This lithe rally-machine which proved to be the car to beat… after some years of dominance of the Mitsubishi Lancer Evo's & Subaru Impreza's… is the second of the three coming out of the molds from Tamiya.

The latest 2001 version comes along with driver & co-driver figures! (as can be seen at the new-releases on the Tamiya site!) 2000 was also a welcome change in livery; instead of White, Peugeot choose Silver as their main color which is more striking to the eye.

The Building process

As always with Tamiya a pretty straightforward process, just some cleaning / sanding of little moldmarks & flash. I start with cutting all the parts loose from the sprue's & begin with spraypainting everything in the right colors. 

For painting the disc-brakes I find it easier to use a 'hose' / 'tubing' with the right diameter which covers the center of the discs. Then cutting a circular mask from tape / foil. 
So you can first spray the whole in Gold (Brembo calipers & disk centers are always Gold colored!) and then with the right diameter tubing cover the center and with a piece of tape the side of the caliper and then spray the steel color of the disc itself.
For that extra 'life' in the brake-assy, fill the grooves with some thinned black & paint the wind deflectors on the rearside flatblack.
(*You could even go further by removing the calipers from the whole assy, then clamp the discs in a rotary tool and spin alongside a sanding paper to depict the wear of the brakepads & spray them with a 'Metalizer' which will bring out the 'wear'. But this goes maybe a bit to far for 1:24? ? ?)

Next up is the dash… which is Flat-Black & the center console Flat Grey! Again careful masking with low-tack masking foil and spray-painting the Flat Colors.

As mentioned earlier I like to spray-paint everything since coverage is that much better & Flat Colors will come out that much better.
With a brush I simply can not manage to get a even flawless Flat paint-layer.
And Metallic Colors will not have that Metallic feel to them since you are brushing the Metallic parts down so they will not 'shine' unlike when spray-painted!

The rest is pretty straight-forward since I only wanted to build it as a box-stock model… although I've added painted Bare-Metal-Foil to simulate the full-length seatbelts!

I also wanted to add some extra carbon decals (doorpanels, kickplate & 'shoebox' co-driver…) but these are hardly visible after finishing!

All in all a nice model of this 'small' world-rally-car… except that engine bay.

You know what let's all email Tamiya Co. to ask for full-on engine-bay details.