Tamiya McLaren Senna

[galaxyg]

I'm sure not even McLaren would claim this is an attractive car. However when I'd read that Tamiya were releasing this kit, I knew I'd buy one and build it within a reasonable time after getting it. In this instance, about 7 months later. Ugly as it may be from most angles*, it's undeniably an interesting car and an interesting model kit - Not only is it 21st century Tamiya at it's best, the construction is unlike anything else I'd built and I'd fancied a change. It's also my 101st build, something to celebrate - the start of a new century.  The Enzo I have in the stash looks a similar style of construction but - I've not built that yet.

 

Having looked at a lot of images of this car online, it does look a lot better (to me) when painted silver, and with less black than standard, so I'll likely make the roof T and roof intake silver as well. Some photos indicate this is a real-life option.  Accents (brake discs and a few parts under the lights for which I have no name but are shown as blue on the box cover, perhaps something else too - seats or belts maybe) will be orange. Papaya orange if I can make it, regular if not.  It might be an extreme car but it does not seem to suit extreme colours.

 

* facing an angle of 180 degrees from the direction of the car, it looks a lot better.

 

Onwards we go. It's a big box.

 

 

And there's a lot of parts in there.

 

 

What comprises the body, mostly.

 

 

I prefer to start with the engine, even if Tamiya have placed that at step number 27. 

 

 

The next 6 images are a succession of priming, painting, masking and more painting. There's a lot of semi-gloss black parts - many not shown.

 

 

(Below) The difference between aluminium (ends) and titanium silver (centre) is barely noticeable. And it'll be even less noticeable once hidden under all the bodywork.

 

 

(Below) Unpainted. This is both the cars endoskeleon and it's exoskeleton at the same time.  Painting calls for part of it to be semi-gloss black and part of it to be gloss black, for reason that become apparent when you see how much of it is visible in the final build.

 

 

And finally after a few hours one afternoon and a morning's spraying, masking and more spraying, I've got here. There's a fair bit more to it than that yet, but it's almost enough to start gluing things together.

 

Edited August 31, 2021 by galaxyg
fixed typo

[Spiny]

To tell the truth, I was expecting much less difference between the aluminium and titanium silver - makes it seem worthwhile having those options in Tamiya's paint line-up now.

 

Very quick progress to start off with, and looking very good too. But I have to admit that I don't envy you dealing with all those sharp edges which are just screaming 'burn through' when it comes to polishing!

[galaxyg]

29 minutes ago, Spiny said:

To tell the truth, I was expecting much less difference between the aluminium and titanium silver - makes it seem worthwhile having those options in Tamiya's paint line-up now.

 

Very quick progress to start off with, and looking very good too. But I have to admit that I don't envy you dealing with all those sharp edges which are just screaming 'burn through' when it comes to polishing!

 

Thanks.  One advantage of this kit's unusual construction means there's about 20 parts of bodywork instead of the usual all-panels-in-one-piece, so if I do burn through an edge, I only have to repaint that one piece of bodywork rather than the entire body / masked off parts of the body.

[galaxyg]

Masking and painting the inside floor mats.

 

 

Other chassis work

 

 

Radiator. Intended to be just semi gloss black like everything else, but I added some aluminium to give it a bit of texture and visibility.

 

 

More bits.

 

 

 

I've temporarily placed the black insert over the top of the engine - it later will get clued to the underside of the skeleton. In position now it shows how much of the engine is visible in the final assembly.

 

 

Not the time to do this yet but I tried them up against each other anyway. A shell of a car.

 

[Toftdale]

Great progress, the metallic shading looks particularly good - Andy 

[johnlambert]

It's not a car that I like but the kit looks really interesting and you're doing a great job with it.  Definitely a build to watch.

[galaxyg]

The dashboard is comprised of 14 parts (and 4 decals), some of which are shown painted below. I've already glued the two parts of the steering column before painting - the bit with the indicator stalks and the bit with the flappy paddles. Not shown but of note - the silver rings around the air vents are separate parts to allow easy painting. Like so many parts of the car the painting instructions call for black, matt black, semi gloss black and gloss black. And a bit of grey.  I'll be increasing the amount of grey to make some contrast but what's nice is that Tamiya have separated so many parts that if you wanted a more varied interior, you'd be able to do it with little or no masking.

 

 

Meanwhile, on the outside of the car there's about 20 or so parts that comprise the exterior. Some of them are shown here in silver but not yet clearcoated. More silver parts will go on pause until after the weekend as my can of Tamiya Mica Silver has run out and I need to buy some more.

 

[galaxyg]

The first piece of bodywork gets attached.

 

 

Assembling the rear wings, each wing is made of 5 parts.

 

 

They're not attached here, just balanced in place to see how it looks. It's certainly unusual.

 

 

Meanwhile in the interior... masking off the Matt Black in order to spray the Semi Gloss Black area.

 

[Tyas]

It really is an unusual car. Still remember the day I saw one in the flesh, I just can't believe how intricate those details are.

Also, now I really want to build another Senna (in an even more insane spec than my previous build) but I haven't even finished my NSX...

[galaxyg]

These are all the McLaren orange parts - using Mr Hobby Orange-Yellow.

 

 

 

 

Completed brakes. And the discs do rotate as Tamiya intended.

 

 

Installed into chassis.

 

 

[Toftdale]

The brakes look great, judging by the box art the wheels are open enough to still see the detail when completed.   I must admit when I first saw the official Tamiya photos of the completed kit I thought it looked a bit toy like, so I wasn't interested,  however now watching your thread I am running out of reasons not to by one 😅 

[galaxyg]

 

Each door is 4 parts plus one decal for the speakers.

 

[Alan R]

Nice looking build. I am much inclined to add this to my stash...

 

Cheers,

Alan.

[galaxyg]

These orange aero parts are tricky to install. It's not that they don't fit, they just don't easily stay where you've put them. The smaller ones (the lower ones in the photo) probably too me about 15 attempts for each. Certainly it'd be a mess to attempt this with regular model glue already on the part, you'd just end up with it all over the place, paintwork, etc. I've got them all in place and then used a few blobs of PVA instead.

 

 

Now I've added the light sub-assemblies (6 parts per side), it's starting to resemble a car.

 

[galaxyg]

The silver T-bar section on the roof acts as a clamp for the windscreen and the two glass panels on the roof, meaning no glue is needed for this glass.

 

 

Yet another sub-assembly finished: The dashboard. The photo as quite a lot of grain in it as was taken in less light that I'd have liked.

 

 

Making seatbelt material. Masking tape put onto a suitable low-adhesive background (Hotel Chocolat wrapper!) then sprayed once with orange and once with yellow. Adding seatbelts and retainers are the only additions I'll make to what's in the box. Except *perhaps* a custom number plate.  With all the hidden details in this kit, it's amazing it didn't just include the very non-hidden seatbelt retainers. I don't know what kit manufacturers have against them - never found a kit yet with them.

 

 

 

Fortunately the as-yet unthreaded seatbelts have the holes already opened in Tamiya's mould. Also added are two seatbelt retains which shortly get a dab of red paint.

 

 

Finally many sub-assemblies come together in the completed inner body. Minus the wheel arches which I'll add now the photos are done. I've taken some better photos at this point as the inner body is as much a completed model in itself as the entire car will be.

 

[Toftdale]

Yep, I like this alot and your photos are very smart to - Andy 

[Windy37]

There’s some great detail. Like your seatbelt idea , I use electricians tape , which is smooth , but masking tape has a fabric feel to it , like the real thing . Might borrow that idea next time I do a car without seatbelt ribbon provided . 
 Gary . 

[Vesa Jussila]

Real nice build and good progress. And looks it's nice kit. But I need to say that this is not most beautiful car in the world...

[galaxyg]

The long black thin side panels clamp some glass in place, but they are fiddly to install.

 

 

Nose goes on.

 

 

I've added the rear wheel arches - the front ones are part of the upper body, and added the wheels. Centre lock wheel nuts are separate parts so easy to paint first and the McLaren decals for the centres are attached in place with a bit of thinned PVA. Like so many parts on this kit, the wheel nuts were just itching to twang off the tweezers and into the mouth of the carpet monster. One did, but I found it, but of course it landed black side up not orange side up.

 

 

Some idea of what the completed kit will look like, body panels placed roughly in position. It's been three weeks to this point but it feels like a lot of work.

 

[Spiny]

That's very fast progress to be so advanced after just 3 weeks. This one is coming together nicely.

[galaxyg]

Annoyingly the clearcoat has pooled in the corner of the doors, and created a line/ridge.

 

 

Some sanding and priming to get things back to normal.

 

 

The front wings are now in place. They are fiddly and don't have a lot of glue contact points; the entire front end of the car requires more thought and test fitting than the rear. So far anyway.  Mine is imperfect because of a mistake I'd made in the angle of the V shaped silver part right below the 3rd white circles wing joint, but it's nothing major. The fit of this area from how the car is moulded is I'm sure as perfect as the rest of the kit, but it's something to be learned rather than just dropping together.

 

 

Meanwhile underneath the car, the two Titanium silver panels are in place. There's another 6 black panels yet to go on there but at least the car's underbody is not just one flat and boring entirely semi-gloss-black piece.

 

 

The Front of the car get's the little "bonnet" thing down the middle. Most but not all Senna's have this as semi gloss black, but having seen photos of some real life examples like this, I think it looks better on body colour. 

 

 

Rear wing is assembled. Like several other parts, this has more silver than the original instructions intended and indeed evidence can be found for this on real-life versions too.  In theory only the end plates here should be silver if I follow the instructions.

 

 

Test fitting the rear wing.

 

[Mpfiend]

Really nice progress on this build.

Thats a really useful set of photographs and descriptions you have there for anyone who is building this kit.

I'm looking forward to seeing more.

 

Regards

Keith.

[FunkyChiken]

Well I think it is a beautiful car, not as attractive as a ferrari fxx k, but a stunning piece of engineering artwork none the less, and your super clean build is amazing, can't wait for the finished product! 

[Malc2]

This is looking really good, I also cant believe there is not a spec of dust to be seen!

Modern plastics are amazing.

There is a guy on youtube repairing a crashed 720s and I cant believe how complicated the body panel shapes are.

 

Malc.

[galaxyg]

15 minutes ago, Malc2 said:

This is looking really good, I also cant believe there is not a spec of dust to be seen!

 

Thanks. The dust all been mysteriously attracted to the Toyota Celica I completed not long ago, it seems a magnet for the stuff.