59 replies to this topic

[Harry P.]

As I did for the Chrysler 300, I took the photo of the prototype model and overlaid it on a photo of the real deal. In this case, the profile is very close to correct... not dead on, but pretty close. The biggest goof: the door handle is way too low.

[Michigan Madman]

As I did for the Chrysler 300, I took the photo of the prototype model and overlaid it on a photo of the real deal. In this case, the profile is very close to correct... not dead on, but pretty close. The biggest goof: the door handle is way too low.

Shave the door handles, and nobody will notice that.

[Ron Hamilton]

Personally, I am not a fan of this car, but after seeing this, It's a must have.

[Dave Metzner]

Regarding the door handles on the Hornet.
The photos in the gallery are a mix of several different stages of work on the mock-up. You may be looking at an old photo of the mock-up.
I spent some time yesterday with photos of the real car and photos of the most recently revised mock-up, I even overlaid some photos to check.
I cannot find any evidence that the door handles are measurably too low on the mock-up as it exists today.

Dave

[Darin Bastedo]

I was hoping for better wheels. Just kidding it looks awesome, and what I'm most impressed with is the fact that while well detailed, they didn't see the need to over complicate the kit the way Accurate miniatures and Trumpeter did. The hudson along with the 300c appear to compare favorably with the Galaxie limited 48 Chevy kit, which in my estimation is a high water mark in model design.

[Michigan Madman]

Pulling my foot out of my mouth here...

It's not a 'Triple H' engine, which is what I called it earlier. Triple H is a WWE wrestler, not a Hudson mill!

TWIN H, Chuck, not Triple H!

I will now return to ogling the pics...

[elan]

Unreal!!!! I've been waiting for this kit for a long time.

[dustym]

I'll buy. that's a cool looking car.

[Zoom Zoom]

And yesterday while out at lunch I had the pleasure of seeing a gorgeous metallic green '51 Hudson Hornet coupe make a left turn onto the street I was driving, and passed me. Looked like a brand-new car

A question about the chassis bracing: I was showing the photos online to another builder last night who is familiar with these cars, I believe he still has one somewhere on his property. While drooling over the photos of all the details, he commented that the quantity of bracing underneath looked to him to be from a convertible. Therefore my conjecture is that this is a good sign that a convertible is planned from this tooling?

[Chuck Kourouklis]

Not sure, Bob, but I think we done heard tell somewheres from Art about a NASCAR version and a convertible from this tooling -

mebbe si, mebbe no...

[Dave Metzner]

The chassis of our model is for a coupe. I have photos and drawings of the underside of a couple different coupes as well as photos of the bottom of a convertible - under restoration,
the structure of the bottoms of the coupe and the convertible are virtually identical.
The only visible difference between them is a small square well under the driver's side of the back seat of a convertible for the hydraulic pump to operate the top.
I'd have to study some photos to see if it's even visible on the bottom of the car...

Dave

[2000-cvpi]

Well there goes the Christmas money. Both models look great. I am going to need at least two of each.

[Art Anderson]

And yesterday while out at lunch I had the pleasure of seeing a gorgeous metallic green '51 Hudson Hornet coupe make a left turn onto the street I was driving, and passed me. Looked like a brand-new car

A question about the chassis bracing: I was showing the photos online to another builder last night who is familiar with these cars, I believe he still has one somewhere on his property. While drooling over the photos of all the details, he commented that the quantity of bracing underneath looked to him to be from a convertible. Therefore my conjecture is that this is a good sign that a convertible is planned from this tooling?

Considering that Hudson, unlike the rest of the auto industry from the late 30's onward, made no convertibles from the ground up, choosing instead to take coupes off the production line, move them to a separate area for final work, literally cutting the roofs off of the coupes and installing the top mechanism for a convertible top, plus a different, distinct interior, along with window sill trim, it's not at all likely that their convertibles had any extra bracing either underneath or inside the body shell--after all, "Monobilt" unibody construction, as Hudson practiced it, made the common reinforcement of an otherwise closed body pretty much unnecessary. As an example, the very reason for the abnormally large (compared to competitors' convertibles) windshield header was that on a Hudson body, that was a MAJOR structural member.

The underbody reinforcements on the convertible are the same as for the coupes and sedans, part of the unit body "Monobilt" construction, not separate frame members. They include a full perimeter frame, that on the real car, actually goes OUTSIDE the rear wheels, just above the rear wheel arch, plus a ton of other subframe members underneath, and beaucoup beams and such under the skin. With all that, the convertible was almost as rigid as the coupe it was cut down from, no further reinforcements needed.

Art

[Dave Metzner]

Mock-up was approved yesterday morning for tooling...Should see first test shots here in early November...

Dave

[Harry P.]

Woo Hoo!

This should be good...

[Art Anderson]

Mock-up was approved yesterday morning for tooling...Should see first test shots here in early November...

Dave

Life is good!!!!!! Yeah!!

Art

[bluemoose]

Mock-up was approved yesterday morning for tooling...Should see first test shots here in early November...

Dave

Fantastic! I've already picked the color scheme for my first one.

[sigmaman]

Looking forward to this one. I have a 3.5 year old "Cars" fan who will flip out when you do the racing version. He already calls the various pics I have of the real racing cars "Doc Hudson".

[Eshaver]

Don't forget to Google Autocolor Library.com for stock colors too ! Ed Shaver

[charlie8575]

1953 Hudson paint chips

And for the rest of the colors...

1952 Hudson paint chips
1951-52 Hudson paint chips

And, because there are very few differences between the 1951 and '52s, you could use '52 colors, too. The 1951s had some trim differences, and the 1950s had different grilles. Also, the Hornet didn't exist, however, with a little ingenuity, you could do a Commodore 6 if you wanted to.

Lastly, here's the 1953 brochure.

1953 Hudson full-line brochure

Charlie Larkin