Ford Focus

Having the traditional colors of "Martini"; which have decorated traditional European brands, as Alpha, Porsche or Peugeot, this 300 hp four cylinders turbo engined Focus, had begun to write notorious pages in the World Rally Championship.

Driven by two of the best pilots in this category; Colin McRae and Carlos "El Matador" Sainz, it has given important achievements to the Ford Company, since it was included in the '99 World Rally Championship, when it replaced the proven Ford Escort.

Although I'm not a specialist in rally cars, some of them have been in my hands, such as the "Celica" or the 205, but never a Revell kit, because of this reason I felt more than surprised when I began to take out the bag, having inside the 87 plastic parts that this kit provides, all of them molded with great quality, without fins and almost without visible mold lines.

The kit doesn't provide the motor, however the chassis offers the whole area of the crankcase perfectly molded and with great detail.

The highlight of this kit is the cockpit, which includes all the basic parts to get a very realistic model, the antiroll cage, the seats (with its decal seatbelts, but new ones made of masking tape can be easily added); the firewall with the navigation electronic boxes, etc. The instruments panel as well as the fire extinguisher details are truly excellent.
The body is one piece cast, the kit provides two different front spoilers, so you will be able to build both pilot's versions. The painting will not be a complex job, because the car is entirely white.

The very nice decals provide the model a colorful finishing, the decal sheet has a very good support and an exact registration. The blue sponsor wave is split into two sections on each side. Because of the edge and roof curvature you could want to paint the blue areas, so the decals can be used them like mask templates.

The final assembling after the painting and decal placement is quite simple; it's necessary to have special care when the transparent parts (windows and windscreen) are glued. If you aren't an experienced modeler, I recommend you to use white glue.

It's an excellent kit, and although you aren't fanatic of cars, it will offer you a great satisfaction when building it. If you are a specialist in WRC, this is one of those kits that, without any doubt, we can recommend to our friends. Summing up this model can't be absent in a good rally collection.

Finished model

by Steve Desarzens http://amprilly.multimania.com