1991 Harry Gant Oldsmobile

[MarkJ]

In 1991, September had 5 races in the cup series. Harry Gant won the first 4 of them and came in second at the fifth race. That is why sometimes you hear him being called Mr. September. I tryed to do the livery for the Martinsville car because that was the last of his wins in the streak. He only missed winning the 5th race at North Wilkesboro by 10 laps. His tires gave out with ten to go and Earnhardt passed him for the win. He still was able to hold on to second. The livery changed a little at each race. they kept moving the small number 33 at the front of the car for each race. The Martinsville car had it on the hood where you see it on this model. It took 98.5 hours to complete with 43 of those hours going to creating and printing the decals. I actually watched most of these races back in 1991 especially toward the end of the streak just to see how many he could rack up. You say how can you have 5 races in one month? Well i looked it up and its true . All 5 were in the month of September. Unless Racing Reference got it wrong.

 

[MarkJ]

Here are pictures of the real car at Martinsville.

[yellowsportwagon]

Nice work Mark!!

[Captain Spaulding]

Great job, car looks really good 

[ChrisR]

Looks great!

[gks1964]

Great job!!!

[bbowser]

I love this car!  Handsome Harry was the man, one of my favorite drivers.  Thanks for sharing.

[Ironman63]

Great job on the build!  43 hours on the decals?!  Man, that's going the full ten yards but it looks like it was time well spent.

That was a magical month for him.  I made one trip to North Wilkesboro and it was the one Earnhardt won to break his streak.  It was almost another Harry Gant show though.  He had the field covered leading 350 of the 400 laps until Earnhardt took the lead with 9 to go.  I still have the pictures I took.  Good memories(I am still a huge Earnhardt Sr. fan).   Of course who couldn't like Harry.  I have a kit of his to build.  I wish racing now was still like it was then.

 

Edited November 13, 2020 by Ironman63

[PappyD340]

Very nice!

[catpack68]

Awesome work Mark! I remember those five races like it was yesterday 

[MarkJ]

17 hours ago, Ironman63 said:

Great job on the build!  43 hours on the decals?!  Man, that's going the full ten yards but it looks like it was time well spent.

That was a magical month for him.  I made one trip to North Wilkesboro and it was the one Earnhardt won to break his streak.  It was almost another Harry Gant show though.  He had the field covered leading 350 of the 400 laps until Earnhardt took the lead with 9 to go.  I still have the pictures I took.  Good memories(I am still a huge Earnhardt Sr. fan).   Of course who couldn't like Harry.  I have a kit of his to build.  I wish racing now was still like it was then.

 

Yes, I have always wanted to do this car because most of the Gant builds I see are from earlier in his career in Monte Carlos. The kit i found was for Bobby Hamilton. I'm not sure they actually made a kit dedicated to Harry himself in the Olds.

[Nacho Z]

Love me some Skoal Bandit! Great looking model, Mark. NASCAR had some great characters back in the day. Harry Gant was one of them.

[bbowser]

1 hour ago, MarkJ said:

Yes, I have always wanted to do this car because most of the Gant builds I see are from earlier in his career in Monte Carlos. The kit i found was for Bobby Hamilton. I'm not sure they actually made a kit dedicated to Harry himself in the Olds.

I think the tobacco sponsorship was a problem.  I did mine with aftermarket decals.

[Ironman63]

5 hours ago, MarkJ said:

Yes, I have always wanted to do this car because most of the Gant builds I see are from earlier in his career in Monte Carlos. The kit i found was for Bobby Hamilton. I'm not sure they actually made a kit dedicated to Harry himself in the Olds.

I can't think of an Olds kit of Harry's.  The one I have is the 1985 Skoal Monte Carlo.  They also made a Mac Tools Lumina IIRC.

Bruce hit the nail on the head about the tobacco rides I think.  Somewhere in the late '80s they quit issuing the kits with tobacco and beer sponsorships.  Probably thought it was a bad influence on the kids.  LOL

[Old Coyote]

Beautiful build Mark, spectacular as usual. But, isn't this getting a little "modern" for you??

[randyc]

I built the WRECKED version from Martinsville.  Found an aritcle in Stock Car Racing magazine with a pretty good photo of the car in race.  Built it twice - sold the first one for what felt like a Mint - a whole $50 back in like '93.   I sold the second one sometime in the last 5 years.  And have no photos left durn it.  Benny Parsons said Gant's win streak ended with the wreck but he won it anyway.

But love your build and glad you shared - I loved following NASCAR at that time.

All I can find for images.  

 

 

[slusher]

Beautiful clean build, Mark!

[MarkJ]

On 11/15/2020 at 7:33 AM, Old Coyote said:

Beautiful build Mark, spectacular as usual. But, isn't this getting a little "modern" for you??

Thanks John. All those tiny contengencies are tuff to make good and apply on this era of nascar. But its been bugging me for a long time to do this build just for the historical significance of it.

[MarkJ]

12 minutes ago, randyc said:

I built the WRECKED version from Martinsville.  Found an aritcle in Stock Car Racing magazine with a pretty good photo of the car in race.  Built it twice - sold the first one for what felt like a Mint - a whole $50 back in like '93.   I sold the second one sometime in the last 5 years.  And have no photos left durn it.  Benny Parsons said Gant's win streak ended with the wreck but he won it anyway.

But love your build and glad you shared - I loved following NASCAR at that time.

All I can find for images.  

 

 

Thanks  Randy, but I would never attempt a wrecked version of a model. Its way above my pay grade. I mean how do you apply a decal on a wrecked fender or door and make it look right? I definitely don't have a clue.

[MarkJ]

I forgot to post the wip link. No bigee but I reveal something about the build thats kinda weird. Maybe yall  can figure it out before you find out.

 

http://www.shorttrackmodels.com/index.php?topic=1755.0

[CRANMAN1]

Awsome car!!!

[Johncoliflower]

On 11/12/2020 at 6:02 PM, MarkJ said:

In 1991, September had 5 races in the cup series. Harry Gant won the first 4 of them and came in second at the fifth race. That is why sometimes you hear him being called Mr. September. I tryed to do the livery for the Martinsville car because that was the last of his wins in the streak. He only missed winning the 5th race at North Wilkesboro by 10 laps. His tires gave out with ten to go and Earnhardt passed him for the win. He still was able to hold on to second. The livery changed a little at each race. they kept moving the small number 33 at the front of the car for each race. The Martinsville car had it on the hood where you see it on this model. It took 98.5 hours to complete with 43 of those hours going to creating and printing the decals. I actually watched most of these races back in 1991 especially toward the end of the streak just to see how many he could rack up. You say how can you have 5 races in one month? Well i looked it up and its true . All 5 were in the month of September. Unless Racing Reference got it wrong.

 

Do the numbers on the roof have a border, or anything?

On 11/12/2020 at 6:02 PM, MarkJ said:

In 1991, September had 5 races in the cup series. Harry Gant won the first 4 of them and came in second at the fifth race. That is why sometimes you hear him being called Mr. September. I tryed to do the livery for the Martinsville car because that was the last of his wins in the streak. He only missed winning the 5th race at North Wilkesboro by 10 laps. His tires gave out with ten to go and Earnhardt passed him for the win. He still was able to hold on to second. The livery changed a little at each race. they kept moving the small number 33 at the front of the car for each race. The Martinsville car had it on the hood where you see it on this model. It took 98.5 hours to complete with 43 of those hours going to creating and printing the decals. I actually watched most of these races back in 1991 especially toward the end of the streak just to see how many he could rack up. You say how can you have 5 races in one month? Well i looked it up and its true . All 5 were in the month of September. Unless Racing Reference got it wrong.

 

 

[MarkJ]

54 minutes ago, Johncoliflower said:

Do the numbers on the roof have a border, or anything?

 

John, I had to go grab the model off the shelf to be sure, but yes, the roof numbers have a thin black border around them.  Thank you for the question.

[fireguy14]

So cool!

[MarkJ]

Thanks, David.