Superbird McMonte Posted November 19, 2018 Share Posted November 19, 2018 (edited) Waaaaaay back in 1980 I was 12 years old. My bedroom window overlooked the West Islip High School. Every graduation day, my dad and I would stand on the deck to the pool so we could look over the fence and chant, “We want smoke! We want smoke!” I remember a lot of muscle cars that were driven to School in the 70s. From Road Runners, Chevelles, Corvettes, to 442s, you name it. They never failed to fill our neighborhood with smoke and the smell of burning rubber! I did my part in 1986 with my 1970 Monte Carlo. It was a 350 2 barrel with a 2 speed powerglide. I couldn’t do a standing burnout, but donuts worked to break the tires loose! I have a short video taken by my mother! We were and still are a car family! Here is a short video of my efforts: Back to the subject of this post! One day in 1980 while looking over the cars in the parking lot, I spied a Corvette. It looked pretty cool, so I grabbed my 110 camera, hopped the 6 foot chain link fence and ran over to the car for a couple pictures. Back in those days you didn’t know what your pictures looked like until you sent the film out for developing and got them back. I guess all the running put me a little out of breath and the pictures came back with bit of camera shake. But I saved those pictures all these years. I’ve always wanted to do a model of that car, and the Revell 62 Corvette was just what I needed to finally get it done! There’s some lettering on the front fenders that is very hard to read today in these pictures. But for some reason “Dad’s Dream” sticks in my mind from all those years ago. Recently a friend of mine was able to clean the pictures up a little bit for me, and it does look like that’s what it says on the fenders. So I painted the body white and then masked off what I wanted to leave white. I painted the rest of the car black but experienced some trouble with paint flaking off while I was removing the masking tape. I set that body aside and decided to paint the spare body that I had, black and then mask off for the white. This yielded much better results. Plus as it turns out I incorrectly painted too much of the cove white the first time around. In the pictures I can see the car had a teardrop hood. I was unable to find a teardrop hood for that body style Corvette so I had to create my own. I used plastic and clay to get a rough shape and then made a mold and cast the hood in resin. The resin copy was smoothed out, primed and painted with the rest of the car. Here is where I’m at now. The interior is in place and the chassis with the wheels in place. There are some pictures below. I figure for the engine I’ll do a dressed up 350 with basic chrome goodies and headers. This is artistic license of course, as I did not get any pictures of the actual motor. I printed the Dad Dream lettering on the laser printer using white decal film with a black border. But it’s not working too well. I recently acquired my father‘s old laptop that still has windows XP on it. I have to try and find drivers for my Alps printer so I can print the lettering in white on clear film. Here are some pictures, any comments or suggestions are welcome! Edited November 19, 2018 by Superbird McMonte Typos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gramps46 Posted November 19, 2018 Share Posted November 19, 2018 Wow, what a neat idea and the explanation is appreciated. Keep us posted on your progress please. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrObsessive Posted November 19, 2018 Share Posted November 19, 2018 Lookin' Good Dominick! A while back I decided to go past my old school and drive through the lot for a minute. Long gone are those '60's and '70's cars that littered the parking lot. Back then Dodge Coronets, Chevelles, Darts, Olds Cutlass, Vegas, Pintos and VW's populated those spaces. Now I see Hondas, Nissans, Kias, Hyundais, and the like taking those spaces. I know time moves on, but those cars while very competent and good cars, just don't have the same "personality" like the cars of yore. Hmmm................40 years from now however the high schoolers of today, might be saying the same thing about the cars then! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superbird McMonte Posted November 19, 2018 Author Share Posted November 19, 2018 30 minutes ago, MrObsessive said: Hmmm................40 years from now however the high schoolers of today, might be saying the same thing about the cars then! I agree Bill! When I visit my parents and look out my old bedroom window I see a sea of roofs and I can’t identify a single one!?♂️ My son , on the other hand knows them all!?♂️ On a positive note, he is pretty good at year identifing on muscle cars too!? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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