1977 Toyota Celica RAC Rally

I traded for this kit with a member on another site:



It's curbside with no real nice chassis detail, so it will be another quickie. Target date is Dec 31st!! LOL

Painted the wheels and monted wheels and tyres onto the chassis:



Aoshima got the wheel arch extentions wrong. They are short at both ends of each extention but I'm just going to live with it.

Those wheels look like mk 1 Escort jobbies, Never noticed the arches till you mentioned it, scratch some extensions up, will only take you an hour :)

It actually looks like the arches could with being front to back (although i presume they won't fit any other way from looking at them)
Then the gaps could be where the rear mud flaps and front deflector would slot in.

Looks like a nice model.

Cool old subject Al !

Very cool! I am SMILIN'!

Hi Al,

I always remember the chap who ran the local post office bought one of these brand new and I fell in love, they where and still are a beautiful looking vehicle...

Chicken and popcorn all ready...

A cool little curbside kit. A5h was right to just fill in the gaps with the rubber mud flaps.

Nice and simple. Just the way to end the year.

A5h wrote:Those wheels look like mk 1 Escort jobbies, Never noticed the arches till you mentioned it, scratch some extensions up, will only take you an hour :)

That's 'cos they are Minilites Ash. A widely used wheel back in the day.

Snake wrote:It actually looks like the arches could with being front to back (although i presume they won't fit any other way from looking at them)
Then the gaps could be where the rear mud flaps and front deflector would slot in.

Looks like a nice model.

Correct Colin, the won't fit any other way and besides, the wider ones go no the rear. I'm assuming Aoshima produced this originaly as a road car, then converted it to the rally version. They didn't even include a roll cage!!!

This is what Aoshima think the front end should look like. Compare it with the box art and photo above..... it's way off!! LOL. Looks more like a full width air dam to me!!

The centre piece (the air dam) is too long to fit between the 'mud deflector flaps' by about 2.5mm either side. Rather than cut it, I mounted it under the mud deflcetor flaps as I think it will look better when they are painted matt black anyway.

The Airdam goes over the top on the real car, could you scratch one up out of styrene.

It looks OK as is though, as you say the paint will blend it all In.

You're right Colin, it does go over the top.

However, there is so much not right with this kit and it's a quickie build, so it's not a big deal for me.

Besides, once it gets 'muckied up', it will all blend in better methinks!!

The main problem is that the side mud flaps are too thick as well. Front can be improved some. I still like that era body design. Thanx for the new foto.

I remember this Celica, it was a popular car here. Some people liked it because it resembled the Mustang. OK Al, you've got four days ......

Wow!!! I'd have said the resemblance to a Mustang of the era was pretty far fetched Chris..... now if you'd said 67-69 Camaro.......

Ah! but hang on..... you guys down there are upside down, so that probably explains it!!!

Nice subject, can't wait to see it finished.

Thanks Ron.

More problems with old decals, some of my own stupidity.

The big stripes broke up on application in several places as did some of the others if you look carefully.

However, the biggest screw up was of my own making.

The side sripes are in four pieces: ahead of the front arches and to the mid point of the same. From the mid point of the front arches to the race number squares and then two more rearwards.

I applied the two front lefts ahead of the arches first. Then I applied the decals from there rearwards to the race number. When I looked at them I thought, how could they get that curve so wrong? Finally I applied the rest of the red stripes.

THEN THE PENNY DROPPED!!!!!

The front decals and the ones that fit rearward of those, have to be overlapped..... NOT butt jointed!!! DOH!! Try as I might, by this time I couldn't get them off!!!

Could have done with some of the Torino's 'unsticky' decals here!!! Oh well, as Buck usually says, the sun will still rise in the east tomorrow!!!

Just have to mucky it up a lot more now!!! LOL.

It doesn't look that bad Al, if you wanted to display it in front of a picture of the real car then it'd be more of an issue.

Some mud flicked up after the front arches will fill the gap a bit.

Toyota 'Silly Car'.

Hi Al,

Could you not match the decal colour and paint the gap...?

You could dirty it up as if it has been doing a really dirty Winter rally and hasn't been cleaned up at all, I know when some of the rally cars come through my town after doing some of the Clocaenog forest stages they are minging, white cars look more two tone, with the bottom half being black, from both the stages and just driving on the roads around here...

Andy...

P.S...Any chance of some more KFC please, I think....errr....Colin has been munching it on the quiet...

Thanks guys.

You could dirty it up as if it has been doing a really dirty Winter rally wrote:

That's the plan Andy. Hopefully to-day. Back in 1977, the RAC rally was always held in winter and usually in attrocious conditions too!!





I was going to mask of the 'clean' areas of the windscreen but Aoshima got the wipers badly wrong I fear:



The interior is quite good and could be done very nicely...... BUT..... the glasswork is the worst I have ever come across for clarity. It's positivley opaque and all you can see through it, are fuzzy images. So I kept it basic. The glass was at least a good fit.



On it's wheels and ready to hit the stages:

It's a pity about the stickers Al,
but I've rushed ahead myself and fitted decals only to find they were misplaced when it was too late.
I agree a heavy muddy spray would help to some degree to take way any discrepancies
...and the steamy windows would add to that 'wintery' detail.

Just place it near the back of the shelf as is.  

Years from now you'll look back in retrospect, get a chuckle out of it and say "Did I do that?"

We might not admit it, but we all have them (if we chose to keep them).  

\"Just place it near the back of the shelf as is. wrote:Just place it near the back of the shelf as is. "]

But the back of the shelves are already full to overflowing Mike!!!

Years from now you'll look back in retrospect, get a chuckle out of it and say \"Did I do that? wrote:Years from now you'll look back in retrospect, get a chuckle out of it and say "Did I do that?""]

Been there, done that and wrote the book. LOL

The front end looked way to race like and not enough rally like, so I added some flexible mud deflectors as per box art. They are made from two layers of painters tape. I also made some mudflaps from thin styrene.

Aoshima supply a very thin vynyl for these, plus a template. However, the vynyl, simply 'curls' when you paint it. LOL

Now it really is ready to hit those stages later tonight.

Seems to sit high in the rear. Looks good as a shelf filler. Nice work Al