This Mustang is painted Tamiya acrylic X8 Lemon Yellow. It’s not a model of a “real” life-size car; just a car painted up to run on the track and stand out from all the factory-painted RTRs it races with. The idea in choosing paint colors and decals is to make the car look attractive and also to give it the appearance of a car that could be real. All the decals used on this car are waterslide decals from various sheets in the builder’s decal box, except for the “TropiKai Resorts” which the builder printed on his HP932C printer using Micromark decal paper. Before the decals went on, the body received a coat of Testor 1161 Glosscote thinned with ordinary lacquer thinner. All the painting was done with a Binks Wren airbrush with air pressure supplied by a Badger compressor. Because the airbrush sprays such fine coats of paint you can apply a lacquer-based clearcoat over enamel or acrylic paint without damaging the finish. The builder applied more coats of Glosscote after the decals to seal them into the car’s surface and leave the body with a finish that can be rubbed out to a high gloss.
On this particular car parts of the body are incorporated into the chassis, so those areas were masked off and painted in the same way.
The driver’s helmet was painted to match the body color and the door handles picked out in silver paint using a fine brush. The wheels were painted with Testor #1781 Model Master aluminum and a coat of clear. This replaces the wheels’ original chrome finish with one that looks more like real alloy racing wheels.
With painting complete, reassembly consisted of snapping in the windows and interior, reattaching the bumpers, taillights, and grille with tiny amounts of CA glue, and remounting the body on the chassis. The car was then ready to race with a new and unique look.
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