oldcarfan

2025 Cannonball Entry #15 1975 Volkswagen Golf- As this strange and hectic year winds down, so does our annual Cannonball. Here's hoping for a more peaceful 2026. My 2025 entry was a change from last year's Ford Expedition and this project practically built itself in my head before I'd even finished the Expedition. I've always loved small fun to drive cars, so I went with the prototype for every hot hatch to follow, the VW Golf/Rabbit. Here's a link to the build page if you're interested: A little history. By 1970, Volkswagen was in a fix. The Beetle was old tech and sales were half what they had been just a few years before. Volkswagen really needed a hit and the Golf was a Hail Mary. The car came to market as the gas crunch hit and ended up being the right car at the right time. I always like to have a theme for my builds as it helps keep me focused. The theme for this build was that a couple of crazy German Volkswagen engineers decided to do a Cannonball in the company's new Golf. They managed to get hold of an early car right off the assembly line and with unofficial backdoor factory help they built a contender. The donor kit was an ESCI Rally Golf that I've had forever. It's a decent older kit and if you've ever built AMT's Rabbit, that came out a few years ago, it's the same kit. I don't know if AMT bought the molds or just put it in their boxes. I had both the ESCI and AMT versions which comes into play in the next part of the story. I got started the week after the New Year and made good progress. The body and chassis had just been cleaned up and painted in Model Masters Go Mango when disaster struck. I took the painted body into the house from my shop and set it on the counter. When I came back it was gone. It was eventually found in the back yard. Below is a picture of how it looked when I found it. Still don't know where the paper towel came from. After a thorough investigation, evidence pointed at Fia the cat knocking it off the counter and Bernie, our little girl Corgi taking it outside and chewing it up. They both claimed to have alibis for that time, so the trail went cold. For reference, here are the unrepentant suspects: Luckily I had that AMT kit and got it painted and was back on track in a week. I had just enough Go Mango to do the new body which saved a lot of extra trouble. The rest of the build was fairly simple. I actually did some research on VW's being raced and found that they were getting some serious for the times power out of that little engine. Trivia fact, the Dodge Omni initially used the Golf 1.7 liter engine. At around 90 horsepower, the cars were built more for economy than speed. Following the theme of a backdoor factory entry, I knew those clever Germans would have some tricks up their sleeves. Here's the result, a 1.7 l bored out to 1.9 with some Porsche 024 internals, turbocharged with a rams horn exhaust. This was based partly on work done in Germany by racing teams and the engine should put out 120-125 hp. While that doesn't sound like a lot by modern standards, a Golf only weighed about 1700 pounds when stripped down for racing so the power to weight ratio was pretty good. According to some articles I read, a Golf in this form was capable of 115 mph sustained. The little car's interior was stripped down for weight and only some heat insulation was added for the occupants. A round fuel cell was put in to supplement the regular tank for extra range. The interior was built according to the tech available in 1975, with a CB radio, a police scanner, and a Fuzz Buster. For safety, a rollbar was added and Porsche seats and heat/sound insulation covers the passenger area. Despite the pet inspired delay, I finished the build in record time. Here's how the car looks, fueled up and ready to go. All the guys have to do is load up their gear and head for the Red Ball Garage.

Has there ever been an 'Unlimited' Cannonball? The idea would be a vehicle you would build and race if you won the lottery and money was no object.

I've got too many models too. I started buying in the mid 90s making weekly stops at Walmart, KayBee Toys, Toys R Us, and other places looking for clearances. I kept it over the years and have kits stored in my shop and in the in-laws garage. I really need to go through them some day.

Some good ideas so far! Run What You Brung, or off road, or work vehicles any of those would be cool. Movie cars would be fun too, but I'm not good at doing replicas mine always end up looking like they were "Based On A True Story" rather than actually being a replica. This might be too complicated, but how about a 'Low-Budget Build" thing? Sort of like LeMons. I don't think that's been done has it? Set a price limit, say $2025 for the basic vehicle. It could be any vehicle as long as you could find one under that price. You'd pick an example of your chosen vehicle on Marketplace or Ebay or the local newspaper, and do a screen shot of a super cheap 1:1 example as proof. This is what I was thinking, but any vehicle would work. Maybe allow engine transplants, body work, even body swaps onto a different chassis, brakes and safety and whatever else as long as a good low budget shop could theoretically do it on their own from used parts.

If the police mechanic shop can keep them running and get the bugs worked out, it could be a decent option for policing. Range depends on who is testing, anywhere between 200 and 300 miles on a charge. Most officers don't cover more than 150 miles and a lot do less than that on an average patrol. I do wonder about shift changes, though. If the charge is getting low, it's not like they can gas and go when the night shift comes in.

The MPC Ram 50 is a good option, but you might also look at the MPC 1975 Datsun truck as it has been reissued not long ago and its also coming back out soon. Another option could be the AMT Ford Courier, too. Any of those could work and they could also donate frame, rear end and other parts if needed.

Nice start, Rockford was my dad's favorite show and I grew up on the reruns . I really wish Round 2 would add a stock flat hood and some side vent plugs to this kit or maybe even do a new kit with a base model and a Formula option.

This is my Hasegawa Nissan Sunny truck. I started it three years ago and only painting the body before I got distracted and it went back in the box. I decided to make a new start on it this morning and pulled the box down. Not sure what happened, but I promise it didn't look like this when it went in the box. Sad because it was one of my better paint jobs. The paint is Testor's Model Master under their One Coat Clear and it wasn't too thick. The body was stored in a gallon sandwich bag and in a climate controlled area and the bag wasn't touching it when I opened the box. Those are the details. My best guesses are that maybe the paint and clear coat slowly reacted with each other or that the bag trapped gases from the paint, or maybe the lack of air circulation in the bag did something weird. It's all good, the body is now in the purple pond. It'll work out and I even have an idea for a different paint color. Anyway, if you store painted parts, be cautious.

This is one I built a few months ago from the new release Chevy truck kit. The idea was to build a surplus Forest Service truck that got a second life as a daily driver/parts hauler. The paint looks lighter in the photos. The Jeep is a Welly diecast converted into the truck in the classic Scooby Doo episode, "What A Night For A Knight."

Here's a couple of kits I got a while back that I'm pretty sure are rare. I never knew anyone made a 968 kit, but it looked too cool to pass up. I've always wanted a 944 and this one came cheap. I haven't opened them yet, does anyone know if they are decent kits?

Not that I've heard, but I have been thinking about it a little. Maybe someone can refresh our memories on what the past themes were? Last year was Resto-Mods, 2023 was Run What You Brung, 2022 was birth year, and that's about where my memory drops off!

Thanks for the info, I'll check them out!

I took a picture when the kit first came in the mail, but I can't find it because I have too many pictures in my phone. The car was originally built box stock and painted light green. I got it in the same lot as the Celica GT4 I rebuilt last month as a rally style car.

I saw a car back in August that might make a good project for someone looking to do some fun imagineering or a slump buster. I couldn't get a good shot but today I came across the car on Reddit. The first two pictures are from me and the other two are from the Reddit link. If you haven't seen the Tornados movie, there's some really cool tornado chasing trucks. I'm thinking the Revell Raptor might look pretty nice done up like this.

Because I get bored, I've found a new project. I bought a G-Wagen parts lot on eBay a long time ago and decided that they were all too far gone to do anything with. The lot included two new in the box kits and I've been meaning to build one, but I hated to open up a new in the box vintage kit. I felt I pulled another built up from the stash and disassembled it. Unlike the Nissan Sylvia I just finished, this one was originally built with only a little glue. It practically fell apart with a little prying. The body was painted in what looked like a whole can of runny department store spray paint which is why I got it so cheap. Luckily the paint fell off in sheets after two days in the tank. The body is repainted in Tamiya Pure White. I always like to have a theme for my builds because it helps me keep my interest from wandering. This build's theme is going to be a restomodded vintage G-Wagen set up for desert camping and exploring. I've been following some companies that restore and mod G-Wagens and Range Rovers in the same way Singer Porsche mods 911s. You can have your truck any way you want as long as you have the money. Since I'm not likely to win the lottery, I'll make do with a scale version. I plan to add a roof rack and the usual off road cargo and I'm trying to come up with a way to make a rooftop tent and some other things. The stripes are an experiment and I'm not sure if they will work yet. My wife has a Cricut so she always has scraps of vinyl laying around. I've tried to cut it before with an X-Acto and ruler with mixed results. Seeing how the Cricut works, I bought a sticky cutting pad and put the vinyl on it. I grabbed a few scraps and cut these Rothman's style stripes to go on the truck. Rothman's racing livery is one of my favorites of all time. I'm not sure yet if the vinyl is going to work for modeling use as it's fairly stiff but it seems okay so far. A hair dryer would probably help in the application, but I thought about that too late. I'll give the stripes a few days and we'll see if they conform to the body without pulling away. If it works as I hope, this might be a lot easier than trying to mask and paint a bunch of small stripes in different colors. Of course the grill went missing while I was tearing the kit down. I searched everywhere and couldn't find it so I just spent a few hours scratching up a new one. That's when the first rule of modeling kicked in. I got the replacement grill finished and moved a little box on my desk. I'd checked under that box twice while searching with no luck but when I moved it this time original grill was right there. I'll still probably go with the new grill since I put so much effort into it and the original would need a lot of clean up.