Day 8

This morning I painted the opposite side of the back panel silver – this will be slightly visible through the clamshell. The other side was painted black yesterday. While waiting for that to dry, I attached the pedals, parking brake, seats, and shifter.

I will come back to this part soon. But first, there is more painting to be done! I began to assemble the pieces for the front of the car. This included the front grille, head lights, fog lights, and side mirrors. The mirrors attached relatively painlessly, though I did come close to gluing my finger to the model!

Next, I spray painted the front grille and headlight holders black. I also hand painted the fog light holder black, being careful not to get black paint on the light itself.

The front of the headlight holder had a small light at the front that I had accidentally painted black. I had to wait until the headlight holders were dry, so that I had something to hold on to, and I used Q-tip and my favorite can of paint thinner to try and remove the black paint from these 2 front lights. I did need to touch up the black area around it, but the chrome representing this front light now shines and will match the “100” headlights behind it.

While waiting for those pieces to dry, I finished assembling the interior. I glued the back panel in place, and then attached the back window. Oops! After about 3 seconds of allowing the glue to set while trying to press the back window into place, I realized I had the window in the wrong way. This piece did take a little bit of effort to detach it from the back panel, but at least the mistake will not be visible to Ralphie. :-)

Next came the doors. Rather than apply the glue first as I did with several other pieces, I attached the driver side door, held it in place with 2 fingers, and then glued the side and bottom edges from behind. I had to keep the door on its side until dry, and once I was sure the glue was set, I did the same to the passenger side door.

Finally, I attached the dashboard to the inside of the car, glued it in place, and did some touch up paint work. The interior of the GT is finally finished!! And now I have GT fever! Looking at these pictures makes me want to open the door, slide in, push the start button, and take off! :-)

But before I can take it for a spin (figuratively speaking), the outside shell still needs to be completed... Without further ado, I went downstairs to finish the front of the GT, excited at my progress! First, I glued the "100" headlights into the headlight holders (and now have glue covering the pads of my fingers). These turned out just fine.

The next step was to glue around the very outer edge, flip these lights upside down, and then maneuver them into place. The first one worked beautifully! The second one...not so much. Not only did it take awhile to slide into place, but I noticed that it was not sitting properly. I tore the headlight holder away to analyze the problem, and discovered that the black paint on the inside roof of the GT had a large bump that caused the light to lift at an odd angle. To correct this, I filed down the bump. (My finger nail files are getting a lot of use!!) However, when I tore the headlight holder from the GT's roof, it took quite a bit of black paint off of the front of the headlight. Before I could try again, I had to repaint the top of this piece, and then let it dry completely.

While waiting for the headlight to dry, I logged onto my computer to check my email and noticed that a few more of my friends sent photos of their GT's for the decals. At this point, I should have everything I need, so I put the best photos I could find into a MS Word document, cropped them, sized them appropriately, and sent them off via email to the new print shop. For those of you wondering how I "sized" them, I did it the old-fashioned way. I guesstimated, printed, cut them out, and compared them to the model to determine what the size should be. (I apologize to any tree-huggers out there. I wasted quite a few sheets of paper.) Although I have not heard back from the print shop yet, I am hoping the gentleman that I spoke with yesterday will agree that these are much better quality than what was sent to him yesterday!

My hope is that the GT will be finished tomorrow, and the rest of the decals will be ready to be picked up. Until tomorrow... ;-)