Not a great kit. It's a rushed movie tie-in kit with major quality and fit problems, and a few inaccuracies. But it's the only kit of its kind so you have to make the best of it. And I think I have. If you attempt this kit, I advise cutting off all the major locator lugs and manually aligning pieces. This kit is designed for the non-serious modeller which actually makes it harder for those who do want to do a serious job of it.
This kit comes with the chrome pieces already chromed but it looks naff so I stripped them and repainted them in Vallejo Metal Color chrome, which makes it look more realistic and closer to the movie Ecto 1 - which was still a banger even after a refurb.
This kit comprises of two main colours; red and white gloss - two notoriously difficult paints to work with. This this kit is always going to be hard to do well and is less forgiving than military vehicles where mistakes can be weathered out. Consequently this isn't quite as good as I hoped it would be, but from a few feet away it still looks mint. And it's an Ecto 1. What's not to love?
With the release of Ghostbusters Afterlife you would think there would be a market for a new kit or at least a rerelease of this one, but this one is rare as hen's teeth and very expensive. I got lucky with this one at just under £40 - which is still substantially cheaper than a half decent die-cast of a comparable scale.
Were I to build it again I would seriously consider a white glass rattlecan rather than Tamiya white gloss. I ended up having to use a Revell gloss varnish which doesn't like post effects and takes a long time to properly cure so there may be fingerprint problems.
Masking off the red wings was particularly tricky. I'm used to doing a half arsed job and touching up afterward but with this one it really pays to get it right first time if possible. This is a lot different to military kit building and it isn't very forgiving.
Lucky for me, I get another shot at this as I bagged an Ecto 1A from Ghostbusters 2 just in case I didn't win this one on ebay. It's not quite as pretty but the intention was to heavily weather this one to represent the Afterlife Ecto, and do a clean 1A. As it happens this one is too nice to spoil with weathering. In any case the artificial weathering on Afterlife Ecto in the film looks rubbish. I don't want to risk spoiling this one because it's gorgeous.
