Does anyone have some tips for painting, assembling etc for Tamiya models? Not the RC ones, the 1/24 scale ones. I've checked Tamiya's site and they have some good ones but does anyone have some of their own tips they'd like to share?

I've bought a Jaccs Accord from eBay, and I plan to by some more, and I'm doing a '05 Subaru WRC now. I've been doing models for about 3 years, just recently graduated to spray paint

the usual? prime it, put a coupe of thin layer of paint, use a fine sander to sand it down, then another coupe thin layer of paint, sand it a bit, put the clear coat on and sand it again, then wax it.

Airbrushes are cheap. So cheap that I bought one in 1990 (Badger Cressendo) specifically for painting models, and I've never ever used it... Still have it out in the tool box in the garage.

Airbrush is the perfect tool for painting 1:24 scale models.

I used to build Tamiya motorbike kits. Unfortunately I don't have them any more, they got lost when I moved.

I never used an airbrush for any of them, although one would've came in handy for the fairing, as it was quite tedious using a brush and the results were far from brilliant.

I keep meaning to start building models again, it's good fun. I built a few trucks as a child but never really knew what I was doing so they came out funny and never got painted.

As for tips, the only thing I can suggest is making something to hold small pieces to let them dry. Tissue box with some opened up paper clips tapes on works a treat. A pair of tweezers is very helpful for putting the fiddly pieces together, and pretty much essential for apply decals.

Paint everything before you put it together. Nothing looks worse than bare plastic on a model.

To do metal parts such as a gearbox paint them silver, wait for it to dry then slightly thin down some black paint and paint it over, then rub it off with your fingers. The black will stay in the hollows and reveal the silver everywhere else.

Plastic kits can never reproduce the detail of the real thing, so to get the absolute best effect you need to emphasise the shading yourself. If you feel confident enough, try to paint all the hollows of the model slightly darker and all the edges slightly lighter.

If you want to get serious about detailing, a Dremel is a nice tool to have. I wanted to start a long time ago to build in fine detail. I had thin wire of various gage and various color of insulation as well as very small metal braided thread. They can be used for things like brake lines, coolant hoses, spark plug wires, etc. Use the Dremel to grind off the molded detail such as the brake lines from the chassis and use the various wires to plumb the lines.

Solder is a good raw material for fabricating exhaust systems.

My mother was into sewing. I would scavenge her scraps of fabric for stuff like interior carpet, seat upholstery and other stuff.

There's a lot you can do with detailing scale models if you want to put the time into it. As I said, I wanted to, but never quite got around to it. I quit modelling at the stage where I was getting into detail painting. I have probably 20 models in the boxes all detail painted with the engine components, but never put them fully together.

Painting, remember, cars are not 1 shade of black and 1 shade of silver. You have to have many different shades of each by mixing or using some of the various stock colors. I had several shades of black, but with silver, I probably had at least 8 different shades.

An example of using wire and other materials for detailing an engine bay in 1:24 scale modeling....



Get the basics of detail down, then start on weathering. Majority of cars are not in showroom like condition. You can fade the paint down, make misc. rust and rust holes. Weathering the tires goes miles into making it look real. Add a simple scene to put your model into for display....



You also need some clearcoat, both in gloss and flat or satin. If using decals, give the model a light clearcoat, apply the decal, then another light clearcoat to seal the decals.

You need some light plastic filler to fill in flaws, especially in the body. Also, a selection of sand papers and sanding tools. Emery boards are good for that. Go hoard mom's/wife's/sister's/girlfriend's makeup supplies.

Save all the plastic trees that the parts come on. They can be used for fabricating new parts. Other materials that can be used is polystyrene, such as the trays that you get from your meat packages at the grocery stores. For window trims and bumpers of older cars, the thin foil that will rub onto the plastic is a must. You can't duplicate chrome and bright trim with paint.

Quote from zachary Zoomy :

does Anyone Have Some Tips For Painting, Assembling Etc For Tamiya Models?

Stay Away From The Super Glue!!!!!!!

. I've been buying the (9$!) TS spray cans. they work pretty well, but as meantioned here, a spray gun is better? and where do I get the canister of paints? can I use anything? (X, XF bottles?)

Get yourself a couple of cheaper (or more available) kits, I made the mistake of using a now rare kit as my first attempt and it didn't come out all that well and although I have got better I can't undo the hash job and can't get that kit any more.

So if you spent a while trying to find your current kit, save it until you're better at painting.

Quote from Zachary Zoomy :

. I've been buying the (9$!) TS spray cans. they work pretty well, but as meantioned here, a spray gun is better? and where do I get the canister of paints? can I use anything? (X, XF bottles?)

What do you mean, where do you get the canister of paints? An airbrush is just the tool to spray with. Use any type or brand of paint you want. Stick Rustoleum paint in it, model paints, art paints, automotive paints. You just thin it with whatever is recommended to thin for spray to the consistancy of milk.

You can do very fine detail work with an airbrush with practice as they have different sized needles for different spray paterns. With stock spray cans, you only have a large wide spray pattern. An airbrush can spray the same as a spray can or you can probably get down to spraying a line 1 mm thick with practice.

I see. I bought a model from ebay as its $30 cheaper and I get a good selection. bidding on some more

Now you have me thinking about model building. I may have to dust some of mine off.

Most of mine are musclecars though, which aren't quite a big hit around this forum.

Or, also thinking about airbrush art, since I just spent an hour looking at airbrush techniques.

If anyone's interested, I'm building an '05 Subaru WRC, a Honda Accord Jaccs is in the mail (US postal sucks, 2 weeks from Ohio[I'm in vancouver canada]), and 2 hours left on a ford Sierra on eBay, hoping to buy Volvo Estate and Saloon on eBay in 4 days.

You made me pull them all down off the shelf.



Here's a good indication of how far I always got with building a model....



That's a '70 Boss 429, '71 Hemi, 427 from a '69 AC Cobra SC, Toyota 3.0L from the Hilux (very nice 1:20 scale), '69 400 from The Judge GTO, a Viper V10, 80's Toyota MR2, and a '91 Ford 5.0L.

Here's the 71 Hemi and the Ford 5.0....






3 of the models in the boxes have been finished, but they were on a shelf that collapsed a long time ago. I never got around to putting them back together. The Boss 429 is one of those that was finished, but "disassembled" by the crashing of the shelf.

nice! I started on Revell ones and then moved to Tamiya when I found they had better quality and variety.

2 tips.

1. dry brush your metal bits. basically black undercoat it normally then wipe off the excess metal coloured paint on an old brush and with the very small amount left dry brush it onto the model.

2. if you want a high gloss model and transfers/decals you need to matt varnish it first, then high gloss it. (the reverse is true for a matt finish


3. don't paint the tyres

Blimey, brings back memories, got a box of completed models in my loft, and an unfinished Tamiya RC45 and OW01 somewhere.......

i need to fix this one sometime :/


as for painting... well, i painted it all black with a yellow stripe from front to back, off from center
and i painted the wheels yellow too.

cant find pix tho.

4WD, front rear LSD, disc brake, front rear double wishbones...

Not exactly the kind of model being discussed in this thread......

hey now, you make lil' TracerT sad with your words... does he not need assembly, painting?

btw, anyone know an alternitive to the Tamiya glues? they are very smelly and I've been told not to use the in the house. Assembling in the grass doesn't sound to fun.

Model glue is smelly. Testors is the popular model supplies down here, in paints and in glues.

I use Humbrol because it comes in some handy needle point bottles so you can get the smallest amount of glue in the join so everything looks cleaner

I've bought a $71 (including shipping :0) model from Japan on eBay and I am building it now. thread set up here: http://www.automotiveforums.co ... php?p=5803953#post5803953
and I also bought a $21 Tamiya Accord JACCS model from eBay and will be assembling it soon after this one .

i see there is no love for rc models:sorry: