1/20 Tamiya McLaren MP4/13
Build Report:


General Impressions

The kit comes with over 100 Pieces. The parts of the kit fit perfectly (Tamiya quality). I built this kit straight out of the box, without superdetailing. All parts were painted according to the instructions, unless noted otherwise here.
 

Monocoque, Cowling, and Front nose

The monocoque causes some problems, because it's two haves like the Tamiya McLaren MP 4/8 Ford. It must be glued together with the seat installed before painting (the gap between the two halves from the monocoque must be filled/sanded).
 
The rear cowling is made up of three parts. They must be glued, filled and sanded before painting. The front nose is also made up of three parts and must be glued, filled and sanded before painting.
 



I painted the body first with Tamiya XF-16. Some parts should be painted with MS-5 (metalic grey). I mixed XF-56 and X-18 like the color on the decal for the rear wing. 

The Decals are very thin, like the decals from CLK. I use a little bit decal softener to apply the decals. The decals fits perfekt.



The undertray is predominantly black and the central "blank" needs a wood grain finish. I sprayed tamiya XF-52 for this, and while still soft, I dragged a piece of very rough sandpaper down the length to represent grain. Light washes of woody colours mixed from Humbrol Enamels resulted in a realistic wood finish.


 


Engine

Main block and gearbox are superbly detailed. With careful painting it gives a great look. The exhaust system looks better then other formula 1 kits from Tamiya. The painting must be in three steps: first X-11, then X-2/XF2, end the end in X11/X12. After drying the paint, I paint with little bit of X-19 (Smoke), and this gives the effect of heating metal.

 



Wings

The front wing is made up of three parts. I used Karbondecals (Scale Motorsport 1/43) for the black sections. The rear wing is made up of four parts. I also applied Karbondecals for the black sections. I painted the upper element with X-2 and the lower element with an mix XF-56/X18. then I applied the decals. The decals for the upper element fit very well. The two big wind deflectors are also painted with a mix of XF56/X18. I applied Karbondecals for the black sections.

 


The WEST-Sponsordecals come from STUDIO 27. The Driver figure comes from the Tamiya Kit "Technical Director and Driver". The decals for the helmet from Hakkinen and Coulthard are also on the STUDIO-27 Decal sheet. So it is easy to build the driver figure.

After drying the paint, I sprayed two coats X-22(CLEAR) with a little bit of thinner on monocoque, cowling, wings and wheels. Thats all folks!