A couple more custom Hotwheels - Porsche 911 Targa and VW Drag Bus

 Just a short post today of two customs that I finished up.

The first is a Volkswagen Drag bus.

This was a relatively quick custom that turned out to be a little more "Christmas" themed than I had intended.

The drag bus started life and a Premium line, which means it already came with the metal base, and rubber "Real Riders" wheels and tires... so all I had to do was the paint.

After a quick dip in the stripper, I had a nice and clean casting... so I decided to try something a little different. Rather than straight paint, I had a can of clear green... and I thought why not.. let's see what happens.

Give it kind of a Candy green color... you can still see some of the sanding marks from where I cleaned it up after the stripper.

I also have some candy red that I tried to apply a "scallop" flame design to the side.

If you look close, you can see what looks like an outline on the scallops... this is actually where the red and green overlap.

As a relatively quick custom, the graphics were hand painted, along with headlights, taillights, rivets...

And some engine detailing on the base... just to make it look a little less toy-like.

Engine block, valve covers, fuel tanks were all painted, and I even added a little "heat staining" to the exhaust pipe.

The other custom I completed was a little more involved.

This one started as a Porsche 911 Carrera, and I decided to make a Targa out of it.

So out come the saw, and removed the center section of the roof.

With the interior a little more exposed, I though a nice hoop rollbar would be a nice addition.

So a small hoop made of bent brass rod was shaped and fit to be just behind the seats, and still be low enough to fit under the roofline.

A little selective painting brings out the details like headlights, taillights, exhaust tips, door handles... Again all in an attempt to make everything look a little less toy-like.

A set of resin 3D printed "FUCHS" style wheels completed this Porsche Outlaw looking creations.

I even modified where the axle fits on the base to "lower" the ride height of the car. With the lower profile tires, and raised axle location... this finished piece just barely still rolls without the tires getting hung-up.

Custom Hotwheels - Disassembly

 I am sure there are lots of threads out there in the internet on how to do this... and I don't know that I do anything especially different from anyone else. This is just the method that works best for me.

So with this random 80s movie reference... Let's begin to disassemble...

Extra points to you if you get the reference.

For this segment I am going to be taking apart an LB Super Silhouette Nissan Silvia (S15). Though the process is pretty similar to most Hotwheels

Every Hotwheel that I can remember of have dealt with are held together as a "sandwich of parts.

There is the base (with the wheels) the interior piece, the clear (or colored) plastic that makes up the windscreens, and the body.  The body has long "post" molded in that go down through all the layers, and is flared at the bottom to create a "rivet" end that holds everything together.

Here you can see one at the front of the car, and one in the back. The back one still has the yellow paint from the body.

And here is a little closer picture of the one in the front.

The "head" of the rivet is "squished" out to create a flare that is bigger than the hole it came through in the base and holds everything together.

This is the key of how we are going to get everything apart!

For the first step you really only need two of the three tools shown here.

A drill... and a 5/16" drill bit. Again, this size works best for me, but you want something that is large enough to take the top of the river off, but not chew up the base.

I have done more than a few of these, but be prepared to practice a few.

One of the more common problems I have encountered comes with the plastic base cars. As you are drilling the top off the rivet... sometimes the bit will "grab" the base and gouge a big hole in it. This will get the base loose, but does look a bit messy. Luckily this one cooperated, and both rivet heads came off cleanly.

And a little better picture of what I am left with.

From here, usually with just a little encouragement you get a nice pile of pieces.

From here, you can go on to stripping and repainting, swapping wheels, and anything else you want to do to the parts.... but I have a couple of other steps that I do to prepare it for re-assembly when all that hard work is done.

After drilling the posts will look like this, and will work great for re-assembly using superglue to hold the base to the body (with the interior and windscreen pieces in the sandwich) but I like to go a little further.

So I get out my Dremel with a round metal bit, and shave the posts down a little bit and round them out.

This certainly isn't the route you want to go if you are super-gluing everything back together at the end as the posts may be too short now... but I have another plan!

In the second picture, you can see the shortened, and rounded posts.

The next step is probably one of the two trickier steps....

We are going to drill a 1/16" hole in the middle of the post... Not all the way through, but down about 1/4".... Be careful with this step.... the 1/16" bits are very small and break quite easily. I think I bought a cheap pack of them at Harbor Freight... heck I even broke one while trying to take the pictures for this.

The next tool you need is a 2-56 tap set. (I think I got mine off of Amazon).

For those not familiar, a tap is a special cutting tool that cuts threads on the inside of the hole that you just drilled.

Here you can see the tap doing it's thing. There are small shavings coming out that are the threads being created... 

Three little tips for this step...

1. Same as the drill bit, the tap is pretty fragile... go slowly... It can be difficult to get it started.

2.I also like to use a small drop of a lightweight oil in the hole...(I use gun oil).. this helps lubricate the cutter, and also helps to keep the tap from clogging up too quick.

3. GO SLOWLY.. I know I said this above... but be gentle.. too much pressure will snap the tap off in the hole... and be sure to back the tap out a LOT and clean it off. This helps the threads to cut cleanly, and helps you get the tap back out of the bod.

Now that we have the posts for the body drilled, and tapped... it's time for these little guys.

Specifically these are #2-56 Button Head Socket Cap, Stainless Steel, Full thread screws. (3/16" length).

All that means is they are little machine screws with the same thread  as what we just tapped in the body. they screw in with a teenie-tiny allen head wrench...

And when done....

They look almost like the original thing.

Couple of pointers here. 

Using these screws you have to use the dremel to shorten the posts, so that the screws will seat against the chassis and pull everything tight. On some castings, if you don't it won't pull everything together nice and tight.

The same issue can happen if you don't drill the hole deep enough, and the screw bottoms out before everything gets pulled tight. This you can sometimes fix by drilling the hole deeper and adding more threads with the tap.

So that's my method for disassembly....It takes a little longer then the super glue method... but I am definitely fond of the final look when done.

Up next - STRIPPERS!!!

Hot Wheels Porsche 356A - Custom Convertible

Several weeks ago I posted the custom Ferrari 599 that I did as a police car for the monthly "get-together"...
Well, this time the theme was Porsche... and beyond that it was pretty open.

Well, I had this sweet little Porsche 356A that just came out, and couldn't help myself. I just had to tear in to it!

Here it is already separated from it's base and most of the black paint has been stripped off.
A few molding lines that needed to be cleaned up, but other than that, a solid starting point!

Out come the POWER TOOLS... A Dremel with a small cut-off wheel made short work of removing the roof and making the spider version. Some clean up and shaping with small files and we were just about done with the major surgery.

A quick mock-up to make sure everything still fit back together.  The clear plastic "glass" was cut down so that only the windscreen remains. It took some special care, and a lot of metal filing to leave the windshield frame. Luckily... the clear part was molded in such a way that it would stay in place when it was all sandwiched back together.

And with a lack of progress pictures, here is the final product.
The wheels were swapped for a set from Matchbox that I felt looked more correct for the basic roadster look I was going for.
Simple medium grey paint with details picked out like the headlights, leather hood tiedowns...

The interior I left red plastic, but added a little dark wash to bring out some of the details, and make it look a little more used, and less factory fresh.

And the final piece is the "boot" covering the retracted top.
This was molded from a piece of polymer modeling clay.... It stays soft and pliable until you bake it in the oven... (don't throw the whole car in there, just the clay part).
I could have spent more time getting it symmetrical, and smoothed it out some, but time was running short and I wanted it done for the meeting.

So there it is, my latest custom creation.
Not sure if there is a theme for this month's or not... I may not have one ready in time for this month.

But starting on a new 1/24 kit from Tamiya... very excited, but all of the decal work will be a project in itself.

Thank for stopping by!