Tamiya VFR 750R

Another of my part started collection. On opening the box it looked like I had serious painting problems resulting in the clear font end being hazy and overspray on the  screen. I didn’t think to take a pic but here’s the build so far, it will be standard to the instructions.

Box art 



Not being able to do it as a clear front end anymore i got out the Novus plastic stuff for the screen to see what would happen and it worked, overspray gone but alas I forgot to take a pic, masked up the screen and painted everything white.

Novus stuff



Everything which needed to be white 




Learning from past experiences i feel the bast way to get accurate lines across multiple pieces is to fit the parts before masking up. So for now those parts will be put aside until the rest is built.

I’d painted the frame already with alclad chrome by the looks of it, the instructions called for xf16 for half the frame so I pulled out everything which needed to be xf16 and painted it all together.




Need to repaint a couple of pieces because I think I over thinned the paint so it went a bit weird. 

Next up are as many black x18 parts as I can find and tape up that’s on the agenda for today so maybe an update tomorrow for this and possibly the neko works delta too.

Thanks for looking

I do like my bikes - and I’m tempted to buy myself another kit, sometime in the future - so will be watching
I’ve restored clear screens by sanding them down with 1200 wet and dray, followed by T-Cut and a polish. It works for me (most of the time) 🥴

I’ve only ever made tamiya bikes and considering ordering the Scot team on Racing RS250RW from hasegawa just to try a different manufacturer.

Next up, the engine..

It looks like I painted it German grey for whatever reason. Not what it says in the book so I mixed some paint and this is how it looks now





Think my hands need some time in airbrush cleaner.

Next will be the forks, book says x11 all the way down but I don’t think it will look right. Box art looks chrome at the top and not so chrome on the bottom half. So I’ll try doing that with alclad chrome and tamiya x11 or some zero silver I’ve got. 

Cheers

Get yourself a box of latex gloves - cheaper than celly thinners......and kinder on the hands.

Great project. I love building Tamiya bikes. I've built a number of them.

Ron234 wrote:Get yourself a box of latex gloves - cheaper than celly thinners......and kinder on the hands.

We have some but I never remember to use them

Mike C wrote:Great project. I love building Tamiya bikes. I've built a number of them.

I’ve seen some of your builds, very nice indeed

I found some pictures online. It’s a really nice looking bike too









I’ve got a fair few alclad paints so I’m thinking chrome for the top and polished aluminium for the bottom half of the forks.
The exhaust can is going to be chrome as I don’t have any of that carbon decal in my box.

Nice work Ash. It all looks great and I think your thoughts on the forks is the right way to go.

Cheers Al, I tried the alclad stuff but you could see some lines through it on the forks so I’ve sanded them back and I’ll have another go tomorrow.

I changed the engine colour because it was too brown and now it looks like this, I’ll try some smoke on it and see if it darkens it more. I don’t want to repaint it and mix paint up again.

Enjoying this bike building has got my juices flowing and today I ordered my next Tamiya build....the nearest I could find to my old FZR .....

That looks like a good subject to build.

Ron234 wrote:Enjoying this bike building has got my juices flowing and today I ordered my next Tamiya build....the nearest I could find to my old FZR .....

  that’s brilliant!!

Thanks Ash for the inspiration.

Ron234 wrote:Thanks Ash for the inspiration.

You’re welcome and good to hear of someone else doing a bike build

I built that one way back at the beginning and not too long ago it got thrown in the drawer never to be seen again.
I had too many to put in the cabinet and it wasn’t a very good job that I’d done.

Today I played with the brake discs, forks, rear spring and engine.






I searched through many google images and they all had different engine colours and casings. The majority looked like titanium silver so I went with that as I didn’t like the brown shade.

Leaving the casing brownish for now.
I tried to use the alclad yesterday and it messed up, a bit hazy in places where I’d gone to heavy and you could clearly see where I’d got rid of the mould lines and the 1 grit sandpaper finish.
Painted the bottom half of the forks in x11 but I don’t like them, they aren’t reflective enough. Maybe if I put some zero diamond clear over it then shine it to the maximum (probably burn through the clear when trying to make it shiny). Or I could try a faint dusting of the alclad chrome then a ‘best as I can’ effort on the top part with the chrome and see what that looks like..
any ideas?


Also.. how do you make a wash? I tried with x18 and a lot of thinner but that didn’t do anything.. way too thin

LOL.... you need to experiment with washes Ash. If it's too thin, just add some more paint until you have the correct consistency. Simples.

Always glad to see a bike from my era.

Ash, don't believe Al. It's never "simples".

Great job though, and with the attention to detail with the colors, I'm sure it will turn out great.

Yes, I have a few bikes left in my stash. Hmmmm.....

I think the problem for me with creating a wash is that I’ve never created/used this type of thing before so I don’t know what it should be like.
Can you just thin a bit of smoke to like airbrush consistency then slap it on?

Sam, i agree with the washing, it isn’t simple

What bikes you got ??

This kit is missing one thing, a pe set, the fabia and the tiny steamroller have given me a kind of taste for pe stuff, I’ve got 2 pe mad kits but have  been to scared to do them, a ZXRR  and an M1 both have chains and little boxes and things in bags +  the M1 has the Spider-Man decal set and various other things you won’t see BUT, I got some crazy magnifying specs  this Christmas so everything’s much clearer now, I can’t believe the difference they’ve made. These tiny little moulded nuts which I just dribbled the paint over in the past can now be seen and wow, I’m loving them. This also makes me think that the scary stuff may not be so scary now, I just need the right glue. Something like tamiya super thin but with the bonding of superglue without the mess which the super glue seems to create.
Maybe it’s my administration tool and not the glue which is the problem.
What do people use to put glue on or type of glue?
I’m rubbing shoulders with Loctite gel stuff from Amazon, I tried UHU but that’s thicker than whipped cream, and I have some clear drying jewellers stuff for the clear bits. Cocktail stick usually to smear it on. That is probably not what you guys use

Ash,
I have a Tamiya 1/6 Harley, started. Tamiya Yamaha virago, started. Tamiya Ducati 916 and 888, new in box. Testors 1/9 Harley, new. Revell Honda scrambler, Kawasaki street racer, and Honda XE-50. I think one is started. Aoshima Honda CB 400, new. MPC Honda trail 70, and Sup Hawk CB77, both new. All the started ones, I received that way.

I can’t see my reply for some reason so I’ll write it again.

Save the new ones incase you need some quick cash at some point.
Go through the others and find the one which needs the least work or the one you want to see finished. Then away you go!

The ones I’ve been doing since I took painting are from the part started collection, after this I’ve only got 4 left, tamiya nastro, airwolf, revel focus and a vw camper which I screwed the paint up on, the first 3 I bought like that. Nastro is a mess, don’t even know if all the parts are there, airwolf is nasty too with yellow glue all over and the focus was minor, needs a tiny piece pulling off then priming and it will be good this is what I’m doing next.
.

The Virago keeps calling me. I cannot sell the 916, a friend has the real deal, so reference pics are a phone call away. I want to build all the old bikes, so that leaves very little.

Virago it is.. good choice

Molotow chrome through the airbrush is wicked. I was worried about using it then I googled some stuff and tried it, masking went to the wrong line should be the fork seal at the very top line of the masking with the larger part of the section behind that seal should be all the same colour (if you didn’t already know) but I’ll sort this out if it ever dries.

Can you clear coat it does anyone know? Don’t wanna mask it and pull it off when I’ve finished the silver. I’ll try it with zero clear.

1 last thing, tamiya jars are the best but have a very small range, what could I use instead of zero? They messed up my last 2 orders so I told them I’ll never use them again. I’m stubborn so need a new suppler.
Thanks in advance.