Broken Dreams

Completed March 2019

This was one of my all-time favourite builds and It brought back some really good memories! Tamiya’s Honda CB 750F is a really easy kit to build and I had ample opportunity to focus on the weathering aspects of the build. Surprising, this one took 5 months to complete despite having worked on it every day! I really had so much fun!

As always, I started with the base, using a very basic, dry- fitted model to determine the size base I would need. I cast the concrete floor by making a wooden frame which was as high as the wall and floor would be thick, and pouring a cement mixture in, and levelling it as if I were casting a real concrete floor.  Once dry, I bent the floor slab gently to make the required cracks, and scored the wall using a craft knife to simulate the cinder block outlines. Genkem bonded wall and floor together well.

Having marked the “bricks” on 1mm thick card from the back of a writing pad, I cut them out using a craft knife. Then, spacing them the width of the same writing pad, I pasted the bricks using wood glue. The wooden fence was made from coffee stirrers that I had bummed from the coffee guy at the gym’s coffee shop. I applied a good coat of imbuia wood stain to the fence and painted the wall using Vallejo cavalry brown. Then I used various shades of brown and painted the bricks a multitude of shades. (It is a good idea to reference brick walls on the internet, see what they look like for real, then do your own thing based on what you have seen. No two walls are the same). 

I then rubbed a water-diluted Polyfilla Fine Crack Filler over the wall and immediately wiped it off again using a damp cloth. This was followed by applying an oil wash of a light grey/brown colour and then over spraying that with Rust-Oleum Frosted Glass Spray Paint. This stuff is not to be confused with matte, because, even though it does have a matte finish, it also leaves a whitish hue. Perfect for what I wanted though.

I applied AK “Moss Deposits” to all the cracks, shoved some dried java moss pieces (after I had painted them various shades of green). I then applied diluted white glue randomly all over the slab where I wanted dried leaves to be. Then I generously tossed the dried leaves over the glue, pressing them down here and there. I make my leaf pieces by chopping real dried leaves in my coffee mill. Once the glue had dried (I always leave it for 24hours to be sure), I blew off the excess “leaves” and the floor was done!

I glued painted java fern to the wooden fence, and then glued the fence to the wall using wood glue. At this point, I added an empty packet of Lucky Strike 20s in the corner that I had made from a template I found on the internet. The base was complete.

Then on to the engine.

I looked at some old engines to see what colour faded aluminium looked like and attempted to replicate that. I first sprayed the engine using XF-16 Aluminum acrylic paint (flat), then, once dried, applied a dark grey oil wash into the seams, joints and cracks, and once that had dried too, I airbrushed a mist coat of light grey over everything. This was followed by airbrushing patched of super light grey (almost white) here and there over the engine. The area around the bolts was washed with thinned burnt umber oils. I am, pleased at how this turned out.  

I airbrushed the brake discs using XF-16 again, followed by randomly dabbing a black oil wash over them. Once dry, and making sure not to be too uniform, I used various AMMO and MIG pigments to get the rust effects I wanted. I took an old, very used and dirty piece of fine sandpaper to the rubber tyres to give them a messed up look, and applied a blotchy, random black wash to the rims, then finished the wheels and swingarm assemblies.

After having attached the carbs and air cleaner box to the engine, I dabbed some Vallejo and MIG “engine grime” (they are different, though they have the same name) to the whole lot. After that I used some ochre, and also black, MIG Air Blusher thinned with mineral turpentine to create some streaking effects.

The headers received the same treatment, but only much heavier. I then took MIG “track rust” and “medium rust” and dabbed it randomly over the exhausts and headers to give that powdery, rusted texture, adding a bit more at all the joints. 

I used MIG “Rust” oilbrusher to create the dark rust that one might find on a frame that is starting to rust on all the joints and seams. I also added some MIG “Red Primer” and “Ochre” oilbrushers on the edges of the dark rust to create the desired effect of varied degrees of rusting. Then I fitted the lot together.

Exhausts

I first stripped the chrome off the exhausts using bleach. Then I airbrushed them using Tamiya chrome silver (X-11). My reason for not using the original kit chrome paint, is that it was way too shiny for what I wanted to do. X-11 is not really chrome at all, but it does give a nice dullish chrome finish – which is what I wanted as the base. Then, setting the air pressure to where the airbrush was literally spluttering, I sprayed multiple layers of diluted various rust colours until I had built up to what I wanted.

Then I fitted the exhausts.  You will notice the place on the left exhaust where the guy had ploughed some tar.  This guy had indeed fallen very hard…..

(Also note the side stand spring that I had constructed from jeweller’s 0.3mm binding wire).

I started by airbrushing Tamiya aluminium over the lower parts of the forks, let that dry and then airbrushed black over that. Before the black had dried, I made scratches using a toothpick and dental picks to the desired scale and effect. I used a file to remove the tread on the front tyre, to give it a used look, and then brush-painted some buff acrylic to give the appearance of that the tyre had been worn through to the canvas.  

Finishing the front fork assembly.

Final fit, followed by an overall dust airbrushing of a mixture of very light grey, browns, and thinners to give a dusty look, and it was finished.  A real fun build!