Sincerest thanks for those kind words Mark, it's definitely been a labour but a highly enjoyable one!
Many apologies for the lengthy delay since the last posting – have had some medical problems with both myself and my 95 year old Mum. Mum’s are thankfully gone now, mine are ‘improving’ (slowly since I’ve just joined the ranks of the OAPs – hey, FREE BUS PASS! Yahoo!)
Anyway, I’ve now discovered how to get up to the attic and back down again one handed so here we are again!
The actual construction of the nameplate for the eventual display base was done before my ‘ahem’ accident but its taken until now to get the resultant trial castings painted up to where I could take photos for the diary and post them up.
As seen in Photo 1, the basis for the nameplate was the original base plaques for the scratch build Chindit bust from a few years ago. As intended at the time, the Chindit’s nameplate had the 3d plastic letters fixed down with Deluxe Card Glue so I would be able to dismantle them again for the next project. The bigger nameplate at the top has been soaked in fairly hot clean water until the glue softened and the letters could be pulled off the plasticard. The smaller sign in the middle is awaiting that task and the new Ferrari 312T4 sign under way at the bottom is composed of some recovered letters and some newly removed from the sprue they came on (once I'd found the sprue of course). If I remember correctly the company that makes the letters is called Carrs – they are actually designed for making railway station names in various scales for model railways but they are perfect for making three dimensional name plates too!
Photo 2 shows the new sign with the tiny letters now recovered forming the second line of the Ferrari info. Note that the ‘NO’, short for number of course, later had the ‘o’ replaced with an even smaller slice of round styrene rod with its centre drilled out to form a better looking version. In Photo 3 the 3d lettering is completed, the main technical info will be from a DIY decal made later. The nameplate is now being fitted out with a styrene square rod frame which surrounds the entire plate and also divides the text area from the Ferrari logo and a photo of the great man Giles himself. The logo badge I’d already obtained from the internet back at the beginning of the build to replace the one on the front wing, the photo of Giles was similarly found after much more trawling through the net!
Photos 4 and 5 show the process of turning the original into a silicone mould for casting the plate in resin. In 4 the plate has been temporarily fixed to the melamine base with a couple of drops of card glue and the usual mould box constructed around it with good old Lego bricks, in 5 we have the rubber mould below and the recovered original above – the tiny things scattered around the lower section are the few letters that came off the base when it was removed from the rubber!
The first casting I tried was using what resin I had left from the Sword Beach project, this was probably a year old by the time I was using it on those castings and its now gone way past its use by date! Although it will still mix and cure, the finish is becoming a little ‘variable’ with some areas coming out more shiny than others and I think, more prone to air bubbles too. I sent off for a fresh supply from my usual online supplier and the result is shown in Photo 6. The old resin is shown at the bottom and you might just make out the uneven finish, the new, fresh resin is shown above and is a much more uniform consistency. The first casting wasn’t wasted however; it is shown again at the top after a coat of black car primer and a polishing over with the Uschi Chrome finish powder. The logo and data section are simply plain paper printings from the developing decal sheet graphics placed on the casting – just to experiment!
Photo 7 shows the photo I found of Giles on the internet, this will be cropped down to just his head and shoulders for the rectangular box on the right of the plate. The next trial was to use the ‘good’ casting with a coat of Vallejo Grey primer airbrushed on followed by a second coat of a car spray Chrome as seen in Photo 8. To help the letters stand out more they were then given a MiG Blue-Black enamel wash applied around each letter by very small, fine paintbrush. Photo 9 illustrates half of the Ferrari 312T4 and most of the smaller second line after the wash was applied.
The full trial is shown in Photos 10 to 14 – 10 is the first defective casting with the Chrome finish powder polished on, the logo, portrait and data section are all ink jet printed on to self adhesive sticker paper. Photo 11 had the casting first primed and then sprayed with a commercial gold aerosol before adding the same blue-black ink wash to the raised lettering and the same sticker paper artwork. Photo 12 is the chrome sprayed example seen earlier but with the first of the inkjet DIY waterslide decals as opposed to the stickers, these are a little darker than the sticker paper ones. Photo 13 is a return to the same gold sprayed one but with the main title letters picked out in the Italian national flag colours to match the tricolour stripe which runs around the top of the body shell and finally, Photo 14 is an example first primed with Vallejo Grey Primer followed by an airbrushed two coats of Vallejo Ferrari Red and a coat of gloss varnish to seal it all down and provide a better finish for the waterslide decals. The lettering was picked out (very carefully) in Mig Matt White.
The final stage will be to make up a wooden plinth for the painted cast plates to sit in, and that comes in the next instalment!
Until then, (not so long I hope) Happy Modelling to you All!

Robin.