Welcome to the Build Blog for Monogram’s Days of Thunder kit, the iconic City Chevrolet Lumina driven by Cole Trickle.
Like the recent Fireball 500 build, this was a rushed job to have it ready for a club display at the Australian Model Expo. But it turned into a record breaker for me – knocked the full build over in just one week (aided by a couple of days off work)! I would like to have spent more time on some detailing and perfecting a few areas, but for such a quick build, the end result looks ok.
The Model
It’s the Monogram 1:24 scale Chevrolet Lumina in the most recognisable of the various Days of Thunder liveries that were produced. Other than the decals and box art, it’s the standard Monogram NASCAR Lumina kit of the era.
Multiple sprue trees moulded in yellow plus one of plated parts, some clear parts, tyres and decals. Additional to the kits parts are after market decals plus SMS fluro lacquer paints.
The kit’s original decals do not include all the decoration that is on the movie car, just the numbers and a few of the main sponsor logos
After market decals from PowerSlide are high quality, include all the markings, plus extra decals to allow building the car Greg Sacks actually raced. Unfortunately, no Goodyear markings for the tyre sidewalls.
The Car
It’s only when you start to research a car you realise how inaccurate model kits can be! This car changed configuration, not just from race to race in the movie, but from one cut to the next in the same scene!
As such, I didn’t bother to try and replicate a specific scene or race, and just built this as a general representation of the Cole Trickle City car.
The movie was filmed in 1989 and the early part of 1990, so the car reflects that era of NASCAR Winston Cup racing.
Cole Trickle (Tom Cruise) drives the #46. Note the missing window net? The movie makers wanted Cruise’s face to be visible…
The Build
The wheels and rear spoiler in the kit are chromed, but both are black on the movie car (though if you were building the ‘real’ race car of Greg Sacks, it had silver-grey wheels).
Resulting in perfectly cleaned parts, ready for paint, in a matter of minutes.
The tyres in this kit are rather… average. Heavy seam lines, concave tread surface and thick sprue gate.
Big chunky Goodyear lettering is moulded into one side of the tyre wall. This could be painted white, but raised lettering is not what race tyres have, and it would look very strange.
The other sidewall is smooth, so that’s the side I used to face outward. But see the edge that’s visible on the inside of the tyre?
That edge had to be removed as it prevented the outer rim half from seating far enough into the tyre (because I’ve effectively flipped the tyres around)
Rubber debris produced from improving the tyres…
Test fitting partially assembled sub-assemblies
Roll cage is temporarily taped to the floor pan.
Parts taped together to see how the body will sit and roughly where the wheels will be positioned.
With seam marks removed, the body lightly sanded and the fit checked, the various sub-assemblies are ready for paint.
Several of the clear parts were scratched, so had to be lightly sanded and polished.
A recent purchase: photo-etch saw blades! These allow the clear parts to be cutoff the sprue without fracturing the brittle clear plastic, which often happens when using side-cutters.
Chassis and other parts have been hit with a light coat of primer (SMS Surfacer Grey). The body was masked up to enable the window edges to be painted. I thought this would be an easier way of achieving the black edges than masking each window. In retrospect, maybe I should have masked and painted the back edge of each window piece.
The window edges were sprayed semi-gloss black.
The window apertures and black edging were then masked off, ready for primer and body colour.
This was also mased up from the inside so the inner and outer body surfaces could take paint.
SMS Surfacer Grey was sprayed on the inside and the outside.
The outside was then wet-sanded to smoothen it all out before a quick coat of Tamiya white primer.
Body colours. These are general fluro colours from SMS, but I think they match the Days of Thunder car fairly well.
The photo does not do justice to the brightness of the yellow! The SMS fluro colours are a matte finish
My work table and yellow glow from inside the spray booth! Note the venting out the window (I wonder if the neighbours can smell when I’m painting?)
Like the Fireball 500, it was nervous times getting the colour transition in the correct position and of an appropriate width. It ain’t perfect, but it’s not bad! The matte finish of the fluro colours looks very chalky and I was not able to get a nice coverage with the green. It doesn’t look too bad in photos, but to the naked eye, there are visible bands in a couple of places that I just could not get rid of.
The decals would probably have had trouble adhering to the matte finish, so SMS Super Clear was applied to give a smooth surface for them to grab.
Masking removed, and the body is ready for decoration.
Using a bit of MicoSol and MicoSet, the PowerSlide decals were great to work with and nice and opaque. The big City decals on the bonnet and boot (sorry, hood and trunk…) covered up some of the flaws in the green, so that was convenient 🙂
The right-side of the body has a skirt running along the lower edge. Rather than painting this, I had some left over black decal from another project, so used that instead. It was quite stiff and needed lots of softener to curve around the edges.
No doubt who’s driving!
The bonnet includes blind holes for the hood pins. I just used the kit parts (which are plated) and fixed them in place with Kristal Klear.
Bare Metal Foil on the fuel filler nozzle. This was burnished down, then the excess carefully cut away. Some Panel Line Wash as added later to give it some depth.
Instead of painting the radiator cover, I decided to experiment with Hasegawa Mirror Finish Film. It didn’t turn out so well and I could not remove the small creases around the bolt heads.
Lots of black wash applied to the intake grills. The black rectangle on the headlight is a decal (mine, not from the kit) to replicate another intake vent that’s visible in multiple movie scenes, and the box art. Black paint was flowed into the recessed ‘Lumina’ lettering in the front splitter. I used Tamiya acrylic so it was easy to wipe off any spillage.
Progress continued on the engine, chassis and other components. SMS Storm Grey was applied to the roll cage and floor. I did not bother to properly paint or detail the fuel cell as it’s totally hidden once the body is fitted.
Using the tail pipes to brace the extractors at the correct width while the glue dries. The exhaust system is all done in SMS Stainless Steel.
Roll cage and chassis ready to come together. I added foil to the floor to replicate a heat shield for the driver, but otherwise everything is pretty much as per the kit instructions.
Engine is a tight fit!
Dashboard in place.
Underside of the engine and front suspension.
A look at the interior before the body makes much of this difficult to see. The rear view mirror is a plated part, so the outside was painted black and the mirror surfaces left untouched. Tacho and other dials were all sprayed silver with the dash panel. Black wash flooded into each dial and excess wiped away to reveal the needle numbers that were moulded into the part.
The three front windshield struts are individual parts (not moulded in to the glass – hooray!)
Roll-bar padding and window net is all brush painted. Monogram has included varying textures in the mould for these materials.
Internal ducting was difficult to fit, held in with CA glue.
Chassis, body and tyres, ready to commence the final stage. I had a few different size Goodyear and Eagle stencils from some F1 kits, and used those for the tyre sidewall markings. They’re not quite the perfect size, but the kit nor the after market decals included tyre markings. I feel this is still a much better solution than painting the raised lettering on the other side of each tyre.
Body has to be flexed wider to allow it to fit over the chassis.
When I did get it to pop over, the model had a nose-up attitude I wasn’t expecting.
So, the underside of the axles were filed back (the hole in the rim was also re-profiled with a circular file) to enable the wheel to fit higher, thus lowering the ride height. Wheels are fixed in place with 5-minute epoxy.
Body in place, still no front glass.
The inner duct area of the side vent had to be shaved back to allow it to fit.
Also had to cut back the “tubing” so the window could fit. Exposed yellow plastic was painted before the window was fixed in place.
Rear window fitted and secured with Kristal Klear – which looks terrible here because it has not yet dried. Unfortunately, the rear window straps are moulded into the part and are not separate pieces 🙁
Rear deck spoiler and trunk pins fitted.
I think the inconsistency of the green coverage has exaggerated over time. In a few places (such as the top edge of the fender) it looks like the green has been buffed so thin the underlying yellow is starting to show through. But that can’t be the case as the colour coats on this were never sanded, and the clear coat received minimal buffing. Perhaps the yellow is starting to leach through? Or the green is fading?
Quick look at the underside. Nothing special here. In fact, the underside never got properly finished!
Fuel filler finished. Rear bumper was a separate piece. I’m happy with how that has blended into the main body. Rear window is not a perfect fit.
Passenger side window is tricky to slide into place as it has retaining edges on the inside and outside.
The built model with other items I took to Model Expo 2026 – Fireball 500 (left), race weathered Sauber C9 Le Mans winner (rear), 3D printed Coyote and APX GP F1 from the Brad Pitt F1 movie (right). Build videos for all these are on the Wixy500 YouTube channel – watch them HERE)
Movie poster was made up for the club display a Model Expo – thanks Max!
Conclusion
Never rush a build!
Despite having this kit in my stash for multiple decades, it was only in the weeks prior to Model Expo that I ordered the after market decals from the USA. I didn’t get to test or experiment with the fluro paint, and did not have time to apply multiple coats of clear, wet-sand and polish to a high gloss finish.
Masking the window edges and painting them black was a good thing, but I should have also masked and sprayed the windows themselves, I think that would make it look better.
Despite that, the Days of Thunder colour scheme makes the model look stunning. It’s only when looking closer that the faults become noticeable.
Customary closing shot – my build and the box art.
