Tamiya Ford Sierra RS500 Labatt’s

[Ben_B]

I’ve been wanting one of these kits for years, but they’ve been going for stupid money on eBay. I think the cheapest I’ve seen lately have been in the $90-$100 range. Last month, one showed up for 50. By the last couple of hours, nobody had bid on it, so I did and won! The kit included a set of SK decals with a resin right-hand-drive dashboard (worth ~$20), too.

I got it primed this week and put the first few coats of Labatt’s Blue from Gravity Colors today. Their paint dries pretty flat, so I’ll have to wet sand it and give it a gloss coat before decals. I still have to paint the inside of the body and touch up some spots in the cockpit where I removed the seat mounts from the left side. There are a couple of small details that I’m going to ignore. The real car had cutouts in both front fenders for the air jack and emergency shutoff switches. The roll cage is also simplified. I’m building this as part of another group build on the Grassroots Motorsports forum, so I don’t want to go down any rabbit holes with it.



I had some weird results with Gravity’s primer. As it dried, it’s started cracking like a dry lake bed. I’ve seen this happen when someone sprays a coat of paint over a base coat before the underlying paint has fully cured, but never on bare plastic. I had the same thing happen on a Hasegawa kit, too, but primer from the same bottle didn’t give me any problems when I used it on my Revell Ford GT Le Mans. Can these primers go bad over the course of a year or so? Most lacquers I’ve used seem to last forever if the bottles are properly sealed.

Ben

[afx]

This is a great kit for what is included. I know you will do great job with it Ben.

[arcticwolf]

I like it. I've always wanted to do that car, maybe as a Merkur. Looking forward to this.

[Joel_W]

Ben,
1st off, glad you finally got the kit you've been looking for at a decent price. I do wonder why Tamiya hasn't re-released it as yet?

As for the Gravity paint issues, I've tried their primer, Scale Finish's Primer, and MCW's primer, all are pure lacquer based, all are way to thin to do the various functions of a primer, and as a result you need several lite coats but all had issues. In short, I tossed out every single bottle which got kind of expensive since I bought two of each. My go to primers are either Tamiya Gray, White, or Gray/White thinned with Mr. Color's Leveling #400 Thinner 1:1, or Mr. Color's 1500 line of Black and Gray thinned with their Leveling #400 thinner 1:1. I found the best method is just lite even coats with 3-5 min between coats. Lite sanding with Tamiya 3000 sponge leaves it smooth enough for the Gravity paint. I've never had a single issue to date.

All the pre-thinned lacquer paints I just AB in lite even coats, and depending on the color can go with 3-6 coats. 2 days to dry and cure, then 6-8000 Micro Mesh emery cloth wet, and the surface is more then smooth enough to decal on without needing a gloss surface.

Can you rub out the problem areas and repaint without having to strip and start over again?

joel

[Ben_B]

Thanks, guys!

Joel, yes, Tamiya really does need to reissue this kit, along with the Mazda 767b. 

The paint actually worked well, it just went down flat because it's a base coat. In the past, the only problems I've had with Gravity Colors and Splash Paints were self-induced. They would sometimes go through the Tamiya primer and actually craze the plastic, but that was me putting too much paint down at once. This color required a dark primer, so I went with Gravity's primer. I switched to Mr Color 1500 primers several kits back after you recommended them. I've always liked Tamiya's, it's just a pain to decant it and my local shop doesn't carry their bottled primers. 

It only took a few minutes wet sanding with some 8000 Micro Mesh to smooth the paint out. I'm still going to give it one more coat (probably a mistake!) when I paint the inside of the body this week and then it will be ready for decals. 

Ben

[Joel_W]

Ben,
Actually, I'd love to see Tamiya doing a few reissues every year including the earlier Ebbro kits that I was just to lazy to buy when they came out figuring that they would be around for years and years. Another lessen I learned the hard way.

From what I've been told by Gravity and Scale Finishes is that the paint is actually the same pigment and thinner as used on the real cars. Some how I've taken that with a grain of Salt as I'm thinking that it's paint bought from the same sources as local body shops as it comes in Qts not gallon cans. Today's auto paints are indeed Matt as they don't have any glossing agent, that's one of the jobs for the Urethane finish.

As long as the color coat is smooth, consistent, and no burn through in the corners or raised spots, why apply another coat that you'll had to polish out to get ready for decaling?

Joel

[Ben_B]

Yeah, I don't need to be making more work for myself! Plus, I'm on a deadline with the group build I'm building this for. The paint polished out well enough for decals, and the Mr Color clear gloss does a great job of smoothing out any roughness I might miss.

Ben

[Ben_B]

Started the decals. As usual, SK Decals perform flawlessly. I'm waiting for the Solvaset to soften the stripes enough to press them into the door handles.


Ben

[Ben_B]

Finished the decals. Just need to clear coat the body and paint the window trim. I screwed up and got the "Please" too far back, so there was no room for the emergency cutoff decals. The decals are old and brittle, so I didn't try to lift the "Please" decal with Micro Set and move it. The L had already started to flake off after it dried, so I didn't want to cause more problems. This model won't be leaving the house, anyway. The chassis and cockpit are all painted and just need to be put together, so progress!


Ben

[afx]

Coming along nicely Ben.

[Joel_W]

Ben,
The decaling came out your usual super high standard for sure as the finished body looks great.

Joel

[Ben_B]

Finished the kit last week, but haven't taken any pics other than these quick ones. It's a simple, fun kit. All of the problems I had were self-induced, except for the brittle decals. Probably due to age or improper storage, since I've never had any problems before with SK decals. The "Please" decal needed to go farther forward to make room for the emergency shutoff decals, but the underlying white decal was too narrow. You can also see where the top of the L flaked off and was lost. I've since painted the rear hatch tie downs and fixed the trim around the rear window.





Ben

[afx]

Turned out great Ben.

[ShawnS]

Nice work Ben. Well done.

[mustang1989]

Jan 13, 2022 12:43:20 GMT -8 ShawnS said:

Nice work Ben. Well done.

 X 2!!!!! Very well built, painted and decaled up Ben!!!