Scorchio

I like the sound of that, thanks for the info!

Took all of the vintage BW SS tyres off the Parma chromes and replaced the with ReRe tyres now its finally on display. The original tyre spent a few years in a basement that became damp. They're now feeling very dry and brittle so bagging them up and storing them away until I can figure out what to do with them.

Winter is here and I'm done! Since my last post I have painted the interior with an "approximation" of a beetle interior freehand, but it looks ok through the windows. Saving full shots for showroom entry (which would have been last the weekend, if not the micro surgery that follows) The auction listing contained the following helpful photo (I've cropped it) and I knew this would be trouble, but the bracket was there and complete so I was up for the challenge. The broken tab was held on by nothing but chrome plating, and low and behold the bracket would not just slide back in. Only one thing for it then, carefully split the mirror, and obviously the tab fell off in the process. I could see it was over glued with polystyrene cement, as the mirror was distorted front and back (unlike other mirror which was perfect). Once I got it open I discovered the remains of another bracket buried in the sea of glue which would have to be excavated. Once I'd got the 1/2 bracket out, behind it was a pool of glue. I was determined for the new bracket to sit over the dimple as the original should have. So out with the magnifier & micro tools to excavate back to original plastic without amputating the dimple. Job done, after much grunting "stuff" this (paraphrasing) and storming off to make a cup of tea / pour a glass of wine. Did some more filing & sanding to get parts perfectly de-glued and flat at mating faces. Decided to use epoxy putty for rebuild instead of polystyrene cement as I think it's seen enough of that. no Then back on with tab, fill slight gap and Molotow chrome now exposed plastic where chrome plating peeled away. And over the last couple of evenings, last but not least my nemesis, the slightly worried looking guy behind the wheel, who usually ends up looking a bit "freakish". Thanks to all who have followed & reacted! Showroom entry soon.

So close! Window rubbers & decals done. My first time trying soapy water decal application, so nice to have a bit of slip & slide before committing to position. Will be painting over overspray interior the windows & final body details to do.

Fiddly fiddly times, window rubbers. Not my favourite task so doing one window a night. 2 left to go on drivers side (UK) so hopefully doing decals over weekend. Heres my current technique and it seems to be serving me well! looking a lot sharper than my blue white SS that I did freehand some time ago. Tape pressed into groves with clay modelling tool then line draw round with .5 clutch pencil, which helps when cutting with scalpel.

My 1:1 bug, back in the day used the very same sticker philosophy on rust spots 😂 They look good on the shelf though! Wow you have a lot of transmitters!

Back at work so progress slowing down. I decided there were parts of the bonnet where the lines were not following the cutouts as I'd like. So its been re done, this time with 40mm Tamiya mask and cutting around tight curves with a scalpel rather than trying to follow line with 2mm masking tape. Naturally this led to some overspray roughness so wet sanded and gave it a clear coat. x2 dust coats and x2 full coats. Happy with result so onto window frames etc .

Hmm, worrying. Just seen it myself. I mentioned in a build thread that Allcad 310 has "This product contains chemicals known to the state of California to cause cancer birth defects or other reproductive harm" written on the label, which is probably why you can't buy it here in the UK. It smells considerably worse / more toxic than TS spray, and thats without propellant. Have Tamiya cans just fallen under the "safety standards" radar for many years in many countries, due to relatively low demand compared to car / furniture spray paints found in hardware stores? I don't see myself panic buying in the future though (ok maybe a couple of colours perhaps).

Thanks Jonboy! & no problem. My compressor is set to between 18 & 20 psi and I'm generally around 2/3 trigger, I've sprayed both neat and with 50/50 isopropanol mix and results seem much the same. You have to hit what your spraying hard and fast, you literally have to ignore the overspray warnings in your head and just keep spraying past the flat aluminium phase until you see chrome appear then move on. Then I give it 4-5 days drying before Alclad ALC-310. Again straight out of the bottle, don't do a mist coat, go straight into wet coat but this time listen to the over spray warnings in your head. On smaller parts I think I'll just brush it on in future, as the self levelling qualities of Molotow are quite incredible. Hope that helps!

No idea to be honest, not too big on chemistry myself, but bottle says it contains "Mineral Spirits & Alcohol Solvents" so we could probably rule out water based.

My personal thoughts are, its expensive, quite volatile and generally a bit of a pain, long drying times, but I quite like it and will be perhaps more selective about what I use it on in future. Just realised theres 20 years between these 2 builds

At last! The Alclad lacquer is the one to use with Molotow Chrome, to be precise....... Alclad II Lacquer - Gloss Klear Kote ALC-310. I just noticed theres a British flag on the label, so why cant I buy it in the UK? Also theres a warning on the label that says "This product contains chemicals known to the state of California to cause cancer birth defects or other reproductive harm" Thankfully I live in the UK, but won't be drinking it. Full on double filter mask for spraying this devil juice. The are a couple of lower misty bits where I've under sprayed, but looks great from the angle you see when its on the car.

Now sanded out masking bleeds on the sides and straightened out a couple of "wonky" mask lines with a coat of yellow from the airbrush. Now I have this "de gassing" of the paint before airbrushing sorted, it really flows well without any thinning.

While body drying I've restored the number / licence plates. Had to repair front one as someone has previously prized it from a body shell (not my one) and left a chunk of it behind. Filled with epoxy putty and filed then sanded. Thankfully more missing from rear than front. Then blocked the yellow letters out, then on with blue and wipe away excess from letters with fine cotton but & solvent. Leave to dry for at least 24 hours. Then 1200 wet and dry rub down over a spatular blade. Then final yellow touches to balance / fix letters. Harder on rear plate as its been heated and curved a bit which meant a couple of bits got over rubbed. Finally photo copy ReRe decals, and cut out October and CA 10 stickers for front plate. Found a pic of the plate with a chunk out of it from the listing.