1967 Impala: It's Blue!

Alright, so let me run this down for you real quick. When I first got into building model cars it was due to the LowRider scene. I actually only completed one and the rest were either not done or turned into hoppers/dancers....So lets fast forward to 2012 and I'm at it again. Back to basics I guess.

I am using AMT's 67 Impala Super Sport. It's the "street machine" series with the bright yellow car on the box art. It's a pretty nice kit. Nicely detailed frame, chassis and interior. The only down side was the body details, the window trim was pretty much not there and some flaws on the body lines made it soft. The panel lines needed to be deepened to not lose them in the painting process. I spent about 10 hours on the body alone. Plenty of sanding and trimming, then some more sanding and well, trimming. After all that I primered it with some duplicolor sandable primer to find the scratches. After some more sanding I threw on some Tamiya fine gray primer and it was ready for some real paint. I used Testors one coat De Ja Blue and wet clear gloss right before we got rain, perfect timing. The hood on the other hand, well it's back to square one. I removed the putty that was in the rectangle shaped vent. It wasnt holding up well, it kept cracking. So I am going to fill it in with some styrene, should do the trick. The suspension is set up to be raked up on the front side. The rear is dialed in, but the front required a bit more work. I ended up making some tubular style upper control arms and adding a bit more length to the bottom control arm. I'ts not done, but ya kinda get the idea.

I hope to have more done tonight on the other Projects. You can see my MarkII and Celica peeking in that last pic.

Thanks for stopping by.

Shakotan Celica XX: WIP's

Aaaahhh, Cali. You gotta love it at times. The sun, ocasional rain, snow in the mountains, the girls and days like today make you wish that the sun part will be around. But nooooo it's 8:30am and its foggy, gloomy and no sign of the sun yet. Not only that, but it's suppose to rain tonight! Your probably thinking, "WTF does that have to do with your Celica build??" Well for one, can't paint! It's do damn cold and humid and second, my sinus' are kicking my ass today so I officially am not enjoying the day in more than one way.

Now onto my builds, oh did I say builds?? yup, that plural. I'm currently working on 3 builds, 2 of which I'm hoping to finish for the Citrus Nationals in Riverside on May 19th. But if I keep getting days like this, I will have to enter them as WIP's.

The first one is Aoshima's Toyota Celica XX Garuchan seires. It comes with a lowered stance and some of their Kai series wheels that gives this on a semi shakotan look. I bought this kit back on 2001 at my LHS with the intentions of only using the wheels for another project I had going at the time...haha, I know I'm not the only one that does it..As of a month ago I decided to start on it. Out of the box the stance is not so low and the wheels stick out more than I like. Even if that was the intention of this kit, I personally didn't want it. So I filed away at the inner wheels arches and "rolled" the fender lips. I also lowered it some more to my liking. I started to prep the body for primer by sanding away any mold lines, deepened the panel lines and sanded the body down for the primer to grab onto it. I chose to use Aoshima's Techno Shadows wheels with Hippari tires instead of the kits SSR MKII's, well because I used them on my Shakotan 280ZX already...haha. Next, was the option to use a star shaped exhaust that comes in the new Aoshima "extra posie" sets. They are pretty much bosozoku parts and wheels in a bag.

The 2nd one is a 1967 Impala Lowrider. Hmmmm, something different, something that originally got me back into the hobby some 15 years ago. Even though I have only built one Lowrider and tinkered with a few others at the tender age of 16, I still consider this one my 2nd Lowrider build. I chose this body year do to it curves and aggressive looking front end. It's the Super Sport edition as well, so it's got some balls under the hood and I'm keeping it that way. I using AMT's Street Machine series, it has some pretty good details. Seperate frame and chassis, suspension components are not molded into the chassis and the engine is nicely detailed with some nice extra goodies. There are some down sides to the kit that I ran into and trying my best to fix. First was the bodies panels lines and details around the windows. The panel lines were deepend, one had to be made by the rear window and trunk lid, or else it would look like a lift back Impala. Around the window trims, the body was trimmed down a bit so they can stand out and not get lost when the paint goes one. The hood had some gaps all around, so styrene strips where added to fill that in enough to a more resonable gap. I decieded that I want the front end in a raked up pose, so the rear was dropped as far as possible and the front end was brought up. The front end had to be reworked in order to go in the up position. I made some tubular style A-arms and added a bit of round stock to the lower control arms to pivot them in position. I'll have to take pics of that, just noticed that I didn't do so. I went with Pegasus "D" wheels with their new stretched look tires with thin white walls. As for paint, I'll be using Testors De Ja Blue and Wet look clear gloss. Should be nice.

The 3rd one is a Toyota MarkII for an online forum contest, Stance Wars. I have absolutely no actual progress on this one. It does need work to fit the bumpers on correctly, but it's gonna be bitchin. Slammed stance and some deep offset wheels is always sexy. I am using Aoshima's Welds D1 kit. don't let the cover fool you either as it doesn't come with any D1 interior parts. Yup no gutted interior, no roll cage, hell not even the correct seats to make a replica Weld MarkII drift car. It's all cosmetic, wheels, body kit and decals give it the look of the D1 car. I have chosen to not use the decals from the kit, I'll be saving them for something else. I'm not using the wheels it comes with, I'm not even using the ones in the pictures...It's going to be a slow progress as I'm concetrating on the first 2 builds at the moment.

Here are the pics, I know FINALLY!

Thanks for stopping by. Hopefully I can have some more updates soon.

Flushed Civic EA

With the reissue of Tamiya's Honda Civic EA, there has been several great looking builds. This is one of them. SPC forum member Win'th from Thailand has tackled this kit and added some extra flare. He cut open the hood and added a B16 with a snail big enough to swallow a baby bird. He kept the engine bay as clean and simple as possible as it is done on real project cars. Scratchbuilt intake manifold and charge pipes are just a few details that have been added. A rusty hood covers up the beastly little engine while the rest of the body is done up in white and a baby blue front lip spoiler to catch the attention of the front mount intercooler. It's rocking the ever loving BBS RS wheels with some low pro tires and some negative camber to tuck them into the wheel wells. For the interior you can notice that it has some bucket seats and a hatch bar, but thats all you get to see for the interior. Under in the rear suspension you get a peek at some aftermarket control arms and the subtle camber affect.

"model Tamiya civic ea
custom [resin] engine b16a turbo
colour type R
wheel [resin] bbs
craft square [resin]
Flush style
enjoy..."

All pics were taken by win'th


So there you have it, thanks for stopping by.

Model Scientists Forum, Come Join Us...

Hello everyone, I just wanted to anounce the launch of a new forum. I you are familiar with the Facebook page, now you can join us on the forum.

http://modelscientistsforums.ipbhost.com/

If your a fan of the JDM culture, there will be plenty of it, But we are not just a J-tin community. All types of model builders are welcomed.

The Low Down MK2, Another Commisioned Build..

As I said before Raess has been working on a few comissioned builds and heres another one. this time around its a Golf MK2. slammed down to the ground, so that makes it 2 low down ground scrappers.
this one is a more subtle look to it. porsche mesh wheels get this one rolling around, it's different from the MK1 trio he finish up earlier.

So far this make it 3 MK1's and 1 MK2, all he has left of comissioned builds are a Honda Prelude and a Beetle. I'm sure he would be happy to get those out of his hair soon.

"Another commission build . this was done during the mk1 builds so this progress was a bit slower. none the less it is finally done. This is the second lowest car iv done after the kpgc10 skyline"

Specs of the Low Down:

Kit: Fujimi vw mk2

Tamiya light tan with 2k clear

Ferrari seats

Porsche mesh wheels

 All pics belong to Raees Amien


Thanks for stopping by.

Lower Than Shakotan?? "Godzilla Is Here"

Holy shit this thing is low! The shakotan style is low, but I think this is an all new "low" for Raees. he built this Hakosuka so low that the exhaust is pretty much non-exsistent(see those little things peeking out of the side), it's grungy, dirty, and damn right sexy.

The body has been weathered, it adornes torn decals as a sign of age, classic front mounted oil cooler and race configuration spoiler, flares and head light covers gives it a vintage race track menace appeal. the interior shares the same grunge as the outside, sporting only one seat for the driver, vintage 3 point roll cage, race style gutting, kevlar dash pad and some wethering on the sheet metal. sorry ladies, this is a single mans car..haha it's rolling stock are a set of SSR MKII's with blue faces to match the decals on the hood, they wraped in some hippari style tires(stretched) to clear the race fender flares. it has all the markings of a highway reflector killer and well speed bumps are not an option with this one.

Enjoy.

"So i decided to take a bit of a break from all the commision builds to finish my skyline. this is probably may favourite build. it was really fun trying new techniques. the results i am very happy bwith

"Godzilla's" Specs:

Fujimi takahashi kpgc10 racer

Aoshima SSR MK2 wheels

Aoshima nostalgic seat

Kevlar dash with 'stolen gauge'

Custom weatherd bonnet

Custom damaged exhaust

Colour is a mixture of tamiya silver, chrome powder, weathering set and acrylic paints"

Here chillin with the homies and the sexy silver 510..

All pics are taken by Raees Amien.

Thanks for stopping by.

2012 Spot Light Teaser...

2012 is coming right around the corner. whats in store for me hobby wise??? well I hope to get some more building done, come out with a line of tires of my own design for scaled kits and well, just get some building done..lols

Here's a small teaser of a spot light im looking forward to doing in 2012.

Im looking forward to doing this feature. the good man Raees will be snapping some pics of that menacing looking beauty chilling in the dark corner.

Until then, happy building and thanks for looking

Commissind Build, Well half built...By Raess.

Raees has taken in some interesting projects. he has had some people ask hime to build models for them. some box stock with a couple of mods and maybe one of their real car. this Revell 510 was only half built by Raees. the other half to be completed by the customer, which to be honest with you can make or break this already fantastic looking build.

He has painted and built the interior, chassis and engine. he also added some details like spark plug wires, some weathering on the chassis and the small details in the interior. the wheels are aoshima SSR MKIII's on some super low profile tires with a stance that looks quit menacing.

Well, I can only hope the customer lays down a nice paint job. if possible, I might be able to have an update on that once it happens.

Thanks for looking.