M05 Ver.II - In-Depth Build and Setup

[JimBear]

On 7/3/2023 at 10:51 PM, Pylon80 said:

I think I had a bit of a mental barrier against FWD, which I imagined as a crotch for those lacking the patience to learn RWD. This is why I never gave FWD much attention. Also, proper 1:1 race cars are never FWD obviously /.../

A while ago, I read a comment made by someone on here that RC cars shouldn't have FWD. Then I came to think of the real life examples like the Mini Cooper or the various Saabs in the 60s and 70s ... (would love to see a Tamiya version of the Saab 92 with the roof light, hah!)

Some good information here.

[Pylon80]

55 minutes ago, JimBear said:

I read a comment made by someone on here that RC cars shouldn't have FWD

I think I read it too, at least it sounds familiar. One should always be wary of such strong statements!

[Pylon80]

Wow, it has been a while. I actually had to search for my own thread in order to update it. So with fall finally here I can finally spray bodies. Since this is the part I enjoy the least I usually procrastinate cutting and sanding and here we are with temperature now around 13degC right before sunrise. That is a little cold so the kids nap in the weekend's afternoons will have to be my best shot, with temperatures around 25degC in the afternoon.

And the body is...

I picked the GTI Mk.1 Kamei body.

I have changed my mind multiple times before settling on this one; in the process I have bought and sold 2 CRx bodies which was expensive, but so is the dynamic of this hobby sometimes. To make a long story short, I never really liked how unrealistic this Golf body is hence my initial doubts. If you compare pictures of the original 1:1 car to the model it is immediately apparent that it is an approximative rendering of the real thing. The wheel diameter is the biggest discrepancy, with the giant arches protruding above the black trim lines. However, after seeing @Andreas W's Golf I thought it was actually very good looking. In particular I absolutely love the short, wide, squat stance of it. Rrrrr! 

The GTI's have a special place in my heart. The guy who taught me how to fly RC planes back in 1992 had a black one (Mk.2). He would take me to the flying field on Sundays and I remember how it was really a 'hot' car back then, with a nice grunt from the engine and plenty of acceleration to impress the young lad I was. Then much later I owned a number of Golf's, Mk.4, 5 and 6 until I finally bought my 4th one, a black GTI Mk.6! I have long since sold it but the point is: I will always enjoy a GTI. There is just something about that 'hot hatch' concept, exciting without being a luxury statement. Fast, fun, but still low key.

This particular body is very interesting because it is a re-release of a very old model; one of the first 100 Tamiya models in fact. Back then it sat on top of a 1/12 pan car. Tamiya had perhaps intended to release multiple such scale models for 1/12 pan cars, but sadly they only ever did this Golf as well as a Renault 5 Turbo. Tamiya only re-released the Golf much, much later on an M-05, finally giving it a FWD chassis. The fit of the body was terrible on the pan car (judging from the pictures) and it was not very good either on the M-05. Tamiya got a little lazy and chose not to provide wide axles for the rear wheels - something that is very easy to fix. The wide rear and narrower front is nothing you would find on the 1:1 car, but the 1/12 pan car heritage of this model explains it quite clearly. Another archaism of this body is the front section. Back in these golden age days Tamiya had made the front end of the car out of ABS, that people had to color match to the Lexan then attach with 5 screws, resulting in a very visible seam. I find that quirk endearing as it is a sign of how old the body is. In this day and age Tamiya would most likely mold it all in one piece - as only they seem to know how to do properly. On that note, there are a number of repro bodies for this Golf, they are molded in one piece but with very approximative front ends; and they are expensive.

I went the long way around to acquire this body, buying a full M-05 Golf kit and splitting it, a first for me. I didn't like doing that at all but it was necessary to get my hands on that somewhat rare body. The basic M-05 chassis was sold, the motor and ESC have found a good use in my fleet, the wheels (that I find very 'meh...') were sold and I am on the fence to keep or sell the tires.

I am making this post since I made a tiny-achievement today: I finished cutting and sanding the Lexan portion of the body and I sprayed the ABS front end with Tamiya fine surface primer. Here is a picture of the body cut, sanded and freshly washed... still dripping! The livery will be a 'Tribute To Petronas' sort of thing and I am quite looking forward to the result... I said 'the result', not the painting itself

[Andreas W]

Thanks for the kind words. Looking forward to seeing the finished bodyshell in the Petronas-colors.

 

A tip for you: The Carten 8 spoke wheels with 1mm offset are looking even nicer than the Tamiya Minilites. Like real world 15" Minilites, that would be the current choice on,  let's say, a Bergcup/hillclimb car today. They are going on mine (and the M-08) in the future. I see Phat bodies are selling them under their own brand as well. 

[Pylon80]

2 hours ago, Andreas W said:

Thanks for the kind words. Looking forward to seeing the finished bodyshell in the Petronas-colors.

 

A tip for you: The Carten 8 spoke wheels with 1mm offset are looking even nicer than the Tamiya Minilites. Like real world 15" Minilites, that would be the current choice on,  let's say, a Bergcup/hillclimb car today. They are going on mine (and the M-08) in the future. I see Phat bodies are selling them under their own brand as well. 

I have seen them on the Phat website. I am more of a BBS guy than a Mini lite guy though And Tamiya has never bothered with an M size BBS

I think Rush make something that looks BBS-ish? I want to try them at some point.

[skom25]

On 9/10/2023 at 3:04 AM, JimBear said:

Also, proper 1:1 race cars are never FWD obviously

Not exactly. WTCC cars had FWD few years ago. Do not remember which but some cars from GT series are FWD. WRC also has few categories with FWD.

@Pylon80 great Topic and great chassis!

[Pylon80]

Today I was able to work a little bit on the body. This thread is helping me keep the motivation... There are half a dozen chassis on which I would rather tinker!

ABS Front End

I drilled the 5 holes required, first with a 2.5mm drill bit in a pin vise. Then I enlarged them with my trusty body reamer until I would get a snug fit with the ABS part. The body looks a lot nicer now and I am impressed with how well the ABS and Lexan parts fit together. This test fit was needed before the next step, as I want the 2 colors to split right above the front bumper. Better to have the ABS part on, rather than guess, and guess wrong.

Masking Line

I wanted to draw a clean masking line and thought of this system: the body is propped on a piece of wood at the front while the angle is fined tuned with business cards at the back. Then a Sharpy marker is run along the desired masking line, propped on an object of the suitable height. In this case, a small tin of tea from Solstice Traders! It went a lot better than I thought. Now, the parting line between the two colors will only be as good as the masking tape I stick along that sharpy line, when I get to that stage!

[Andreas W]

16 hours ago, Pylon80 said:

I have seen them on the Phat website. I am more of a BBS guy than a Mini lite guy though And Tamiya has never bothered with an M size BBS

I think Rush make something that looks BBS-ish? I want to try them at some point.

Then we are two. I also wanted mesh-style wheels. That would have been correct for the proper look of my Rheila hommage Golf . 

 

Bright solution you got there for marking up the masking line.

[JimBear]

@skom25 - please re-read the posts above carefully - you mixed me up with @Pylon80. (Nobody remembers that anymore I guess, but let's say Stig Blomquist and Saab 99 Turbo ...)

 

 

[skom25]

I know but I was not able to find original post. Sorry 

[Pylon80]

3 hours ago, JimBear said:

you mixed me up with @Pylon80.

That should be an honor!

[JimBear]

43 minutes ago, Pylon80 said:

That should be an honor!

Indeed, sir! *takes hat off*

[JimBear]

3 hours ago, skom25 said:

I know but I was not able to find original post. Sorry 

No worries - I am just unused to being mixed up.

[Pylon80]

Micro-update:

Finally squirting some paint, on the ABS front end. I used TS-102 on top of fine surface primer. This is supposed to match PS-54 that will be used in the body itself. Fingers crossed 🤞

[alvinlwh]

.

[Pylon80]

32 minutes ago, alvinlwh said:

Is that what the app says? 😁

This is what Alvin said and that's all I need to know! 😘

[Pylon80]

Paint Tests

The ABS front end has been primed with fine surface primer, grey (that was probably a mistake, read on...) and then sprayed with clear. The clear really helped make it gloss without requiring any polishing. It hasn't taken out too many of the really fine details either (front grille, headlights and emblem). These details will be hand brushed with acrylic later on.

So I heeded @Willy iine's usual advice to make paint tests on scrap pieces of Lexan. I sprayed PS-54 Cobalt Green, then backed it on one side with PS-1 white and the other side with PS-12 silver, just to see which is best. That was very interesting indeed - I don't think you can tell from the pictures unfortunately so take my word for it - but the half that is backed with silver looks, well, silvery and greyish and generally not nice. The side that was backed with white on the other hand looks very nice with a deep/saturated cobalt green color. Not sure I am using the right vocabulary here, but it looks mo' better! Note that when placing the piece in front of a the sun or a source of light the silver did a much better backing job; the white is still somewhat translucent.

Now, moment of truth: I put the scrap piece next to the ABS front  end (grey primer + TS-102 + clear) and we have 3 different shades  I am not surprised anyway. The best match is for sure the white backing: very close, only a wee bit lighter than the front end. I still think that if I had primed in white instead of grey I would have hit the target much closer in terms of matching TS-102 to PS-54. Well, I will only know when I do a take 2 body in the future.

Misleading picture: the left side is backed in silver and looks real good but in real life it is greyish with silver sparkles showing (not a fan of those).

Again the pictures are misleading: above the right side is backed in white and looks spot on when it is a bit too light in real life. It is the primer's fault I am sure.

AC-DC

All the above being said, I still intend to Back In Black (haha). I think it is a real shame to see a really nice body, especially in a light color, with perfect decals, but the builder didn't bother to back his paint in black and then you see white through the windows or wheel arches... It kind of ruins the result. So I might use that to my advantage as it could make the body a little bit darker and therefore a closer match to the front end of the car. Next I will spray black on my scrap piece and see how it looks!

 

 

[Willy iine]

Nice job @Pylon80  That is the only way to do it at the end.  

I did the same on some pearl backed various colors the other day to test.   All went to crap.  

[Carmine A]

 

Quote

Better setup - Differential Setting

RC Hobbyists are supposed to be quirky, so here is a quirky tidbit of my life. I hate a/c, but I live in the US and in Arizona at that. That means I have to live most of my life in front of the gasper of an a/c unit blowing ****id air at me at regular intervals. I just can't get used to it; but my US-born colleagues and friends just wouldn't be able to live without it. Add 1deg to the thermostat and they start sweating and getting upset at me for bumping the temperature. So, at the end of my in-office workdays, I am thoroughly frozen, to the bone. So, here is the quirk: for the drive home,  I like getting in my car, which is so hot the steering wheel almost burns my hands, and I do not use the $%^&% a/c but instead roll down the windows. If you have lived in Arizona you probably think that I am making this up... That is impossible! But I am not. Honest, I drive the first 5min in my rolling sauna, with the windows down and the wheel and stick burning my hands. Then once I feel the rush of heat I reluctantly turn on the a/c.

YES! The burn is Real here!!

We are the same, but different... 

I also live in Arizona (85711), and was even born in Texas. You'd think I'd be well acclimated.... NOPE!! 

Home Thermostat: 62...  Car A/C thermostat: ALASKA!!

I was bitten by the M05 bug, from the PAIN of having to sell my M03 Mini Cooper, for nearly 3X what I paid for it. Should be thrilled, right? WRONG!! 💔💔  I can't even replace it, because they're worth even more now. 😭😭

So M05s started popping up, dirt cheap! (Like $120.00 USD... NEW!)  I ended up building a decent roller ~ NOT as higher spec as yours ~ I found a Mugen CRX body (which recreates the 85 CRX I coaxed up to college) FIRST upgrade.... 3Racing gear Diff. ANY choice I'm given, I'll always choose gears over balls!

12T Brushed Motor/WP1080 ESC... made for crazy.... just CRAZY!! I did some of the first postal runs... I couldn't get 6 laps on one set of Tires!!! But the postal races were always about the fun, competition almost secondary, and I hope it still is.

This thread just inspired me to dig up the old M05/CRX, and do some playing!

[Carmine A]

WAIT!!!??? 😮

The new Golf body is Lexan with an ABS grille!?!?  OMG That just topped my list!

[Pylon80]

On 11/9/2023 at 5:05 PM, Carmine A said:

This thread just inspired me to dig up the old M05/CRX, and do some playing!

I remember your bits a build M-05, a pleasure to read that I could somewhat inspire you to dust it off 😃

And allow me to pay respect for veterans Day (belated).

[Carmine A]

12 hours ago, Pylon80 said:

I remember your bits a build M-05, a pleasure to read that I could somewhat inspire you to dust it off 😃

And allow me to pay respect for veterans Day (belated).

Thank you! I appreciate it. 

It was a fun build. Cost twice what a kit would have, but when you've only got  $20-40 per month to spend... you do what you have to. 

I'm even thinking of starting a FF-01, the same way! 😯😜

I started doing piecemeal builds about 6 years ago... I'm glad to see it's caught on to the point where it's actually got a name! "Bits a Build". I've heard it often lately and will have to remember that!

[Pylon80]

I have been busy driving my cars all the while feeling guilty for letting spray season pass without getting the Golf body done. We are expecting our third child soon so I have a feeling that 1) I better run the cars now but then 2) if I don't paint that body soon it will not get done for another year!

So here is a modicum of progress on the body...

Window Masks

I regret having ever complained that window masks should be precut by Tamiya and are time consuming to prepare... because the Golf does not even come with window masks! So I decided to get the Tamiya masking sticker sheet (87130) and make my own. I briefly considered just hacking them roughly with masking tape but since I never know when I am going to be able to spray, I prefer having a set of window masks at the ready and stick them on at the last minute.

I tried various things to get the masks right and in the end the best solution seems to be to cut a rough shape larger than the window, then slowly zero-in on the final shape. The harder one was by far the windshield, with the two large and complex curves at the top and the bottom... that was a bit of a task. But in the end the window trim decals will define the boundary between the windows and the painted part of the body so there is no sense trying to get the edges within a 1/10 of a mm.

For the side windows I made the left ones then cut a mirror image for the right side. The rear hatch was done using a half template that I flipped to obtain the other side... not sure that was the most efficient way.

But hey, they are all there now  and I can stick them on and spray as soon as, well, the kids are sleeping, the wind is within limits and the temperature is in the range.

Tentative paint sequence is: Cobalt green; then white; then unmask the bottom of the body; then black; then unmask the windshield; then re-mask the bottom of the windshield only; then red for the top of the windshield; then white; then black to hide any red or white overspray. That is the plan at least.

[JimBear]

@Pylon80 - it ... does not come with window masks? Oh well, I am up the creek with no paddle in the future, then!

 

[Pylon80]

@JimBear my theory is that this body being from kit 58025 (the 25th RC kit made by Tamiya) it did not come with masks in those early days of 1981. When they re-released the body with a M05 kit they did not bother to make window masks for it which is probably a bit lazy.

First Spray - Cobalt Green Awesomeness!

I always say that I don't like painting but that is not true. Painting is highly inconvenient in my current life as a busy father living in the desert - but when I do get around to painting I actually immensely enjoy it. Last night was no different and it did take 2 full hours to mask the body correctly and then spray the PS-54 Cobalt Green.

I am glad I spent so much time carefully marking the tape line as well as carefully checking every mask to make sure paint would not bleed; I think it went well so far. And I absolutely love this color.

I will spray the white backing as soon as possible. I am quite sure it will take day if not weeks until I can remove the masks which is not advisable but this is the best I can do. I have done that in the past and the result was good - I just needed a sharp blade to help remove the masks in some places.