Post by krow113 on Nov 10, 2016 12:59:11 GMT -5
Tamiya's 1/6 Harley -Davidson FLSTFB Fat Boy Lo.
Decent enough kit , lots of parts and screws and tools and really nice tires. We wont do the satin black version , too boring , it looks ok but not for me. These bikes came in candy orange as well, we'll change up to metalflake red , gloss black on the wheels and some flat for the drive train as I think that looks more realistic.
We'll also try to show the best way to handle the two trickiest parts of the model which are the painting of the engine cylinder fin edges in chrome , and the wheel centers in black. The wheels may be easy with some custom masks but regular vinyl tape would work as well. The cylinder and head fins may be tougher , some deft ab work may be in order, we'll see. No-one has shown how they did this tricky work anywhere on the interweb , so that will be shown here.
I have built custom Harleys for most of my life , in shops and on my own bikes. Softails never did it for me, the swingarm weighs as much as an entire hardtail frame. I did wire at least 50 choppers in the last 10 years, so I am very familiar with the assy procedures and makeup of the real bikes. There are few pitfalls on this kit from what I can see, keeping the small screws and other hardware secure being the main concern. Handling these small assy parts will be looked at as well. Perusing the kit and instructions for a few years now a procedure became clear and direction visualised. I go through the instructions and found that separating the parts into their respective paint schemes is a good way to go about things. So we started there , with separate bags for gloss black , chrome , flat black and the color parts.
Parts in color separated bags:
Assy begins with the parts to be red:
Frame work:
Swingrm cleanup:
Engine assy:
First late-night paint session:
1-1 starter comparison:
For wiring purposes Tamiya dead-stopped the detail at he components, so we'll do some detailing of the wiring. Also the moldings have some round shapes to represent bolts etc. These will be removed and replaced with the relevant hardware.
Its also important with metalflake paint work to begin as soon as possible and maintain maximum patience levels. There are a lot of paint applications to get the flake on , clear over it , red over that , then more clear , ending up with 20 or so coats. I'll show some tricks to smooth and facilitate the work.\
Flaked:
Decent enough kit , lots of parts and screws and tools and really nice tires. We wont do the satin black version , too boring , it looks ok but not for me. These bikes came in candy orange as well, we'll change up to metalflake red , gloss black on the wheels and some flat for the drive train as I think that looks more realistic.
We'll also try to show the best way to handle the two trickiest parts of the model which are the painting of the engine cylinder fin edges in chrome , and the wheel centers in black. The wheels may be easy with some custom masks but regular vinyl tape would work as well. The cylinder and head fins may be tougher , some deft ab work may be in order, we'll see. No-one has shown how they did this tricky work anywhere on the interweb , so that will be shown here.
I have built custom Harleys for most of my life , in shops and on my own bikes. Softails never did it for me, the swingarm weighs as much as an entire hardtail frame. I did wire at least 50 choppers in the last 10 years, so I am very familiar with the assy procedures and makeup of the real bikes. There are few pitfalls on this kit from what I can see, keeping the small screws and other hardware secure being the main concern. Handling these small assy parts will be looked at as well. Perusing the kit and instructions for a few years now a procedure became clear and direction visualised. I go through the instructions and found that separating the parts into their respective paint schemes is a good way to go about things. So we started there , with separate bags for gloss black , chrome , flat black and the color parts.
Parts in color separated bags:
Assy begins with the parts to be red:
Frame work:
Swingrm cleanup:
Engine assy:
First late-night paint session:
1-1 starter comparison:
For wiring purposes Tamiya dead-stopped the detail at he components, so we'll do some detailing of the wiring. Also the moldings have some round shapes to represent bolts etc. These will be removed and replaced with the relevant hardware.
Its also important with metalflake paint work to begin as soon as possible and maintain maximum patience levels. There are a lot of paint applications to get the flake on , clear over it , red over that , then more clear , ending up with 20 or so coats. I'll show some tricks to smooth and facilitate the work.\
Flaked:
Keep it going! 
