I think I haven't started my Chariot because of the overwhelming amount of details I feel I should know about. I've been reading your threads with interest. I'd like to know, from those of you who have built the kit, what do you think are some of the most important things any of us of moderately advanced skills should do to this thing? What lighting kits have been used, and how do you feel about thier ease of installation? (Gill's headlight kit looks to be ready to run, but I want my Robot lit. Suggestions?) Also, who makes the photoetch kit? It looks fantastic, definitely something I'd want! I've contacted Drew about the figures, and I'm on the waiting list. (Another MUST in my opinion, they are fantastic!) In general, what paints have you narrowed it down to as far as color. I swear, I always thought the thing had red on it, not orange! Old TV color bad? I'm an airbrusher, but I think rattle canning would be fine on this build. I like the Tamiya spray bombs, they seem to apply the smoothest. Input? Colors you used? Lou, your build is inspirational, so is Simon Mercs display. All of you have done some fantastic things with this kit, I only hope mine can turn out half as nice as some of the builds I have seen posted here! I also appreciate all of the photos you guys have posted, they are better than directions! :thumbsup:

Tim,
Naturally I'm going to suggest using my templates for at least the inside framework. :)

I really like Gil's photoetch and would recommend it to everybody. for the simplest reason is that he doesn't use brass, so it's good to go and needs no other painting. You can add lights to his headlight kit to light up the robot. I went with one simple amber 5mm LED in the mouth area, but if I had to do it again, I might add a momentary switch to that light so I could make him "talk" and not have the light on all the time.

By all means get Drew's figures and glue them to the chairs and work on them that way. It'll give you more to hold onto while you're painting. The simple swivel is nice bit of realism. just cut lenghts of styrene tube and slide them on top of the stock seat posts.

I cut the pins off of the doors and made hinges with silver tape. One of the snags in assembly was trapping all of the pins in place for all four doors when attaching the canopy to the tub and this got rid of that problem

The biggest dissapointment I had was with the door curtains. the truth is no matter how well you make them, you are still using some sort of glue that you will see thru outside of the doors. maybe a tiny set of top and bottom curtain rods would be the way to go to avoid that.

I used no airbrush on any of my chariot. just rattle cans for the metallic colors and acrylics with brushes for the figures/luggage/ details so it can be done.

those would be my words of wisdom, for whatever they're worth

Enjoy your self, that's the key

What Lou said. Great advice.

Re: the curtains: didn't someone here fashion a set of really cool, metallic-looking curtains out of foil cup-cake wrappers? I've forgotten which thread touched upon this rather ingenious solution, but I thought the finished effect looked fantastic. But, yeah, doll house curtain rods (or a scratch-built facsimile thereof) might be a good way to go in terms of affixing the curtains to the canopy framework.

Even though my build was pretty much straight OOB, I found using paint masks to be very much a time saver when it came to all of the glass framework, and highly recommend them;
http://www.culttvmanshop.com/shop/product.php?productid=16827
Have fun!

Welcome aboard, Steve! As for lighting the Chariot, there are two lighting kits available for it from two different and very reliable dealers:

1) Randy Neubert from VooDooFX makes a nice one, and his link is http://www.voodoofx.com/fiberfx.htm

2) Gil Hernandez at JustAnIllusion makes another pretty nice one. The link to his site is
http://www.needfulthings.net/jai/catalog/index.php

Speaking as a loyal customer of both, you'll get a quality kit and excellent customer service no matter which one you pick! :thumbsup:

And I sell an inexpensive set of decals (that features decals to make the wheels look a bit more accurate). Website is below!

--Henry

As with any model with an interior, the interior is the place to start. If you want to go crazy, check out the DVDs and add all the details you can find. I agree with you, the interior trim looks red. Find pictures on-line of Snow Cats and check out the Thiokol red (more a red international orange) that trims out the cockpit and exhaust duct (missing in the kit) behind the front seats. The bucket seats are definitely orange orange.

Henry, I ordered your decal sets for the J2 and the Pod last night! Nice stuff! I didn't order the Chariot decals, because I have the photoetch stuff and lighting kits coming, which will eliminate the need for a lot of them. (the wheel decals look nice though!) You've got some nice stuff there! Thanks for the note!