Tamiya Lotus 25 1:20 F1 1963 Monza

[Flying Badger]

Lotus Coventry Climax Type 25 as raced at the 1963 Italian Grand Prix in Monza (round 7 of 10) where Jim Clarke won enough points to be clinch the driver's championship title.

 

 

My first car build in 35 years!

This is the first in a series of builds of the cars of the Formula One drivers championship winners from 1950 onwards. 

Built almost entirely OOB except for the mesh engine trumpet cover.

Paints are a combination of Tamiya spray cans, Tamiya acrylics and Alclad II lacquer metallic

 

 

 

 

 

 

WIP thread: 

 

[klubman01]

That has turned out nicely.  great work, well done.

Trevor

[Vesa Jussila]

Looks really good. Nice old school formula. I am waiting your next project.

[Flying Badger]

3 hours ago, Vesa Jussila said:

 I am waiting your next project.

Thanks. I'll be coming back to this period with the 1965 Lotus type 33 at some point (the 33 was only a minor upgrade of the 25).

 

Before that I've already started on the next car over in the WIP sub forum. Its a 1978 Lotus type 79 JPS. 

A lot more detail and small parts to deal with in the 79 compared to the 25, spent all evening removing them from the sprues and sorting them by main colour ready for primer and paint.

 

FB

[keefr22]

That's just lovely - your paintwork is excellent (probably better that Lotus' was back then!)  Top job! 

 

Keith

[Flying Badger]

13 minutes ago, keefr22 said:

That's just lovely - your paintwork is excellent (probably better that Lotus' was back then!)  Top job! 

Thanks! I bought the three different grades of Tamiya polishing compounds and tried them for the first time on this build.

Not sure why I have never tried them before as they really work well to get a lovely smooth gloss to the clear top coat.

 

They don't take much work either and the course grade does most of the work. Only took perhaps 20min to polish this up to a lovely shine. I washed the excess off with water as the polish gets in the nooks and crannies, but it washes off easily.

 

FB

[dnl42]

That looks amazing! 

[desert falcon]

Stunning 😍

[Redstaff]

Really nice, well done  

The finish on the green is superb 

[Flying Badger]

24 minutes ago, Redstaff said:

Really nice, well done  

The finish on the green is superb 

Thanks. 

Its Tamiya spray can TS-43, but I decanted it and sprayed lots of thinner coats with my airbrush. Polished the last coat with the Tamiya polishing compounds, washed it, applied the decals then top coated it with several thin coats of X-22 before polishing it all again. Sounds a lot but it was fairly simple to do. 

[Malc2]

Looks great!

 

Malc.

[Neddy]

As has already been said - stunning.  Lovely finish and attention to detail.  Old school kit modelling maybe but that's the way I like it.  It is also tempting me to go the same route - 1:20th scale classic F1 car building.  Many decades ago I built an F1 Honda in 1:12th scale (can't remember if it was Tamiya or Monogram) but the result was good and the build one of the most enjoyable.