1951 Belair: getting the stance right

So I got brave and took 2 mm out of the lower edge of the inner door panels. These are resin parts and presumably hard to replace if I screw up. However it all worked out and the chassis now sits where it should, with the tops of the door panels roughly level with the door tops.

The stance as shown here is with the dropped kingpins, the rear axle in its standard position, and with two types of whitewalls from the parts bin. The fronts are from one of the aftermarket companies supplied through Model Roundup (I forget which one), and are the same size as the black walls that come with the AMT kit. Note they are very large inside the fenders and would not steer at 1:1 without fouling the fenders. The rears are from AMT's MH Racemaster slicks parts pack and are both taller and wider. While they raise the rear, the stance is actually quite nice, and furthermore they now fill out the fender wells a lot better. I suppose another approach will be to go for the down in the weeds look by lowering the rear. To be decided.



It also appears that the chassis needs to move rearwards slightly relative to the body (the wheels look to me to be a bit forward in their fenders), which will allow the body to drop a bit more over the chassis (it's hanging up on the top of the dashboard, and just inside the rear bumper). Too much and I'll have to cut clearance for the headers peeking out from under the right side rocker panel.



Incidentally I had problems getting the color coat, a Krylon automotive paint, to sit on the inner fenders, even on top of Tamiya primer. This is interesting because the Tamiya rattle cans and Testor's bottled paint all took fine. This could be because the solvent used in these auto paints is a lot more aggressive ('hot') than Testor's or Tamiya. Anyway I stripped it all off with paint thinner, then cleaned it up some more with isopropyl alcohol and put on a couple of coats of DupliColor primer-sealer. That seemed to do the trick. I've given the body some added scrubbing with alcohol just to be safe.

So progress is being made! As this is my first transkit, as opposed to the multi-media resin items from Profil 24 or Model Factory Hiro, I am pleased with the state of it at this point. So far (says I, knocking loudly on wood), the trimming and adjusting needed has not been horrendous. Stay tuned!