John1955

I enjoyed reading this so very much! But actually, nobody got it right. It was PMC (Product MIniatures Company) that started the "annual" tradition, at first with dealer promos for the major automakers and then assembled 1/25th ones for toy and hobby stores, kits came later. Annual kits by AMT/SMP, Revell and Jo-Han were not based on only dealer promos at all. Quite the opposite was true. Their annual kits were often more detailed and had many customized options, including detailed engines. Only some were unassembled promos, most were not. Annual kits dominated the market all doing the 1960's and 1970's and MPC quickly became the leader, over taking AMT due to better detail and better fitting parts in MPC kits. (AMT's CEO started MPC after leaving AMT).

I use this a lot. It is the strongest glue I have ever used, it works on plastic, resin, metal, rubber and glass and it is fantastic to use to force old warped dealer promos back into their original shapes, using gumbands and clamps until it dries. And maybe best of all, it is extremely inexpensive and is sold everywhere.

I agree and they are so much smaller as well

When the Reagan recession hit, I got laid off from my factory job, and had to take any job I could find. I was hired at a doughnut place that made delicious homemade doughnuts, and they let us eat as much as we wanted while making them. They knew what would happen, LOL, after a week or so, the LAST thing I wanted to eat was a doughnut. Smart managers there.

No, they are not. Little Debbie snack cakes are made by the same family owned company that they always were made by. Hostess snack cakes are made by a giant corporation, but both brands taste good. In my area, Little Debbie costs much less, so that's what I buy.

Tastycakes are to greasy, yuck

I refuse to spend even one penny at Hobby Lobby. I will not support people like that.

Thank you, 90% are plastic and/or resin hybrids. 10% are diecasts.

Thanks, I still miss it all these years later

I need to buy a better camera

My camera is junk, I apologize for the lack of clarity

I had a '78 T/A, the last year they had the real 6.6 litre, the Pontiac made 400 engine. Fortunately, a good friend's dad owned an inspection station was a rebel rouser. We broke emissions laws and put a custom dual exhaust in it, REAL dual exhaust, with two empty canister catalytic converters (fakes) and bypassed all emissions stuff. Yes, it was wrong and we were bad, but the car became an untamed beast and I drove like a maniac back then. (I was young).

But I guess people want to make things more complicated instead of using something I expensive and easy

I am unable to spend too much time on just one kit as I build many, kind of like an assembly line in my basement work area. I also have two rooms full of models on 4 foot by 8 foot plywood shelves, going back 60 years of building models, so I restore older already built models. I use industrial Endust which is available everywhere and gives a nice glossy shine to older models and even to models that have been molded in color. It makes them look professionally painted and it's not expensive and takes only a few minutes to wipe on with a soft cloth. Endust also works well on freshly painted and built new models, and within minutes, the scent goes away and it can fool even expert judges at model shows. To make chrome shine brilliantly on new kits or older already built ones, I use Windex (or generic versions). Windex is also great for cleaning plastic windows, but I have found that contact lens cleaners or eye glass cleaners are even better for that.

I hear ya and I share the pain. Adults who didn't know the hobby didn't realize how bad those Palmer kits were. I was fortunate enough to know my maternal grandparents and my paternal grandma when I was a kid, and they knew we boys loved building model cars, so they often bought us Palmer kits for Christmas and birthdays because they lived in a rural area with no big stores and the tiny store there sold Palmer kits. We always smiled (fake smiles) and thanked them, it would have been unkind not to. They never found out that we built them and then blew them up with firecrackers. We never wasted good spray paint on them, and would brush paint them using leftover paint my parents had in the basement (water based usually, wall paint). I am so glad this thread was started, because although I hated Palmer kits, it has brought back so many great memories from my childhood.