Jump to content

Honda Road Racer


Recommended Posts

Hello all,

It has been a while since I built a motorcycle so I decided to pick up the Round 2/AMC 1:8 Honda Road Racer kit.

01_zpsclgqtqla.jpg

I was going to build this for the Classic Models group build because I believe this to be a reissue of the old 60's or 70's MPC kit but I can't seem to find anywhere that actually states this.  So I will just put it here.

First off I wanted to get rid of all the chrome plating, there is a lot of it.

02_zpszf71uzg8.jpg

My chrome stripper of choice is Purple Power.  Usually it only takes about 20 minutes in this stuff to get the job done but not with this kit.  The chrome came right off the red plastic but I had to soak the chrome covered black plastic over night and even then I had to use a little sand paper to get it all.

03_zpss79105wh.jpg

Starting with the engine I found that Round 2 used some extremely hard plastic in this kit.  It is like trying to glue granite together with Tamiya Extra Thin.  Make sure you have plenty of clamps on hand.

 04_zps2bic5yyg.jpg

I usually build Tamiya 1:12 bikes and I was surprised by the size difference in this 1:8 scale kit.  Here is my last Tamiya kit compared to the engine on this kit to show a size comparison.

06_zpsd86czjxw.jpg

More work on the engine and more clamping.

08_zps6lelgrbn.jpg

I also started puttying the tank and other parts.

07_zpsg4vgehye.jpg

 

 

 

 

Link to post
Share on other sites
  • 1 year later...

Wow you guys have been digging back.  Unfortunately this kit is still sitting at this same unbuilt stage.  I ran into a problem with the rubber/vinyl tires.  The side walls of the tires that came with the kit are to thin and they sag to one side or the other once you put the rims in them.  I got a new set of tires but they have the same problem.  I am not sure if this is a problem with all the kits or I just got lucky twice.  I tried putting pipe cleaners in the tires to fill them up and that kind of worked but it still looked like crap.  I gave one set of the tires away to someone who was going to try and fill them with resin.  Last time I checked he had not done anything with them either.  Since there is some interest in this I may just try to run some epoxy around the edges to see it if helps.  I want to see the kit finished, these old reissues can be frustrating.

Els

Link to post
Share on other sites
  • 4 months later...

Well I finally finished this kit.  I will post some pictures of some of the things I had to fix, maybe it will help someone else who is trying to build this kit.

I added some bracing to the swing arm because the attachment is very weak and the plastic that this kit is made of is very hard and grainy.  I found that the glued pieces were fairly easy to pop apart after assembly so this will add some strength.

47982531316_21839336f6_o.png09 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

In this picture you cans see the problem that I was having with the tires.  The walls of the tires are not of an even thickness and this makes the tires pull/lean to one side or the other.

47982479953_04c74b9878_o.jpg10 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

The first thing I tried was to flow some epoxy into the tires to strengthen them.  This did not work, the epoxy did not stick to the tires.

47982531251_535f38a6d8_o.png11 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

So then I wrapped some styrene around the rim to fill up the empty space in the tire.

47982479793_cd7371929a_o.png12 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

Then I cut a hole in the tire and put it on the rim.  After that I filled it full of epoxy.  After the epoxy cured I filled in the hole with Bondo and sanded it down.  That worked pretty well

47982479603_e0da905884_o.png13 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

I also modified the rear shocks to make them a little more realistic.  Here is a before and after.

47982531031_6f3bd3b094_o.png14 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

Here is the finished kit.

47982479483_b498dff60c_o.png15 by Hal Elsberry, on Flickr

Because of the size of the finished kit it looks pretty impressive and I am happy to have it on the shelf.  Is it a replica of Dick Mann's Daytonal Winner?  No.  There are a lot of differences between the real bike and this kit.  The tail piece is different, the front fender, front suspension, shocks, exhausts etc...It is a good starting point if you wanted to make all the changes and accurize it but I am going with the idea that someone wanted to build a tribute bike.

I don't think I would build another one of these.  I don't want to say it is a bad kit, it is just that this is a kit of the 60's or 70's and they are not up to the standards of today's kits.  The engineering of the kit is a pain in the backside.  One thing that they could have fixed though are the instructions.  They are terrible.  There are bad views, parts just show up later in the instructions that the builder was never told to install.  There is no decal chart, there is tubing that you are told to install during the build that you are not told to attach to anything.  It is nothing that someone who has built a few kits could not figure out but they should have fixed it before they reissued it.

I will post more pictures in the display tab.

Els

 

 

Edited by Els
Link to post
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...