Detail

Wheels assembled and painted.

Tow hook installed.

Next: interior

Eat my own words

Even though I said there would not be a new project for a while and the 2 work in progress ones will be shelved, I could not help but played with this little guy. Decals on the body are done and clear coat applied. Since I'll be away from my workbench for 2 weeks, the rest of the work will need to pause for at least that long.

Leyton House CG901 1990 French Grand Prix Ivan Capelli

1990 Leyton House CG901 Complete

The average time I took to finish a kit has been around 6 months. This is no exception. Checking my old blog posts, it was October last year when I started playing with this guy. And it is mid May already. Finally today, it is done.

Although there are so many kits in my inventory that I would like to play with, I will not start a new project for a while until I can afford the time to do that again. The work in progress Porsche and McLaren will stay as is for now.

So close, so very close

Moving at warp speed these couple of days. Mounted the wheels, adjusted the height. It looks almost finished. It's getting late tonight. Things to work on tomorrow:

• Finish the mirrors
• Fabricate the rain light
• Paint and mount the wheel nuts
• Mount antennae
• Miscellaneous touch up

I can see the end of the tunnel

Front and rear suspensions completed. All that are left are wheels, mirrors and the rain light. Hopefully, this guy should be done pretty soon.

As usual, the kit's mirrors and the supports are casted together in one piece with white metal. The supports are too thick, so cut the support off and replaced them with brass wire. Then they are cut to length and I painted the mirror housing in body color. I will paint the support in black after the paint on the housing is dried.

The tires with the kir are the typical old Tameo black rubber donuts with no markings. The kit came with the tire decals, but decals do not like to stick to rubber. The tires from new Tameo kits have all the markings already painted, good for lazy people like myself. This time, I took the tires from another kit. Also added a valve stem to each of the rims. These guys are smaller than a flea. It happened so many times when I use tweezers to handle tiny metal piece, the metal piece turned into a projectile and few away. I lucked out this time, did not lose any.

Next would be finish painting the mirrors, install the wheels, front and rear wings, then mirrors and miscellaneous other little pieces.

Progress, slow progress

Making progress little by little. Front suspension almost together except the upper control arms. Will try to do as much as possible this weekend.

Finally getting some warm temperature in Chicago today. I was still wearing a winter jacket yesterday morning. But today, I can just wear a polo shirt. It's about time.

Impatient

Got impatient and it paid off. Finished putting all the decals on the body. Wait for it to set, then clear coat.

Murphy's law

Started on doing the decals. But unfortunately, I ran into some issue with Micro Sol. May be I was a bit too generous in using the softening solution. I thought Micro Sol is safe on paint, but I guess I was wrong. I notice a dark circle around a drop of Micro Sol on top of both sidepods. On the right side, I was able to buff it out. But on the left side I was a bit too aggressive and it went through the paint to the primer. So, I masked off the decals and spray the turquoise to fix it. Now, I will have to wait for the paint to cure. I have no choice but to let it sit for 2 days.

Tighten the belt

Installed the harness. Should have started putting the decals on the body, just couldn't get the motivation. It is like hitting the wall, the mind is willing but the flesh is weak.

I recently read a quote from William James Durant: "Forget past mistakes. Forget failures. Forget everything except what you're going to do now and do it."

I guess, that is exactly what I need to follow.

Restraint, Superhero and Reading Material

I was planning to spend more time working on the CG901 over the weekend, but all I managed to finish was the harness.

After putting one together for the Ferrari F1-90,  I am getting better at doing this kind of harness. The frustrating part is not putting them together. they are so small that when it flew away and I ended up crawling on the floor trying to recover them.

Besides all the Easter religious activities, I went to watch Captain America with a bunch of friends. Although I do not follow the Marvel comic books, the movie was quite entertaining and loaded with action. Being able to take my mind off my problems and relaxed for an hour or two, that is definitely a good thing. Thank you Captain.

And a friend who recently returned from Japan brought me the latest copy of Model Graphix, as a return of favor since I loaned her my Fukuoka Guide Book.

Main feature of this issue are classic rally cars. Although the builds are all 1/24 scale, it may be useful in the future.

Restart

Building models is an important part of my life. But there are other things in life that are more important, so the CG901 project was on hold for the past 2 months.

Things in my life are still far from normal, but as I have said before, building is my therapy and it keeps me from going insane with all the craziness around me.

Kind of put the rear suspension together. For the car body, when I was a bit careless when I was polishing it over the weekend and went too far. So, I resprayed the body and have been just waiting for the paint to fully cure before I can polish it again and put the decals on. Good thing about these mid field or back markers, they usually do not have a lot of sponsors. That means not a lot of decals to put on!

Next item on my list is the cockpit. Surprisingly, this old kit did not even have the photo-etched seat belt that usually comes with Tameo Kits. So, I will be using Z Models' belt kit. Haven't looked at the steering wheel and the dash yet. Not sure what I will do. But I will definitely use the turned aluminum shift lever rather that the flat photo-etched one.

Leyton House CG901B Start Up Procedure

When will I finish my CG901?

今日の次に何がある？明日の先に何がある？

ゴールはまだ見えない

Turquoise

After things got stalled for a couple of weeks, finally I got my butt off the couch and sprayed a coat of turquoise on the body.

March/Leyton House is probably the only F1 team that uses this turquoise color. I cannot think of another team that uses this color.