Post by jpeeler on Jul 25, 2017 19:49:39 GMT -5
This is a project I'd been wanting to do for a really long time. After I got Janet Guthrie's memoir A Life at Full Throttle more than a decade ago and saw the picture of her with the Celica she raced in the '70s, I bought a Hasegawa Celica kit and designed artwork for Janet's car. I paired the artwork with decals for the "Texaco Star" Monte Carlo she raced in the 1980 Daytona 500 and a buddy of mine in the ALPS printing business printed a few and sold them. I kept a few sheets for myself against the day I'd finally build the Celica.
For whatever reason I never got the Celica built - afraid of messing it up, I guess. A few weeks ago I decided "enough" and started the project...only to find out it wasn't as cut-and-dried a project as I'd initially imagined. The more I looked at it, the more I saw I had to do: modify the kit roll cage, backdate the front grille, alter the stance, flare the fenders a little...every look at the references showed one more thing I needed to do. Worse, some other areas had to be guessed at - although the car still exists (and is still competing in races!) there are differences between how it looks now and how it looked when Janet raced it, and there are other areas that aren't as well documented as I'd like. In some areas I split the difference, or just didn't feel like reconfiguring some things (hence the stock muffler configuration...I know, it sticks out like a sore thumb, but I wanted the project done). Fortunately, the Hasegawa kit provides a decent set of Minilite-style wheels and suitable tires and enough racing parts to take you much of the way.
The decal film did not age well; several decals fractured as I applied them, and the lettering on the front fender is printed a little out of registration. I also found out some of the artwork is about 15% underscale! But since I don't have an ALPS-style printer, it'll have to do. The body is painted in Tamiya Light Blue and Racing White from spray cans. All other paint comes from various types of acrylics, airbrushed or hand-painted as need be. There are flubs here and there I should fix, and I still need to make a period-spec window net, but otherwise the project's as done as it's gonna be.
Anyway, I am happy to have it on the shelf, and even with the things that didn't quite work out it is a nifty little model of a neat-looking car. Hope you'll enjoy having a look.
Jodie Peeler
For whatever reason I never got the Celica built - afraid of messing it up, I guess. A few weeks ago I decided "enough" and started the project...only to find out it wasn't as cut-and-dried a project as I'd initially imagined. The more I looked at it, the more I saw I had to do: modify the kit roll cage, backdate the front grille, alter the stance, flare the fenders a little...every look at the references showed one more thing I needed to do. Worse, some other areas had to be guessed at - although the car still exists (and is still competing in races!) there are differences between how it looks now and how it looked when Janet raced it, and there are other areas that aren't as well documented as I'd like. In some areas I split the difference, or just didn't feel like reconfiguring some things (hence the stock muffler configuration...I know, it sticks out like a sore thumb, but I wanted the project done). Fortunately, the Hasegawa kit provides a decent set of Minilite-style wheels and suitable tires and enough racing parts to take you much of the way.
The decal film did not age well; several decals fractured as I applied them, and the lettering on the front fender is printed a little out of registration. I also found out some of the artwork is about 15% underscale! But since I don't have an ALPS-style printer, it'll have to do. The body is painted in Tamiya Light Blue and Racing White from spray cans. All other paint comes from various types of acrylics, airbrushed or hand-painted as need be. There are flubs here and there I should fix, and I still need to make a period-spec window net, but otherwise the project's as done as it's gonna be.
Anyway, I am happy to have it on the shelf, and even with the things that didn't quite work out it is a nifty little model of a neat-looking car. Hope you'll enjoy having a look.
Jodie Peeler
Pro Tech | MAD | Scale Motorsport
