Tamiya 14081 Suzuki RGV500 converted into 1997 Lukcy Strike version.

This project started in March 2001, finished April 16 2001.
When I heard about Studio27's transkit (tk 1202) I immideately ordered it from Japan, because of the irresistible looks of the Lucky Strike color scheme.
The kit contains decals, resin fairing and rear cowling plus white metal exhaust mufflers, rear swing, front forks and mudguard. The parts are very well made, but a few compromises have to be made because the fairing is thicker than it should be and has integrated air box and air intakes. It is also not detatchable and molded in one piece.
I therefore decided to build the bike whitout any engine detail, simply because the engine cannot be displayed.

Preparation
All the transkit parts needs some attention, there's a few mould lines and rough edges to look into, and the parts also needs priming, so that's where I started. When all parts was prepared I went on to the painting..

Painting
I started with modeler's white on the fairing, tank wheels and front fender plus the rear part of the rear cowling, and after masking the tank and rear cowling when the paint was dry continued with a mix of Tamiya TS-49 (bright red) and about 10-15% TS-36 (fluorescent red) to get a red color that matched the red on the lucky strike decals.
Next I painted the frame and rear swing with Badger engine black, the exhaust's Alclad highly polished alu, the radiator alclad alu and the front forks with Testors black chrome trim, as well as a lot of minor things well described in earlier projects.

Decaling
The decals are superb, very rich in color and easy to lay down using Aero set and aero sol decal setting solutions, no problems here, ans the decals did not react to a clear modeler's paint coat (after two days of drying)

General
The kit is not as easy to build as a standard Tamiya 14081 kit. The fairing must be installed prior to the front fork ans that can cause some problems. The fairing fastening points must be cut shorter and holes redrilled to accomodate the thicker transkit fairing, and I also had problems finding reference pic's for the bike, and had to assume a few color chioices.
I am satisfied with the result, but it's a very pricy kit so You should be experienced with modeling before attempting this project.