SfanGoch

You're not kidding about obscure pics, Bill. I scoured the net for months before I came across a resto parts supply site which had pics of the trunk lid stood up vertically, perfect for tracing the ribbing. I ordered a couple sets of Detail Master PE door hinges. The smaller ones can be used as trunk hinges. All that needs to be done is to grind them down along the top and inner portions of the "U" part so they'll fit. One thing that crossed my mind was adding torsion bars. You mentioned that you originally planned on doing that for your '59 Impala.

Yup. The '60 Impala has an almost imperceptible inward taper near the C pillars. I need to get my hands on an AMT '60 Bonneville HT or ragtop, a junk body or even a gluebomb. Trumpeter screwed up with the length (too short) and overall look (too wide) of the hood spear. I'd like to make a copy of the entire hood and use it on this kit.

Yeah Bill, that taper is annoyingly obvious. Tell me what you think of this solution: Remove the trim all the way back to the C pillars. File the inner vertical surface enough to straighten it and make it parallel with the door skin. Cement .50 x 1.5 mm stock on the inner lip, flush with the door top and then glue a piece of 1 x .75 or 1 mm strip stock to make a new window trim. Thanks Marty and Patrick. I hope the information will be of some use to anyone building these kits. Trunk lid from the '59 Impala. I traced a template from a scaled down photo of the underside ribbing and used that to make the ribbing from two single pieces of 1 mm sheet styrene and .25 mm sheet to fabricate the inserts. It actually looks better than the photo would indicate. The dark lines in the recesses are residue from the Revell Aqua Color 36137 Ziegelrot I use to detect defects. I credit my time in Catholic school carving .45 automatics from a bar of soap during art class for my somewhat questionable scratchbuilding skills. The screws.....uh....nuns turned a blind eye to this kind of artistic expression since they were armed with the dreaded "Board of Education", three heavy wooden rulers wrapped in rubber bands. They were some tough broads, I'll tell ya. The way that the trunk lid is modeled on the kit is odd. On the 1:1 lid, there is a vee shaped piece of trimwork which is attached to the trunk edge and is very prominent. When the trunk lid is separated from the body, there is a gaping hole in the shape of that trim. After making the inner lip for the lid opening, I taped the the lid on the body and used Magic-Sculpt to fabricate the trim piece. The Magic-Sculpt was pressed between the trunk lid and the rear panel. When it reached sufficient hardness, it was smoothed down with water and gently scraped flat to perfectly match the the angle and fit between the trunk lid and the body. Once completely hardened, the trim part was removed from the trunk lid and was sanded into its final form. This part is only 1 mm thick and is solid. Magic-Sculpt is a must-have item in any modeler's bag o'tricks. The finished trim piece was then epoxied in place. The trunk emblem will be replaced with the PE part from the MCG '59 Impala set.

Among some of the WIPs presently on my assembly line are three GM vehicles: A Revellogram '59 Impala HT A Revellogram '60 Impala HT A Trumpeter '60 Bonneville HT There has been a lot of discussion here about the problems with the roofs of the '59 Impala and Trumpeter kits; basically, that they are inaccurate. All three of these cars shared the same roof sheet metal so they should be identical in all aspects. I'll concede that the Bonneville is inaccurate.........to a point. The main issue with the Bonneville roof is that it is 2 mm shorter than it's supposed to be, which is 51 mm measured front-to rear. Also, the A pillars don't have the distinctive, graceful and noticeable curve as they meet the forward edge of the roof. This is error is shared with the RM '59 Impala. What I want to do here is dispel the theory that the roofs of all three kit bodies vary in shape, contour and overall accuracy. The '59 Impala was the first that I tweaked. Using reference photos, I saw what was required. I shaved off the outermost trim at the edge of the A pillars, leaving the second and third trim sections. The upper part of the pillars was filed and shaped to match the contours of the 1:1 car. It's that simple. No hacking off the roof of a '60 Impala and having to go through the process of grafting it onto the '59. Now, I'll explain what was done to the Bonneville. As I stated, The main issue with the Bonneville is that the length of the roof is 2 mm too short. This makes the tulip panel wide enough to park a car on. To correct this glaring error, I sawed the roof 5 mm from the rear window trim, made a cut 12 mm from the front edge of the trunk opening and a cut 2 mm in front of the base of the C pillars. 2 mm of styrene was added to the roof, the cut roof section was reattached and everything was filled and smoothed in. The piece of trim on the C pillars which is closest to the rear glass was shaved off and worked to match the shape of the pillars on the Revellogram bodies. The A pillars were next. The frontmost piece of trim was removed all the way to the roof joint, leaving the second and third pieces intact. I then used a diamond burr bit to form the curve as found on the '60 Impala. Finally, .025 styrene rod was glued to the front of the A pillars and the lower portion of the rod was blended into the lower windshield trim/cowl panel. This beats the heck out of the hack and graft for three reasons. First, I consider decapitating a perfectly good model car body an unnecessary and extravagant waste. You're destroying one kit to enhance another. Secondly, the work involved is extremely time consuming and labor intensive.You have to worry about cutting the cowl off the sacrificial donor body and that the area removed from the recipient body matches within very close tolerance. Unless you can make the cuts absolutely perfect, you'll end up spending a lot of time and effort filling and sanding around the entire perimeter of the upper body to blend everything seamlessly. For the average schmo, that means you're guaranteed to screw up somewhere along the process and the results will look like a U.S.D.A. Grade A turd and you'll only end up with two useless and destroyed bodies. Third reason, and one that should be of major importance to rivet counting builders who want absolute accuracy, is that you won't get that picture perfect, on-the-money-just-like-the-real-car-only-smaller 100% replication by grafting the '60 Impala roof onto the poor, allegedly inaccurate '59. Why, you may ask? Because the cowl on the '60 Impala is completely different.There are three vents and the wiper arms are located on the grilles of the outer ones, whereas, there is only one vent grille running across the '59's cowl and the wiper arms are located on the outside of the vent, on the cowl itself. You couldn't use the '60 roof on the Bonneville for the same reason because the Bonneville and '59 Impala cowls are identical. Now, let me bring up the contentious subject of the roofs on these three kit bodies. I had discussions regarding the shape and accuracy of the '59 Impala and the Trumpeter Bonneville. I always said that, aside from the shape of the '59 Impala's A pillars, its roof, and that of the '60, were 100% identical in every respect. Now, I'll prove my assertion. Thanks to the posts on fiberglass replacement parts by the inimitable resident automotive expert nonpareil, Bill Engwer, I was prompted to prove my point that there is no difference. So, I made a fiberglass mold of the '60 Impala roof This is the mold fitted on the '60 Impala Notice the fit along the roofline above and the C pillars in the photo below Next, I placed the mold on the '59 Impala Now, please observe that the fit is exactly as seen on the '60 roof, including the the fit on the windshield and backlight and both the A and C pillars. It lays perfectly flat. with no rocking front-to-rear or side-to-side. Zero difference. All contours match. Pictures don't lie; and, neither does the mold. If anyone still believes that there is a difference, what can I tell you? One might perceive something which is or isn't there and that is the case with the roofs of these two kits. I also checked the accuracy of the corrective surgery performed on Bonny. I slapped the mold on it and the fit was 100% identical to the '59 and '60 Impalas. Dead on match on all three cars. I'll pat myself on the back for getting this right the first time. I hope I was able to provide convincing evidence which changes any perception of difference or inaccuracy in the '59 Impala roof. I'll post more updates on these three as work progresses. If you feel like posting comments, criticisms, critiques, care to dispute my findings and/or methods or tell me you want to bust my beak for being a smartass wiseguy, feel free to do so.

Of course I know that the Mopars go for large amounts of cash. But, as I said, you can find them at great prices if you scour the internet long enough.I recently missed the opportunity to snag an unbuilt Polara for $49.99, an unbuilt Marlin for $39 and unbuilt '66 and '68 300s for $45 and $49 respectively. Those I saw listed at hobby store sites, not ebay. I was slow in inquiring about those kits and they were gone by the time I did.

The only time quoting some comment is convenient is when there are a few responses between the quoted post and your reply when it is posted on the board. This directs your comment to a specific person and you don't look like Rain Man answering to no one in particular with non sequiturs.

Revell paints, both enamel and acrylic, are fantastic. I still have about forty still good tins of 1981 vintage enamels I bought when I was stationed in FRG last century.

Nice rescue work. Have you decided if you'll go for the "broken in" look or total makeover?

Are you kidding?!? You Fords are fantastic. It's always great to see what else you have up your sleeve.

I wish. I'm fresh out of uncles. I'm constantly scouring ebay and various online shops for good deals, of which there are plenty if you are patient and smart. I ain't dropping a C-note for a '64 Caddy or '68 Fury police car when I know I can get them for 25-35 bucks. I have a fleet of unbuilt Police Furys that cost me less than 30 bucks each. I didn't pay more than $25 for any of the three '31 Caddys or the two Mercedes 500Ks either. The two '64 Caddys I have so far set me back $52 total. I'm not cheap; but, I don't buy on impulse, either.

That's just boss, Marcos. Really slick.

Geez David, you and Leslie got some swell loot. Like Bruce said, nice haul.

The Johan '31 Caddys and Mercedes 500K kits are among the best in terms of detail produced by any manufacturer> Considering that they are over fifty years old says a lot about John Hanley's dedication to accuracy on a small scale.

Got the last of the three Johan '31 Caddys I was looking for. Now, I can start scrounging up Johan Mopars.

This practice is considered a Class A Felony on some fora.