On the bench in Feb 2010

Alfa Romeo BAT11 by Yowmodellini

Yow Ito’s concept/styling kits are an asset as most Concept/Styling cars are only made as built models therefore by-passing the kit builder. Yow is a new supplier to us at the Studio and it was good to receive the first kits from him a few months back.

Yow’s kits are rather expensive at the moment due to the high exchange rate with the Yen. They come in a rather odd plastic packaging that offers no protection to the contents inside. Fortunately the postal packaging was substantial so kits were undamaged. The kit contains well cast resin wheels/tyres, dash, seats etc. and decals for the light badges. There are no instructions and just a small photo of the finished model, so a good look over images of the real car is helpful as it’s not obvious where some parts go.

There were a few air bubble holes to be filled, then a quick degrease and it was ready to prime. After priming it was painted a metallic mid green as the 1:1 scale car. The vac-form forms the roof and windows so has to be masked and painted body colour. Not for the beginner it would have been nice if there were two vac-forms, one for testing on first………….

Next step was to paint all the ancillary parts, wheel/tyres are cast in black resin with separate brake discs, and wheel centers. Wheel centers come as two parts which are painted sliver and black. Interior consists of cast base with rear parcel shelf, separate seats, dash parts and steering wheel. These are mid grey on the real car.

Final assembly is relatively straight forward but one thing to note is that wheel have no axles and are just glued under the wheel arches. Care needs to be taken to get the correct ride height on all four wheels and last but not least there are a few decals for badges, lights etc.

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Dave Eames : Automodelli Studio