Our letter build is well into the painting stage now. Jody and Anna made great headway, even if they are only 3 feet tall. We're doing the English and French version of the print ad, which means lots and lots of letters. I'm thinking I'll have to roll up my sleeves and pitch in tomorrow, they're coming along, but not quick enough. I would have liked to spray them, but were using a pretty heavy texture in the paint, and it doesn't like to flow through any of my paint guns!
Speaking of painting.....the rims for the toon racer got primed and painted their aluminum color. They look great. I still have to drill them out, but that'll come later.
I was bound and determined to get the spoilers done today as well! I cut all the plates out of 1/4" styrene. I thought about heat bending the airfoil on the rear of the car, but I didn't want to take the time to make any jigs to form it evenly. I opted to go for 4 ribs that would get clad in easy-bending .060" styrene. The ribs will slot into a rabbet on the sides that our Techno milled in.
The ribs will be on the underside, so it won't be a really big deal.
Here's the airdam slotted into the sides of the spoiler. This will be plenty strong once the solvent weld hardens up. I didn't get a picture of it mounted onto the car :( but it was a little intimidating drilling into the body of the car with all that super-awesome shiny it's got goin on!
The front spoiler was way more simple. I did actually heat bend the front one, as it's so big, I thought the ribs would be frustrating. I place the flat plate of 1/4" styrene over a piece of pipe, and heated it with the heat gun until it drooped over the pipe, then I quench cooled it to hold its shape. Nothing fancy with the side wings, just glued them to the ends, and put screws up through the bottom for extra strength. I shaped the angle of the mounting block by taping down some sand paper to the bent spoiler, and sanded it fairly quick. I have no idea what the angle was, so this solved the problem.
The finished piece got chem-welded and screwed with some #6 countersunk screws. You can see the clearance holes drilled for when I attach it to the car.
The final step was to add the "supports" for the fins. Just some 1/16" brass rod, bent to fit into the pre-drilled holes. A little CA glue and it was done.
I did primer spray all the parts, so tomorrow I hope to get the final paint and clear on these. I'm having my artist friend Karen Coombes come in tomorrow to sculpt the drivers upper body and arms from epoxy putty.
It's almost done, Nice!
8)
JWO
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