Motorbike building Tips.

Modeling Subjects Autos
1

Hey all.

How about if we post our tips, techniques, AM parts & links here on how to improve Motor Bike Models. I see many tips for cars, tanks, planes, etc but few for Motorbikes as such.

In recent days many have talked about opening of air-holes on Brake discs for models where this is not done by the kit maker.

Here is a site that I often reference for tips and techniques, many are common and well-known others are not.
http://home.interlog.com/~khartlen/tips/tips.htm

I will also translate a few tips from older Tamiya publications that deal with Motor bikes and tips for improving them, again many of those are well known.

Of course people can/should also ask for tips/techniques on how to improve certain areas of their Kits.

Tip #1:
Improving Spark plug wires WITHOUT the need for drilling or cutting parts.
Materials needed:
1mm rubber tube(usually supplied in Kit)
0.5mm rubber/plastic covered wire(AM Spark plug wire)

Cut 3mm sections of the 1mm rubber tube (1 per spark plug), and cut the 0.5mm wire into the length given in the Instruction sheet.

Slide the 1mm tube over the sparkplug as per instruction, insert the 0.5mm wrie into the 1mm tube and secure. FINISHED.

I find this helps with the look of many custom choppers as they oftem use AM parts and wiring harnesses.

More to come later on.

2

Here are some more tips from Tamiya:

http://www.tamiya.com/english/howto/bike1/howto_bike1.htm

Have fun.

3

Tip #2:
Mirrors
In the recent Kits Tamiya has decided to include Metal film for mirrors and similar areas.
Interestingly enough this technique was already recommended by them 20yrs ago in one of their publications.

You should be able to get hold of metal tape(Silver, Gold, etc) and use it instead of the supplied film or on kits where it was not supplied.
I normally got the tape bigger than i need it and work the tape onto the part using Q-tips and tooth-picks and than simply run the knife along the edge to cut and remove the excess.

Tip #3:
Many Bikes use a black tipped halogen bulb in their headlights, I often apply a small dap of flat black to the molded in bulb to simulate this.

Tip #4:
Painting the headlight careful with Gunze Sangyo’s Smoke Clear Blue can achieve a sligthly tinted lens look. NOTE: This is a separate colour from Clear Blue.
Clear yellow of course will also work for older Bikes.

Tip #5:
Bikes are exposed to a lot of sunlight and colour will fade in places, most older Bikes will also show this on indicator lenses, some being darker than others or where a lens was replaced due to cracking, damage, etc.

Tip #6:
Fuel stains, on many older Bikes the fuel tap starts leaking fuel a bit this will drop onto the engine block and over time create a small yellowish stain, use clear yellow to reproduce this.

Tip #7:
Drive Sprockets don’t wear evenly one side of the tooth will look flatter, you can sand them down a bit to create a worn look.

More elaborate tips to come soon.

4

Tip #8:
Exhausts
1.) Strip ANY plating of the exhaust.
2.) Remove any alignment pins and sand the interior smooth.
3.) Paint the interior flat black
4.) Assemble the exhaust halves and fill/sand the joint smooth.
5.) Paint the exhaust, AM pipes are often black.

At times the rear plate of the exhaust will have holes drill them open them if needed, install into the mufler.

Dirtying up the exhaust pipes inside, Motorbike exhausts are dirty and can be greasy depending on how the engine runs and burns.
You can use different colours to represent this, flatblack with ground pencil lead rubbed into it will work ok.
The dirt goes a bit over outside end of the exhaust too.

Check a few Bikes in your neighbourhood to get a good feel for it.

5

Forgot to post one thing that was on my mind.

Tamiya includes those little screw-drivers in their Motorbike Kits. I normally ditch mine as they are #0 size the screws are best used with a #00 driver.

Luckily found a set with #1, #0, #00 screwdrivers and matching set of minus screwdrivers at the 1-Coin shop.

Sometimes I wonder why some makers include wrong sized tools or screws that are way too soft to be used properly.[?][?]

6

Tip #9:
Fairings.

Most fairings in the kit are too thick and the edges should be thinned to represent a more authentic look, simply sand the fairing from the inside.

7

Tip #10:
Plated parts.

Here many people will disagree with me, but I find the plating to represent Chrome to bright and shiny on the Kits.

It can be easily taken off using standard kitchen bleach and than repainted using metallizer colours.

Many Bikers I know strip the plating of the crank and similar covers and polish the aluminum cover to a high-gloss finish, this is done mostly for looks as Chrome covers get soon dirty, many also sandblast them along with the Engine block heads (Common ons V-Twins and Harleys).

Tip #11:
Engine blocks.

It is not uncommon for engine blocks to be repainted by a rider, initially engine were all metal till the Vincent Black Shadow first used a heat dissipating black paint. FYI, even most metallic looking engines got a coat of paint over them and this will be affected by the heat of the engine.

Tip #12:
Rear Rims.

Especially on many roadbikes that are in daily use you will find quiet a accumulation of dirt on the rims. Rear wheels also often suffer from chain-lube splatter, lube is applied to the chain and often will fly of the chain during the first run and spatter the rim.

Tip #13:
Brake Fluid containers:

Many Bikes got Brake fluid containers attached to the handlebars, those are either white plastic with black lid or metal containers that are painted black.

On the metal containers it is not uncommon to see the paint flaking off from spilt brake fluid.

Have fun, still plenty to come.

8

Many of the modern (sport bike) motorcycles use stainless steel or titanum for the exhaust systems (CBR929, GSXR1000,750,600) all come from the fatory with Ti (titanum) headers. The tail pipe is made out of aluminum and it has a brushed finish. Ti is grey in color, but when the bike is running parts it will turn blue or purple. Weld joints on the pipe will turn gold in color and are usually shinyier than the surrounding tube.
A stainless steel system with usually will turn a yellowish (some times it will tun a metalic brown color too) color esp in the header area as you go back the color will get lighter hot > cool.

(mad modeller, if your riding a motorcycle that has sprokets that are showing that much wear you should really replace them… chain too… your loosing Horse power, have seen it on the Dyno, as much as 6 hp… no kidding)

Herr Gray [:-^]

9

Don’y worry my Bikes are well maintained, atleast I don’t turn the sprockets over when they are worn.

Chain and sprockets are always replaced at the same time with me.
BTW, I am not into superbikes, but prefer choppers, touring bikes and similar.

Things that I can customise and fix myself on the weekend. [;)]
Most Bike models I build are customised, aged and weathered similar to Bikes I see daily on the road and at rallies.
I am one of the guys that rides 365 days a year(unless the weather is REALLY too bad).

10

I’ll give you some credit it is more easy to build a “clean” bike than a dirty… But for me my bikes always stayed clean, so I could not bring my self to build a “dirty” bike.[:-^] I have seen many dirty bikes …[xx(] and I have had to work on a few [:(!] I would say thing to the customers like, “next time you wash it you might want to get it a little closer to the hose [:D]”
Anyway, you have excellent tips for those that do want to build well used machines… I just added a few for the sport bike types out there [:D]

Herr Gray

11

I also like my Bikes clean, but doing 80km a day to work and back does show wear and dirt on the Bike.

Usually washed, serviced and did customisation jobs on them on Sundays after I came back from the Breakfast run.

Usually I always own 2 or more Bikes at the same time, so having one stripped does not make an impact on my life.
[:D]

Either way it is good to have tips for clean an dirty Bikes out there.

12

I agree. Since the scoot is all I own, riding it takes precedent over washing it. Once I get the hang of simply assembling something, I’ll get more into the detailing. Normal wear and dirt will be a part of that detail.

13

I’ve been working on the $3.00 1:18th scale motorcycle diecasts. New bodywork first, then the ducts, frame, brakes, engine, hoses, wiring and paint. talk about a challenge…
The first bike is a cbr600 the way I would want it…
katana

14

This post is a goldmine…

Thanks guys.

Murray

15

Tip #11:
Worn seats on Motorbikes(softened foam).

This is a bit more complex than the other tips.
1.) Take the seat and turn it over.
2.) Put Epoxy putty on the inside where you want to deform the seat
3.) Turn seat over and with a Hobby knife cut the plastic away to expose the putty.
4.) Shape the Putty to look like compressed/softened foam with a loose cover over it.
5.) Smooth edges and finish as normal.

Tip #12:
Carburettor Air-funnel:

Many Bikes drop the air-box and instead at wire filter or similar to their Carburetors, here is a quick and easy method to make them look better.
1.) Measure the mesh diameter on the plastic part.
2.) Take wooden block and cut a hole into a bit larger than the measure diameter.
3.) Put Copper mesh over the wood block and PRESS the plastic part down over the whole to form a copy of it.
4.) Cut out and glue over the Plastic part.

Tip #13:
Radiator Grills:

Many Bike Models got the radiator grilled molded on, best is to cut it off thin the frame where the frame was and glue wire mesh to make a new grill.

Tip #14:
Splitting the fairing.

Many Models come with the upper and lower fairing molded as one piece.
1.) Cut the fairing apart at the joint.
2.) Attack a strip of 0.5mm styrene sheet to the upper fairing(left and right.
3.) Temporarily fix the upper and lower halves together again and drill the molded pins out and also through the styrene sheet attached to the upper fairing.
3.) Make new pins by cutting stortening pinning needles to a length of 2mm (head included of course)
4.) Attach new pins to the lower fairing.

16

Tip #15:
Adding cushions to G.P. Bikes.

Many G.P. Bikes got red-brown cushions under the tank, seat and other locations, those can be cut from 0.3 ~ 0.5mm styrene sheets.

Those are often attached with nylon bands/cords to the frame and radiatorst, the bands can be made from a variety of materials or even thin masking tape cut into sized strips.

Tip #16:
Adding a Windscreen to Choppers.

I will add this at a later stage as I will need to scan the template in.

Tip #17:
Racing fairings and seats:

Many of the older Bikes had their standard fairings cut for racing and quick maintenance access, this includes BOTH fronf airings and side fairings under the seat. Check publications for references.

Racing Seats can be made from Plastic sheeting, 2 sheets clued togethr in a rough L-shape conforming to the fairing(locator pins will need to be rumoved from the fairing).

The L-shaped sheeting is than covered with epoxy putty and sculpted into the cushion shape.

Tip #18:
Adding weldmarks to the Frames and Swingarm.

Weldmarks on Frames:
Add a thin line of putty into the part where you want the weldmark, add detail with the sharp end of a bit of stretched runner or similar tool.

Weldmarks on Exhaust chambers can be added by gluing stretched sprue to the parts.

Tip #19:
Adding seatbelts to Motorbike Seats.

Take 0.5mm plastic sheeting and cut it into a strip as thich as the belt should be,
bend and glue to the seat. paint seat as normal.

Optional:
You can scribe stitch marks into the belt to make it more realistic.

Tip #20:
Replacing molded wheel spokes with Wire spokes.

I will need to do some scanning of this one too. [;)]

Tip 21:
Making your own stackable display cases for your Motorbikes.

Again will do some scans and than post the full details.

Note:
Many of the Tips I have posted here come from a small publication called “Tamiya Junior News” and was published about 18yrs ago.
Hoping to find more of those little goodies on at the 2nd-hand shop as they are bassically give-aways at $0.40 and contain wealth of tips and visual references.

Most of he tips were designed for Models that were released at the time of issue of the publication, but will work with many other models too.

17

Tip #22.
Part 1: Gluing fairing/body halves together with NO puttying needed.

1.) Remove all alignement pins from the body-parts.
2.) Apply glue to both sides and set aside for a short while, this will soften the plastic on the join edges.
3.) Put the parts together and rub(with some pressure) them against each other till a bit of excess plastic forms a ridge on the joint, align and let to dry.
4.) Once dried scrape the excess ridge off with a modelling knife and sand smooth.

The part should be joined now with no visible seam. [;)]

Part 2: Prepping for paint and decals.

1.) Take your fairing and body parts and polish them with a finishing cloth till they are smooth and shiny. Fine top-compounds will also work
2.) Spray your parts in the desired colour/colours.
3.) Prep them again with the finishing cloth/etc.
4.) Apply your Decals/
5.) Finish the kit off with Modelling wax to give it a shiny and deep finish.

Note:
No primer is used here, but I think it would work on a primed kit too.