Mostly models of Canadian aircraft
AMT 1/24 1966 Ford Hardtop Mustang
My daughter has a love affair with classic cars of the 1960's and 1970's. Her dream car is a class 1960's Ford Mustang.
Our family spent many summer vacations in the Okanagan, and a must make stop for me was Fine Scale Hobbies in Penticton. The kids found the store boring, and typically didn't visit. One year, she decided to stay, and sat at the front of the store alternately chatting with the owner, and working on her laptop. While browsing the kits, I found a 1966 Mustang kit. I showed it to her and her response was something like "that is the car I always wanted." I quietly added the kit to my pile and resolved to secretly build it for her as a Christmas present.
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Fall 2019, and all three of our kids headed away to university, giving me time to get started on the Mustang. Work progressed at a reasonable pace, knowing that it had to be done for December 25th. I finished with time to spare, the finished model was mounted in a display case, and was wrapped and ready for Christmas morning. My daughter's reaction was worth all the effort, and the completed kit is now proudly displayed on her bedroom shelf.
The Build
The kit is fairly old, and showed its age with lots of flash and seam/mould lines that needed cleaning up. The main details were still sharply cast, and the kit went together without any problems.
The Engine and Interior
The kit engine build up into a nice model in itself. I had originally intended to enable the hood to open but a test fit quickly killed that idea. The hood to body joint wasn't very good, and the hinges weren't strong enough to keep the hood in place. I knew the car would be mounted in a display case, so made the decision to glue the hood shut.
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My daughter knew that "her" car would be a baby blue, but what colour should the interior be? A web search found several restored baby blue Mustangs, with black and tan interiors. That looked sharp and I set out to duplicate it on the model.
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The initial attempt at a tan interior looked too light and washed out. A dark brown oil paint wash added the desired texture and colour.
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The instrument panel was painted as wood trim using oil paints. It was masked using Micro masking liquid, something I won't do again. The masking liquid worked really well but was almost impossible to remove from the confined spaces. I spent forever picking little bits off the dash with fine point tweezers. A dry brush to highlight the instrument bezels and the interior was complete.
Exterior and Body
The chosen colour was baby blue, created using a Tamiya spray can of the appropriate colour. Two light coats were applied initially, followed by a heavier, "wet" coat. This was allowed to dry for a week until all the solvent smell was gone. Once dry, the paint was painstakingly polished to a mirror shine using Tamiya polishing compounds, working thru coarse, fine and ultra fine. This is a very slow process, and needs care to prevent rubbing thru the paint on corners and creases. Naturally, I did exactly that several times, resulting in reapplication of the blue and then more polishing. Finally complete, the shell was masked for the silver trim around the doors and windows, the front and back bumpers, door handles, and the rocker panels. Finally, a heavy gloss layer was applied to seal and protect the paint, allowed to dry, and then it was also polished.
Final Assembly
The final car consisted of an underbody panel, the interior tub, clear plastic for the front and back windows, the exterior shell. Repeated dry test fits were done to ensure that the everything would fit together on final assembly. Naturally, when it was time to bring everything together and apply glue, the components wouldn't fit. The clear windshield kept binding on something, and refused to click into place. Repeated attempts to resolve the issue were unsuccessful, resulting in the use of copious amounts of superglue and heavy clamping. With the clear insert securely fastened, body shell was mated to the underframe.
The kit provided two sets of tires. One was a set of mag wheels, while the other represented skinny street tires. The mag wheels easily looked the best, but to my horror, wouldn't fit the wheel wheels. I couldn't figure out what was wrong but the car looked like it was lifted. Reluctantly, the skinny street tires were substituted and the car finally sat properly. With that, the finished model was mounted in the display case and wrapped for Christmas morning.
Christmas morning 2019
