customline

Thanks, Rusty, I went that way because of the decal situation. The paint was certainly cheap enough! It had to be a light color so I could use clear paper. Even after a second run-through, I worry. In the sun it's pretty glittery and it might help brighten the decal colors.. not sure which ones to use but I gave myself options.

Yup. The red one. Love it! ? all of 'em cool.

Nope. 86 the 'Vette tail light. Not gonna work. It was a great idea but I couldn't make it look right. Bummer. It's getting either '41 Plymouth units or some other nondescript things I picked out of my chrome junk. It's gonna work, though, trust me...? Today I painted the upper shell (for the second time ?) with Duplicolor (see below) and this time I will be covering that with Krylon gloss clear, out of necessity, and again after decal placement. Gotta do it all before the green dust flies because I paint out in nature ?. I'm getting there, but it's not easy these days ?. Thanks for looking. Still some decisions to take.....stand by....

Cool slump-buster, Bil, the Starliner is high on my want list. That's not a mess, man, it's just the residue of accomplishment! BTW, I hope the boxes under the bench are empty, the ones up against the convector. ?

Awesome! Thank you! ? Nope, not too late, I work really slow ?. These ref shots will get me where I want to go. I found some nice chassis shots but they don't give me much for the line routing. I just want it fairly close. It's a model nobody in my house will ever see the bottom of unless they drop it on the floor. ?

I tried to find reference pix of the chassis/underside of the Riv for brake line routing but there isn't much help out there; only a little for the rear axle housing so I worked with that (most live axles would use similar positioning. ) the rest will just be WWJD (what would Jimbo do?) The exhaust follows the "spine" so, if I want the line to show in a logical way, I'll have stay off the side of the frame behind the pipes. Suggestions encouraged ?. I glued a small piece of angle, with a hole to accept the flexible line, to the inside frame rail and attached a drilled block to the axle housing and connected them with black insulated 30 guage wire. It ain't perfect (in scale the block is about the size of a Marlboro box) but I drilled it through for the solid line to go through. Not easy for me to work with tiny stuff like that at my age. ?. A little detail painting and we're good. By the way....because this build will be slightly altered from a showroom stock rendition but is still basically out of the box, I feel it's time to create a proper acronym for this type of thing. This is a BOOB....Basically Out Of Box. ☺️

YAAAAAAY!! ish ? Thanks, Snake, looks fantastic. ? This car looks really nice in white. I've been saving a rattler (pun intended) of pearl white (Tamiya) for a build like this, with an interior a dark red or "ox blood" red. Thanks for the peek!

....but on a positive note, this kit is a blank canvas for some obstacle-free detail work. The underside of the floor is free of cast-in fuel, brake, and emergency brake lines so that they may be realistically represented with appropriate materials. ? . Like Manfred Mann said, "That's where the fun is!" All I need now is some good reference photos. Incidently, if you install brake lines to the backing plates, you won't be rollin'.? I have left the spindles free to pivot for now. I'll decide on positioning later. ? I gotta work on the wheels now so I can mock-up a (non) rolling chassis. Thanks for your interest!

A minor thing but just another issue to be aware of if anyone here plans to build this model kit. First the reference photo: showing the automatic choke on the right side of the rear carb. Then the instructions showing the carbs in the correct positions. Clearly, the choke is visible if you are paying attention but if you use the orientation pins on the bottom of the carbs to locate them (blindly) you will find that the joke is on you. This may only be a problem if you are going for a well detailed engine with fuel lines (and heat riser tube) on those nice carburetors. Now you know what to do ? ! Take your instruction sheet and stuff it....well... sell it on Ebay.

Mmmmmm...... the styrene addiction....I'm so sorry. I didn't know it could get that bad but, apparently, it's pretty serious. Maybe I could get my wife to use her thousands of dollars worth of computer-aided plotters, cutters, and card-making equipment and room-full of paper and card stock, stamps, dies, embossers, and on and on.....to make a sympathy card to send you. Issues....yeah, I know. ? ..... but not me, I'm ok.

I will try to not disappoint, but as I plunge further into this kit, which I originally thought was a super nice kit, I am finding some pretty "common" stuff I gotta fix, bringing this kit down to 3 ? stars. Thanks for your interest!this is the sort of detail found in better kits, but the little glitches in casting quality brings the kit back to ordinary. I primed the body today and the hood shows a sink line all the way across the panel where a cast-in brace runs across on the flip side. When the primer dried it vanished. But it's there and I gotta fix it. That nice detail is a double edge sword.

THANK YOU MISTER RUSTY ! ! I knew there was a crazy person out there who could identify this wacky thing (it's yours, isn't it? You don't have to answer that) ?

Here's a shot of the flip side of that weird floorboard/pyramid thing. I can't find anything on it. It must be valuable! ?

Small headaches. This kit, despite the decent parts count and details, is giving me small headaches ?. The Deluxe Champions are nice and the super cool ribbed whitewall inserts will surely look fantastic but when I attempted a mock-up the wheels wouldn't fit. Not just a tight fit; WAY OFF! I Got to work with Mr. Dremel and enlarged the insert till the wheel went through. Not good enough. I'm now having to thin out the wheel rim for a proper look. Headache.? I decided it was more important to me to get a nice finish rather than have a showroom stock Riviera with door handles and scripts....... Mild custom ?. I'm finding the instructions aren't quite perfect either, but all of these things are pretty normal and a full detail kit of this subject is still worthwhile. I shall press on ?.dAnybody know what this is? (Below) It came in a junkyard lot that I got on Fleabay.

OK, good. That'll work. Thanks again!

Easy to fix, though, on the tyranny pan. The big, fat pin marks on the axle housing will be a pain. The (lack of the) valley cover surprised me. Got that covered, the only thing I accomplished all day. I just got a 100' roll of 30 AWG Kynar covered wire in black for stock type plug wires so I used that to look like the perimeter bead of the valley cover. Crude but it will sorta look OK if you're looking for it, but who would? Nobody in my house ?. Better than nuthin'. It's great they made the effort to detail the engine where nobody could see it. But if you do that, why not give us a valley cover? ? Don't worry- after it's painted, it'll be fine.

Some thoughts for today.....I will be removing the scripts to allow me to get a better finish. Are there any aftermarket decals to replace them? (Not a rhetorical question) Also, I noticed the intake manifold (which is inaccurate to begin with - compare with photo of actual ) will need detailing between the runners and, as Con-Can pointed out, the non-existant valley cover needs attention. There are a variety of sink spots and ejector pin marks to be smoothed out, just normal ?. There are a few little fit issues I will try to rectify, among them is the mating areas at the top of the parking light bezels. The firewall has a minor gap situation where it meets the cowl. I don't usually get this fussy but I'm slowing down on this build. I want to clean up my act a little ?.

Thanks Tim, I'll look I to it.?

I have a few questions ?......concerning the firewall/interior/body....ummm...relationship. ERTL wants me to glue the firewall to the floorboard. Jimbo wants to glue it to the body shell. Who's gonna win this one?

Thanks for your interest and your comments, guys. Dominick, I'd love to see that 3D body! Be sure to give us a look when you get it (I'm not a facebooker.)

Yes, Dave, it is. There is little to no flash and the body has almost no parting lines. A couple of sink spots here and there but minor.

Gee, Steve......just had a peek at your Fotki page...your Riv with a couple of small alterations? ? Yeah, right.. That subtle "chop" is pretty darn amazing and , as far as I can tell, the model for a chop that I have in mind. The Galaxy Ltd. '47 Aero. It took me a while to "see" it....but then it hit me. This is how it's done....basically. A few more cuts maybe but basically, this should work for a fastback. I may box up the Riv tonight and break out that Aero kit! No sleep tonight ?

Wow, Steve, that's frikkin' awesome! (I can say "frikkin', can't I?) Thanks for the engine tip! Geeez, that's beautiful ! ! ! I think you just picked out a color for me ?

Rusty, I totally agree and you are welcome to jump in here whenever the spirit moves you! Those cars were beautifully styled, heavy, smooth riding, powerful, generously equipped, comfortable, and a pleasure to drive. BUICK had an image of being an "old man's car." Well, I'm an old man ! ?‍♂️ I'm close to getting out from under my present project and I think I will do some preliminary clean- up on the Riv today. If anyone that has built or is building this kit would like to share info or pictures, please do. Thanks! Concerning the question by Doggie427, the gas tank and the wheelbase mods could be coordinated, yes? I don't know what the '65 floor pan looks like but my guess is it incorporated frame and floor. The '66 frame shortening is simple. Mine was twisted when I pulled it out yesterday and I straightened it out just by twisting it cold. What a strange chassis design! ?

Although my personal experience with a 1:1 Riv was a '70, I do think the earlier ones were better looking cars. The '70, with that odd side trim and smoothed out fender to roof line was a departure from the classic lines of what came before. AFTER that, (and a lot of disagreement will probably rain down on me for saying this) it got weird.... but beauty is in the eye..... Will we see your '66 annual project here? I hope so ?