Rover 2000 TC: Paint

I have only been able to unearth one period colour photo of this car at the '65 Monte Carlo, showing a white roof and dark red body. (All body panels, including the roof, were bolted on, and I recall ads saying you could have a whole other set of body panels in your garage for, say, summer versus winter. But I digress). Sadly most colour photos online turn out to be of this kit, or of the Corgi version of it with the wrong hubcaps. Apparently the car is at the British Heritage Museum in Graydon, which I visited in 2001; if they had it on display at the time, I didn't take any pictures of it.



The photo illustrates the soft suspension leading to lots of squat on acceleration. Not particularly fast, but very comfy, and the leather seats were the most comfortable seats I have sat in up until the Volkswagen GTI came along. There are also some hilarious B&W pics online of it cornering, with so much understeer that it is trying to roll the inside front tyre off the rim.



Getting paint to stay on it was the usual problem, and after three or four trips to the acetone bath to strip it down and start over, I went back to the old favourite for metal, namely Duplicolor Primer Sealer. This fills in minor pits and scratches very nicely, and takes Tamiya rattle can paints well. I do not recommend it on styrene or resin, however, as I have seen problems with it; I would suggest sticking to the Tamiya stuff or primers that explicitly say they are for plastics.



So at this point I have the roof done with two or three coats of TS-7, Racing White; keeping my filthy big mitts off it for a few days while it hardens will be made easier by the fact I am heading out of town for a few days. Then I will tape up the roof and shoot the red, which will probably be Duplicolor Milano Red, a slightly dark shade of fire truck red. Stay tuned!