I finally finished my build of the Revell F10 back in early December. Christmas seemed to start so early this year – the whole month of December became a bit of a blur and I never got posting the final pictures. Between decorations, parties, Ebay sales and my son doing a revamp of my Website (I’d be totally lost without his technical know-how- so a sincere thanks to him) I’m way behind on my Blog postings – so this is the first of 2012 with hopefully more to come on a daily basis (after all, New Year resolutions are made to be broken!!). A few words on the F10 build -its more or less an “Out of the box” job with a few additions, however, there is one major difference; this version never existed in reality! For a number of years I’ve wanted to build a “Black Test” car version of an F1 Ferrari – I had been intending to use one of my un-built 1/20 Tamiya F2000’s (which has been languishing in my kit stash for many years) and then when I saw the looks and lines of the fabulous F10 I became totally smitten by it. So when Revell brought it out in 24th scale, I just had to build one – well two actually! I also have another (conventional) one “on the go” at the moment – but more on that later. For this build, I decided to indulge myself with a bit of “What-if” while I was at it and get a few other “itchings” out of my system!
I often get the impression that using the “What-if” approach to miniature modelling can result in the final product looking a bit “Sci-Fi-ish” if one doesn’t start out with some sort of structure and boundary for the project – making it up as one “goes along” can produce a somewhat confused result. I wanted to use the opportunity to include some surface finishes which I hadn’t used in plastic builds before and also to use aspects of the F10’s design which evolved later in the 2010 season and incorporate them all into a season long Test “mule” if you will.  So I imagined a Test car running for a full season at Firano with bits being added and subtracted as they were developed and subsequently discarded in search of those illusive mili-seconds of improvement! So this version is a compilation of what that imagined car might look like with the early and late aspects brought together for the purpose of my indulgence – there’s nothing like having ones own test track!! This approach allowed me to include the bits I really like about the F10 – for instance, I love the Airbox fin and the subsequently outlawed what I call; “outrider wing mirrors” – I think they contrast really well with the sharp pointy nose of the car and give it a kind of attractive “prickly-ness” – but I better stop there before I get too technical!!
I had intended doing the entire car in Carbon Fibre but to to be honest, I chickened out and went for matt black instead. As an aside, I have a 1/18 scale Minichamps Jordan 191 already painted matt black for some months now waiting to be “Carbonised” – I’ll have to be careful or I’m in danger of running out of long fingers!  Back to the F10 again, while I was quite pleased with the final result, I thought it looked somewhat “dull” so I added little highlights by covering the exhaust panels and wing mirrors in a bright Carbon fibre. I wanted to include a reference to the old (now defunct) “Barcode livery” by chopping down the fin decal to fit the rear wing. This decal looked a little “lonely” back there so I added an “echo” of the Barcode on the front nose courtesy of my decal spares-box. Again, to liven-up the overall appearance I used the green (soft compound) markings on the Bridgestones – (now I’m really stretching reality!). While I’m very satisfied with the overall result, I understand this “flight of fancy” may not be for the F1 purist among you.  So now back to finishing that other “conventional” F10 I see poking from the shelf above my bench, or perhaps I’ll carbonise the Minichamps Jordan – on second thought I think I’ll just “un-make” another New year resolution – start like you intend to continue I say -enjoy the small gallery shots below!
So now that I’ve kicked off 2012 with my first post, I wish all my friends and supporters a very Happy New Year -have a good one – Cheers.