paint problems go. I'm confident that all I'm dealing with is minor glitches. What could possibly go wrong?

 

Tony.
 

[JeroenS]

7 minutes ago, TonyW said:

What could possibly go wrong?

Famous last words! 🙂 

[TonyW]

A bit of progress on the Buick twins,

 

The White car has been painted, including the refinished hood. It's come out nice and glossy straight from the can although it needs flatting off and polishing once all the decals and a clear coat or two get applied.

 

The Yellow car has had some tire decals added, from Fireball Modelworks. This is the first time I've used these and I think they are brilliant! Easy to fit and perfectly readable, Polyglas GTs in this case. They really do finish the tires off nicely.

 

 

[Cooper645]

nice work on these, I'm sure for all your woes, these will be a pair of beauties when they're finished. 

I also really like the idea of this picture frame bases, would never have thought to use them. I may try one out with some mirror spray from a can (yes, that's a thing)

 

Coops