Bugatti P-100 Racer

Motivated by Rolands 1:48 build of the same plane I decided to show the state my racer has advanced to so far. 

Being one of Special Hobbys newer kits, the Racer has quite a good fit. I want to show the plane unpainted, so no "color" at the cockpit, just "wood" and "metal". 

The wing roots require some trimming and dry fitting. 

I cut out the control surfaces. 

The resin vents at the edges of the three part stabilizer have to be carefully blended in.  

It does look fast, doesn't it? 

The supports were fashioned after pictures showing the plane under construction in a workshop. 

The wheel well covers at the landing gear are a bit coarse; so I did new ones from 0.2mm sheet. 

Trailing edge of the wings and a new air vent above the cockpit done. 

The canopy frame was flush with the clear parts. So the protuding frame of the kit part had to go.  

Trimming the edges for a flush fit with the fuselage 

Finally I found my motivation to finish the instrument panel. 

 

To add a dash of color, I opted for blue saftey belts. I suppose that this would be unusual for that time frame, but - Hey - Bugatti himself build that plane. Unusual stuff was the rule. 

Time to close the chapter Cockpit. 

Literally. The gaps were filled with highly diluted sprue gue. 

Here my preliminary idea of how to color this bird 

Build a few items for the workshop 

 

I struggled to find workshop equipment in scale 1:72. Here the polish company EMP3D came to my help. I ordered via superhobby.de and the stuff was produced on my demand. Yesterday it arrived and I am very pleased with the quality and the ease the parts can be separated with from the printing supports.  

The workshop equipment received some color. The workbench is scratched and crate, chair and gas trolley are from Hauler-sets. 

The EMP3D-parts really add to it. The orange plastic crate is only a guest from another project. 😉 

 

Finally the beautiful figure set "Painting Soldiers" from Royal Model arrived. They are beautifully sculpted but not without casting flaws. Some superglue should fix that. That they are supplied with three heads, two without military insignia was a nice surprise. The added compressor is a great addition. 

No, this build is not forgotten. Two further additions to the planned dio. 

Bottom with first basecoat with Mr Hobbycolor 313. I'd be surprised if it wouldn't show me some spots where some more filling and sanding is needed.  

As I sanded off all the canopy frame, placement of the masks was a bit tricky. But the frame of the original was flush. Thats why it had to go on the model too. 

Three colors had to be replicated. Stainless steel for the rear canopy part first. 

Dull aluminum on the two horizontal struts followed. 

The other 'frame' parts were just contact areas where the different pieces of the canopy were glued together. I tried to replicate that with matt coat with a little bit of matt white. 

And here we are. 

I am quite happy with it. 

The polished canopy allows quite a decent view into the cockpit.  

When everything is properly cured it will be masked it off again. Time to switch to the paint job of the body. 

Continued on the base. I used UvdR Workshop set as a starting point. The set is grossly disappointing as its layout is quite ridiculous. Some pieces were cut out and glued on cardboard. 

The painting workers were prepared, base coated and highlighted with white. 

Still quite a few areas to address. 

After sanding almost everything down I finally added another base color again. XF55 and XF59 were sprayed through a sanding sponge onto the base layer of XF57 to give it a bit of variation. 

Let the masking beginn... 

First steps with oils to create some wood. 

 

Second masking round 

 

Result after the third masking round. 

Ailerons and rudders, which are fabric covered, will be sanded carefully to show the structure of the internal frame. Then a few light passes with fabric color are planned. Let's see. 

Little by little. Taking care of the control surfaces. Modifying the technique Roland demonstrated at his SG-38 build.
scalemates.com/profi..bums&album=41779

After a beige base coat I carefully sanded the Ailerons again to bring out the rib structure. Then the fields in between were irregularly painted with highly diluted light buff to enhance the (hopefully) semitransparent effect. Next will be a light buff coat to simulate the fabric. 

Maybe a little bit too much coverage but bottomline I am quite happy with the effect. 

Love this technique. 

 

The last wooden panels were masked and painted. To paint wood in the small scale I like to use oils on an acrylic base. Various colors are put on a piece of cardboard so that the oil gets soaked up a bit. As a palette I use a small white tile. 

The basic tone of the wood grain is then stippled onto the panel. Tiny dots of other colors, usually darker ones are added randomly. 

With a dry brush I brush the oils in the direction of the intended wood grain.  

This is done until I am happy with the result. For a stronger grain texture I repeat the step with the tiny dots another time. 

The wood painting was quite elaborate. So time for some motivational shots before I switch to more masking and the metals. 

 

 

 

 

30 min masking for half a minute spray. 🙂 

Hope that the clear coat protects my "wood" sufficiently and doesn't get ruined when demasked. 

Demasking is always exciting. So here is the little bird with the metal parts sprayed. 

Detail painting will be the next step. 

I triple checked my masking but obviously missed a spot. I hope I can polish it out. 

I did not like the dark metal color at the exhausts at the wings. So I decided to modify them and to fix two more panels I messed when I tried to improve looks. 

well, that is more to my liking. 

took me a while to find a suitable technique to build the exhausts of the engines. The kit provides the shrouds only, but with the engines installed the exhaust tubes protude through the shroud. I tried canules of syringes first but handling them with grinding tools proofed too fiddly. Brass did not look good but then I recalled that I have aluminum tubes slide-to-fit it my stash. The 0.9 mm ones had a nice big inner diameter and were easy to handle with saw and file and superglue. Now it looks the part. 

Final masking session (at least I hope so) to go for some shading 

Demasking after mottling the metal parts with Alclad dull aluminum and steel. Looks much better IMHO. 

A panelline wash enhanced depth. Dark brown was used for the wooden parts, black for the metal ones. 

Another varnish to protect the effects to follow.  

Fed up with the crappy Uschi von der Rosten paper workshop I decided with a heavy heart to do things myself. Glueing the paper on cardboard resulted in some warp, so I tried a different technique.
Modelling clay rolled over sheet, trimmed and scribed. 

Layout of the wall corner. 

Base plate advanced. The panel lines will be emphasized and the floor will get more dirty. 

Progress on the first wall. Base colored concrete, the bricks in H47, the iron beams received anticorrosion red (masked) and some bricks were picked out with various colors.
Next steps are plaster of paris as mortar and some washes to blend the bricks. 

Hm. You don´t see nottin. So let me tell you: I matt varnished half the wooden part of the plane to have a difference in shine. Here is the idea: the painting guy (see pic 36) will stand and coat the wooden parts with a wood protection varnish. So the left part of the plane is shiny (coated) and the right is matt. Well - let´s say: I didn´t ruin the build. But - honestly - you probably won´t realise it if it is not pointed out. I thought the effect would be more prominent.
But hey, the AK Ultramatt varnish is good stuff and eats up any shine there is.  

Further progress on my first wall. The preliminary result after adding the plaster, removing most of it again and blending everything together with some washes. 

Calling the first wall done. Lamp and radiators come from EMP3d, the other details are scratched. 

Finally got the scribing done on the second wall, glued the panels and fashioned the window. A varnish sealed the plaster parts.
Ready for primer. 

First of the two figures done 

 

 

Pain-twork done on the second wall. 

A couple of washes later. Unfortunately not quite the same as the other wall. Will have to get this one closer... 

The little racer is ready. 

I redid the canopy frame as the original one suffered from handling. 

 

Actually there were four access panels on the backbone which I tried to replicate. But it took three attempts with different materials to build them. When finally mounted they looked pretty much out of place. So they were removed again. 

 

Props are now glued for good. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now the little bird needs a home.

Stay with me 

I inch myself forward. Window installed, wall tweaked, handels on the drawers of the workdesk attached.  

Some more stuff ready for paint. 

Setback. Masked the inside to paint the edges. When removing the tape some of the groundwork peeled off too. 

Filled the defects with acrylic plaster. Impossible to achieve the same look like the surrounding. But, hey, any workshop floor repair might look similar. So I call it a feature, not a bug.

 

Motivational shot.
Floor fixed. Walls further detailled. Main components of the workshop placed.
Paint on o few detail will be next. 

Thought I messed it but the repair turned out ok. 

Will have to reattach the brush which broke off. 

The walls finally done and assembled. 

Was looking for french adds of the thirties, printed them on decal paper and stuck them to styrene sheet.  

The radiators received their plumbing anew after I lost three of them during handling 

Chose to put the plane off its supports and onto its wheels 

Calling this one done. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Detail shot of the Carpentry. 

Saw dust done with light pigments.
 

 

A word or two concerning the shades of blue. A lot of people- me included - would have expected a french Bugatti to appear in French Racing Blue. But the color the prototype was colored with, was a much darker blue. So, the builder of the replica opted for this dark shade for his plane. I found the argument that the dark blue color might have been a mere primer and was to be painted over with the Bugatti blue later on. I burrowed this concept. So, this is what you see here. Parts of the wheel well covers primed in dark blue in the process of receiving the final coat of French Racing Blue.