Build Review: Suyata Madness of the Street Luna & Selena (Pt:I)
From Suyata
Kit No: MS-001
From Suyata
Kit No: MS-001
1/32 Scale
Injection Kit Pre-coloured sprues
?the figure "Selena" comes with two head choices (with base) with or without a helmet.
Length: 16 cm/ Width: 6.5 cm/ Height: 4.5 cm
Price: $26.93 AUD from Hobbylink Japan
Previous parts of this build:
Pt.1: Box contents & Construction begins
Today:
Pt.II: Interior & Exterior paint before weathering...
Selena
Selena is easy to assemble and her parts fit well. In her right hand she’s carrying a dilapidated-looking stuffed toy rabbit by one ear, and this does need a little care as the locating points are very small. I opted to partly glue the rabbit to her leg, making it much more solid while keeping the dangling appearance.
The heels of her shoes are provided as part of her stand, which makes sense as they extend back from the toes parallel to the ground, rather than vertically as with most heels. It should be possible to carefully separate them from the stand with an etched saw, but it's probably easier to build as directed and then sink the stand into the surface of a diorama base or similar.
Exterior paint
I gave everything a couple of coats of Alclad grey primer and did some minor cleanup this revealed.
With the surfaces prepared, I started by tackling the upper bodywork. I tried a combination of Tamiya Repsol Orange and Racing Green, decanted from rattle cans and airbrushed. On reflection I felt that two colours were too busy in the relatively small space and stripped the part back to bare plastic. I opted instead for the very vibrant LP-51 Pure Orange, which covered well over the orange plastic. For the spoiler and fairings I left the Repsol Orange undercoat which again made coverage easy.
I sprayed the lower body with decanted Luftwaffe Dark Green and enlivened it with a dry-brush of a lighter, warmer green acrylic since it was very dark. After masking off the relevant areas the splitter plate, underside and rear end received a couple of coats of Gunship Grey 2, as did the rear engine cover.
As with the green areas I lightly dry-brushed the grey sections with light grey acrylic to sharpen the edges. I shaded the whole assembly with dark brown and black enamel washes, and then sealed everything with a mist of Testors Dullcote.
I used a mixture of the kit decals and many spares from my decal stash. On the matt areas I applied them over patches of wet Johnson’s Klear, which acts to fill in the imperfections of the surface and is much quicker than a gloss coat! The bodywork decals went over a gloss surface as usual.
There were a few details to paint on the body, like filling in the engine vents with black acrylic and touching in the fuel filler with Vallejo Liquid Metal Silver. Because I’d use a lacquer base coat it was relatively easy to remove any mistakes with the end of a damp cocktail stick.
I finished the orange parts with Alclad Klear Kote Light Sheen and the rest with touch-ups of Dullcote.
Details
The front armour plate is painted the same way as the green bodywork, and the armour cage I sprayed with Alclad Jet Exhaust with a mist of copper over the top. I drybrushed the edges with copper acrylic and picked out the fasteners with Scale75 Heavy Metal Silver.
I carefully masked up the edges of the glazing to paint the rubber trim. This is moulded-in at the back, and I added a thin strip of trim all the way around, and again where the windscreen panel fits into the recess. Tamiya Rubber Black was perfect for this job.
The brake discs are fairly visible through the openings in the rims and after a coat of Alclad Steel I painted the calipers bright red with small yellow placards suggesting a maker’s name.
The rims themselves are sprayed with the gorgeous Tamiya TS-84 gold. I gave them a brown enamel wash and touched in the bolt heads with Vallejo Liquid Metal Silver. I gave the tyres a dry-brush with light grey before mounting them.
I opted to replace the solid moulded mesh for the underside of the engine cover with fine etched mesh. The bright mesh reflects so much light that it’s impossible to see though - If I’d used a black mesh I would have needed to create some engine detail.
Final assembly
The fit of the larger body components is excellent although I needed a bit of clamping to get the dashboard into exactly the right place. The glazing drops in and the armour cage clips over the top holding the glazing in place without glue.
The various details fit well apart from the rear lights. I attached the front lights first without issue, so assumed I could do the same at the rear and didn’t test fit first. As it turned out I had to trim them quite a bit to get them to fit and ended up with a slightly messy result. This might be down to my eagerness to close up the gaps in the rear end earlier, I'm not sure. Perhaps larger light clusters would have been a more reliable approach than the individual clear parts?
Attaching the exhausts also takes a bit of care. Most of them have solid attachment points but some need a bit of help from glue to get the alignment just so. Once in place they’re pretty impressive!
Verdict
This is another novel, excellent kit from Suyata and it’s really nice to see a car with such an angular, cyberpunk look to it. It might not be the most practical vehicle - the ground clearance is minimal and there’s no space to turn the front wheels – but it certainly looks very cool.
Fit in most parts is good, only the rear lights really gave me any difficulty. And the fit of the glazing to the bodywork is flawless, just as it should be.
If I had a criticism to make, it would be that the clear parts would be better in clear plastic, or at least a clearer plastic. The dark smoked colour makes it very hard to see the interior, and the rear lights end up maroon rather than red when painted.
Quibbles aside, I really hope that this ends up being the first of a series as the title hints it might. I’d certainly like to see where Madness of the Street goes next.
In the meantime, I’ll be painting up Selena, weathering her car, and making a base to display the pair of them. That will be the third part coming soon on TMN...
Will Vale
Thanks to Suyata for sending this kit to Will to build and review. Check out the "Suyata" Facebook page for more information on their innovative range of new kits and tools coming our way.
