The F1M Forums

Excellent work as you can see so far. I started the Williams this year and closed the monocoque today. For the dashboard there are two more decals for the switches on the original decal sheet. Number 39&40 on page 11. I almost missed them as they don't show up well on the decal sheet. A tip for the zip ties, burn them out briefly with a lighter. Then they are much easier to bend into shape. Will continue to follow your report. Great what you are doing. Maybe I'll show you some pictures of my 14B.

I got these from Michael (not Mike) at Indycals Decals. I had some trouble with the original Tamiya set because of their age. The few that I've used so far have worked really well and I am very happy with them.

Seema wrote: ↑Thu Feb 24, 2022 4:32 pm Excellent work as you can see so far. I started the Williams this year and closed the monocoque today. For the dashboard there are two more decals for the switches on the original decal sheet. Number 39&40 on page 11. I almost missed them as they don't show up well on the decal sheet. A tip for the zip ties, burn them out briefly with a lighter. Then they are much easier to bend into shape. Will continue to follow your report. Great what you are doing. Maybe I'll show you some pictures of my 14B.

You're right, I went back and checked and I missed them both. When you're using the Top Studio kits, you have to keep going back and forth between instruction sets. There have been a number of things I've almost missed because I've been concentrating on the Top Studio instructions. #'s 39 + 40 are on the Indycals sheets, but most of the decals don't have the corresponding Tamiya number printed next to them. Finding them is like my typing, hunt and peck.

Wiring is a nightmare to me, takes hours and hours like nothing. Your work is looking good so far, but i would have replaced the grey-blue Top Studio braided lines against real blue ones, don`t know why TS put in the wrong color for that. They call to paint them, but there is matching stuff on ebay around to replace it in royal blue.
Before glueing parts into position it is allways good to check both building instructions a couple of times if there is other stuff in this area to be done.

I use Shunko decals on mine. The blue from Zero-Paint set fits almost exactly. If you don't use the two small decals, that's no problem either. When the cockpit is closed, you can no longer see them. You can make some mistakes in the build order. I attached the frontshot and forgot the steering column. I had to remove the universal joint to slide them in. As long as you can fix it without damaging it, you're just wasting a lot of time learning for next time. Make sure that you glue the cockpit shot well and firmly and check that the wishbones can be inserted correctly. Otherwise you have too much ground clearance. Had to reset it after painting. You underestimate the thickness of the paint layer. Primer, base coat and clear coat can cause mismatch.

I was able to add the two missing decals for the switches without destroying anything. It helped that I hadn't installed the cockpit yet. I had some trouble with the seat belts. The ribbon seems to be very stiff and doesn't fall like a regular seat belt. It's the first time I've ever done seatbelts, so I'm not sure if it's me or the material. Using CA glue on the ribbon didn't help with the stiffness. Now I just have to install it and start on the front suspension. After the 30 cm of snow we got this week, I'm not making a lot of trips to the lake yet.

The cockpit looks very nice. The strap material is not easy to lay down. I used diluted wood glue for this. I paint the belt and then lay it out the way it should be. After it hardens, it stays that way. A small drop of CA on the belt buckle secures everything at the end.

Progress of a sort. Tamiya upper and lower A-arms and all the resin bits from the Top Studio Front Dampers and Chassis Front Bulkhead kit, primed and ready for paint. The other pic is the photo etch, hoses etc. and itsy bitsy swear inducing parts for the kit.

Hi, I've been busy with everything except for the FW14-B. Still, I have accomplished a little. I keep telling myself I need to work on this, then, "OOOOH SQUIRREL!!!!!" and I'm off running in a different direction. I absolutely love the Top Studio kits. The itsy bitsy tiny parts make me nuts when they pop out of the tweezers cuz the CA is drying, but the end result is worth it. Here's the latest updates, and Have A Happy New Year. May everything go in an upwards direction.

I've been in and out of the city this winter, so building has been slow. I also had a setback when I decided I should have used the white primer on the engine cover and the upper body parts from the nose. I'd sprayed the black on the bottoms, and some of the blue on the uppers. When I started on the yellow, it just didn't look right with the light grey primer under it. Spent a little quality time with some Isopropyl Alcohol, SuperClean and a pot scrubber. The Tamiya primer thumbs it's nose at the Isopropyl and the SuperClean. A green pot scrubber fixed that little discussion. Today I got more work done on the connectors and the hydraulic bottles. Those pictures will show up soon. really, I promise.