AMT Junior And Craftsman Kits

[keyser]

Only correct 57 Bird top molded. 
maybe Drag City does them. Thread around here discusses. Good hit. Blue rarer. My 2 are red. 

[sfhess]

5 hours ago, keyser said:

Only correct 57 Bird top molded. 
maybe Drag City does them. Thread around here discusses. Good hit. Blue rarer. My 2 are red. 

I found an assembled blue 57 Thunderbird, with box, at NNL West last year.

[ChrisBcritter]

Had a blue one when I was a kid back in 1967; have two blue ones now, one's clean and one's green:

(The flash made it look white)

Head-on with the full kit, from an old thread comparing the windshield frame angle.

 

[Phirewriter]

Those Craftsman/Custom JR T-Birds are nice, I've got a few...

[MJStyline]

I dream about finds like these! Like NOS parts in my 1:1 world.... 

[tim boyd]

On 1/2/2021 at 9:04 PM, Tom Geiger said:

Here’s a 64 Valiant I’ve been working on, with the Duster chassis under it. It will be a replica of a 64 Convertible I once owned. 
 

Duster chassis and engine bay do git well. Chassis needs to be shortened, look right ahead of the rear spring mount.

Tom....really promising start on this one.  Go, go, go!!!!!   TIM 

[Beamerman]

On 1/18/2021 at 3:18 AM, Phirewriter said:

Those Craftsman/Custom JR T-Birds are nice, I've got a few...

What a collection...a holy grail...no chance to find these rare things in germany...for me the old kits are a piece of art and culture...but maybe i´m crazy...;-)

[Mr. Metallic]

On 1/13/2021 at 3:06 PM, keyser said:

Only correct 57 Bird top molded. 
maybe Drag City does them. Thread around here discusses. Good hit. Blue rarer. My 2 are red. 

Drag City Casting does cast them. You are correct, the top in this kit is much better than the one in the full detail AMT kit.

[Casey]

Somebody here has to be watching this one currently on eBay...already set up with a proper cowboy rake. ?

[Casey]

Edited March 23, 2021 by Casey
Photobucket monster ate the earlier posted images

[1972coronet]

That Continental Mark IV looks sweet ! Wonder if its dies were scrapped ( hope not ) during the 'great purge' ? 

[charlie8575]

1 hour ago, 1972coronet said:

That Continental Mark IV looks sweet ! Wonder if its dies were scrapped ( hope not ) during the 'great purge' ? 

Those, I remember reading in Collectible Automobile's model section, are confirmed gone.

That said....with the new re-creation program, it may not be an issue much longer. I suspect R2 watches the swap meets and eBay.

Charlie Larkin

[Bob Ellis]

On 1/17/2021 at 9:18 PM, Phirewriter said:

Those Craftsman/Custom JR T-Birds are nice, I've got a few...

I guess you like them. I have one.

[ChrisBcritter]

21 hours ago, Casey said:

Love the box art! I remember it from when I had one around '66, and of course played with it to death. Scored a very very clean builtup last year:

I figure I can give it a polish, redo the silver paint with BMF and Molotow, maybe give it wide whites, and call it done.

 

Edited March 24, 2021 by ChrisBcritter

[Phirewriter]

4 hours ago, Bob Ellis said:

I guess you like them. I have one.

Yeah, I had a couple and ended up with this factory case along with some other interesting Ford models when I came into a collection many years ago. It still amazes me that something like this still exists after all this time.

[the other Mike S.]

I think if Round 2 does more kits like this (and why can't they with the 3D scanning/cloning technology now being available ), I'd like to see them molded in color that can be polished out. 

Whenever I mention something like this on the forums, I always get shot down by the rivet counter club.  You know, the guys who can spend weeks scratch building a '34 Ford hot rod chassis in brass with full working suspension.   Funny thing is, they themselves will go on a gush fest rant about some old Craftsman glue bomb they acquired on ebay and are now restoring it back to original condition.  So, it seems there is a viable market, a business case, a ROI, whatever you want to call it, for simple/easy to build kits and people will buy them. 

Maybe not kids which have been traditionally the market segment for these back in the old days. However, the market that exists now is better because they have a lot more buying power and have sentimental value towards these simplified rather crude "Craftman" style kits. They remember building them as kids themselves in the golden age of modeling back in the '60's.  Full detail kits do have their place and I am grateful for their existence, but so does the wonderfully simple to build Craftman style kit. 

Edited April 4, 2021 by the other Mike S.

[Motor City]

You get no disagreement from me, Mike!  There is a market for those not interested in building full detail kits.

[Casey]

15 hours ago, the other Mike S. said:

So, it seems there is a viable market

Yes, and I don't think it's a single, dominating factor, either, which makes it viable. Age and lack of agility and dexterity play a part, as the target market is mostly in the 50+ demographic.

Revell did bring their highly accurate (save for that '34 Ford Coupe) and detailed 1/25 scale snap-together kit to market almost twenty years ago now ('63 Vette, '77 Monte Carlo, '70 Chevelle SS, '57 Bel Air Hardtop, etc.), which were more detailed than promotional models, previous snap-together models, and almost always were improvements over their previous generation full-detail counterparts. Tamiya has always had kits like this, too, just few if any American automotive subjects, so Round2 is more accurately re-visiting an existing idea, with an added twist or two. Not entirely different from JO-HAN business model for the majority of their kit, too, with highly accurate bodies being their main selling point.

With the '62 Chevy II Wagon and '64 Galaxie out or on the way, the '64 Mercury Comet Caliente has to be next.

[1972coronet]

2 hours ago, Casey said:

With the '62 Chevy II Wagon and '64 Galaxie out or on the way, the '64 Mercury Comet Caliente has to be next.

And , of course , the Cutlass F-85 convertible , and the pending 4-4-2 hardtop . I watched Chris' [ HPIguy ] last night , and I was salivating ! 

I agree re: the 50+ demographic and simplicity . There was a time when I was hand-painting gauge numerals using a toothpick on 1/24 & 1/25 scale kits . Now I'm lucky if I don't 'colour out of the lines' when painting an engine ! Haha ! 

[Casey]

On 10/1/2016 at 7:21 AM, pack rat said:

The '60 Merc mentioned was in the so-called "Flower Power" series, along with a few other oldies such as the '60 Bonneville.         

So you're saying there's a chance? 🤔🙃

I think this would be warmly welcomed if reissued:

[ozmodeler]

On 3/2/2022 at 6:37 AM, Casey said:

So you're saying there's a chance? 🤔🙃

I think this would be warmly welcomed if reissued:

O.M.G.  I would buy several of these and the same era Buicks if they were available again. Doesn't hurt to dream !

[JS23U]

All these cool Craftsman kits make me wonder if the tools still exist. Many of these had their last run in the Craftsman series and have not been not butchered for Modifieds, Funny Cars or whatever. The kits that come to my mind are (not complete):

60 Bonneville

60 Starliner

59 Buick

59 Parklane convertible

59 Impala convertible

59 Lincoln

59 Edsel

59 Galaxie

60 Chevrolet Nomad wagon

57 T-Bird (we only have the glue kit version)

And then there were some that were annuals in Craftsman disguise, also never reissued or modified:

63 Falcon convertible

63 Comet convertible

64 Corvair

On the topic of the 59 Buick and Lincoln I always wondered why the '59 model year still existed in the sixties and not the '60. Both annual kit molds should have been changed for the subsequent model year. Or did AMT have more than one mold each?
With all the new technique... wouldn't it be great to have some of these back?

[Dave Darby]

17 minutes ago, JS23U said:

All these cool Craftsman kits make me wonder if the tools still exist. Many of these had their last run in the Craftsman series and have not been not butchered for Modifieds, Funny Cars or whatever. The kits that come to my mind are (not complete):

60 Bonneville

60 Starliner

59 Buick

59 Parklane convertible

59 Impala convertible

59 Lincoln

59 Edsel

59 Galaxie

60 Chevrolet Nomad wagon

57 T-Bird (we only have the glue kit version)

And then there were some that were annuals in Craftsman disguise, also never reissued or modified:

63 Falcon convertible

63 Comet convertible

64 Corvair

On the topic of the 59 Buick and Lincoln I always wondered why the '59 model year still existed in the sixties and not the '60. Both annual kit molds should have been changed for the subsequent model year. Or did AMT have more than one mold each?
With all the new technique... wouldn't it be great to have some of these back?

The 59 and 60 Buicks had different tools, as did the Lincolns. That said, the tools on that list were scrapped in the early 1970s.

Edited March 8, 2022 by Dave Darby

[250 Testa Rossa]

Hopefully the Corvair kits come back. 

[JS23U]

13 hours ago, Dave Darby said:

The 59 and 60 Buicks had different tools, as did the Lincolns. That said, the tools on that list were scrapped in the early 1970s.

I heard similar things, that's sad. There are other (non-Craftsman) kits that fall into the same category of unknown whereabouts (for me). Like 63 Ford pickup, 64 Pontiac Grand Prix. Did they kill these as well?