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The 59 Dodge bought 9 yrs ago


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Ken, I got a couple of those too. I'm hangin' on to 'em because Johan was the ONLY one to do that '57-'59 Dodge-Plymouth two door hardtop roofline accurately. AMT's '58 Plymouth is a big miss for me for various reasons that's been beaten to death.

I truly hope Moebius (or Model King) reissues this one. One can never have enough late '50's Chrysler stuff! :D

Edited by MrObsessive
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-I wished I had found at least one of the '57's by Dodge. At least a D-500!!!!! BUT I didn't now well they're WAY outta my price range! BUT I wished someone made MORE of them as well as just a '58 -'59 Dodge Power Wagon...... I LOVE the looks of the W-500 trucks HUGE pick-ups....

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I truly hope Moebius (or Model King) reissues this one. One can never have enough late '50's Chrysler stuff! :D

Back after Okey released the '59 Rambler wagon kit, it was rumored that he had the '59 Dodge all set to go, complete with box art.  That never happened and he had the old Xcel versions that he was selling at the time.  When he bought the Johan material at auction, it looks like he got the remainders of their '59 Dodge, '56 Desoto and '56 Plymouth stock,  either as pieces or sealed in the plain white boxes as I bought mine. 

These have no interiors and have green glass to mask that fact.  Mine wasn't painted, all in white plastic.  All that's in the box is the body, glass, very heavy promo chassis, chrome bumpers, wheel covers, and headlights. There are clear red tail lights, and a metal axle.  There are two torsion bars, two pieces that must be plastic axle ends and four plastic pins to replace the chassis screws. Very simple, just like Johan sold it.

It would be difficult to sell this as a new kit today.  The big hurdle is that they'd have to tool up a new interior bucket, dashboard and steering wheel for starters. The tire mold may not be with the kit, so tires would have to be made to fit the wheel in this kit.  

While those of us in the know would be very happy to have this again, there are a lot of people who wouldn't know the history and wouldn't understand why they were getting a simple kit with very thick parts.  That's been a problem in the past with these historic re-releases.

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Yeah, the two I have I got from Okey. Actually, I got a "complete" kit, and another with just the body shell. My original idea was to cut the roof off the '59 Dodge body and replace the woefully inaccurate one on the RC2 '58 Plymouth. However, I haven't had the heart to do it. Those '59's are getting ever harder to find, and one need only look on the 'Bay to see what they're going for. I'll just hang on to it, and turn it into something someday.

If all else fails with Moebius/Model King, I could always kitbash the body with the mechanicals of the '58 Plymouth kit They were pretty much identical mechanically during those years.

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Bill, why not make a mold of the top and copy it? Miles ahead of cutting up unobtainium!

That's a thought, but I'm not familiar with how to do that. I could fix the roof on the '58 to something much more correct, it's just that the ambition to fix it hasn't struck me yet. I'll need to recover from the roof job I had to do on the '59 Impala! :D

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I hope Moebius is going to reissue it.

Would it be too wrong to use the AMT '57 Chrysler underpinnings?

The '57 Chrysler's chassis would be too long for the '59 Dodge. Better to use RC2's '58 Plymouth (they're everywhere) for the chassis, engine (some changes would be needed), and other bits and pieces.

I don't remember who it was (perhaps John Goschke?), but there was a thread years ago on correcting the Johan '59 Dodge's rear wheelwells. They are just a bit too low, and IIRC, a '57 Chrysler's rear wheelwells were used to correct them. It looked very good as I remember, and those '57's are everywhere as well.

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Good to know the underpinnings of  the '58 Belvedere/Fury thingy can be used to detail the Dodge.

When moving my inventory from the hobby room, to the spare bedroom yesterday, I found I still have one of those.

Anyway in a perfect world, a model kit manufacturer would use the old Jo-Han bodies as a guide to design an all new full detail kit.....

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