Jim N

Looks very good!

With as late as it is, they may have to find a warm body to put in the seat for 2017 and then do a more thorough search for 2018. But when a seat of this quality opens up, there are probably a number of guys' lawyers reading the escape clauses of their contracts. This will be interesting as it looked like all of the seats were spoken for at the conclusion of this season.

Looks good. You did well with what you had to work with.

For what it's worth, I use the number 2 blade and handle. it fits in my hand better.

Looks real good!

To answer the original question, it may be very difficult. Resin is typically glued together with epoxy or super glue. Regular modelling glue will not work with resin. I have had very little luck separating plastic when glued together with either of these and resin is much more brittle than plastic. Others may have a different experience, but that is mine.

Keep in mind that when the Pacer was introduced it hit the market with a resounding thud. When the car was in the planning stages, American Motors had let it be known that it would be made of fiberglass and have a rotary engine. When it came to the market, it was made of steel and used one of AMC’s off the shelf engines. The car was heavy, did not drive well and got very poor gas mileage for a car its size as a result. My first car was a 1975 Matador and I think it would be cool to have one again as a reminder of that part of my life. The reality though is that this was not a good car. It spent a lot of time at repair shops over common stuff that nobody puts up with in today’s cars. That seems to be a common thread to this era of cars. There were some good cars, the vast bulk of them fill a large sea of sadness.

Very nice. Hard to believe the Christmas season will be soon upon us.

The only thing I can think of is to figure out a way to chuck the tire into a drill and load a little bit of paint onto a brush or Q-tip. Put the brush or Q-tip on the tire and slowly spin it with the drill.

Steven, that is a brilliant idea. I too struggle with putting foil on my kits and never thought about using painters tape as a guide.

Model Car World makes paint that is a match of the real car. I do not have access to my computer right now, so I can't give you the web address. A search on any of the search engines will bring it up.

Very nice. One of my favorite body styles for that car.

Excellent work! Really stellar.

Back in the day, guys suffered permanent and serious illness from painting without a respirator or a paint suit. Now they are pretty much required in the 1to 1 shops. Given the reaction you had, I think you should wear a mask whenever you paint or clean up, particularly since this sounds like it has happened before.

I like Graveyard Carz, Detroit Muscle and Gearz.

Very cool!

Looks superb!

Very nicely done! I always thought that was the most beautiful generation of Cutlasses GM ever produced.

Your model looks real good. I did the same thing and liked the result.

Believe it or not, we are still the world’s largest manufacturing country. The reason we don’t see it is because these companies do not make the things we buy. Companies like Boeing, Caterpillar and Deere are very big here and in the export markets. While these are manufacturing jobs, they require a skilled labor force to do the jobs. Having stated that here is the rub. The benefit of having a broad manufacturing base is that it allows our under educated and uneducated population an opportunity to live a middle class lifestyle and put their kids in college, which allows inter-generational progress. This is what has made this country the powerhouse it has been for a lot of its history. The other problem that is compounded by not having a broad based manufacturing sector is that if we look at the high school graduation rates in many parts of this country, it is appalling. We have large cities where the graduation rates are well under 50%. This in turn leads to a large number of people who have little to no skills and cannot find jobs that will help them move up the economic ladder. The move toward the economy we have now started in the 1950’s. It gained some traction in the 70’s and then took off in the 90’s. The economy we have now is what a lot of people feared would happen, but our elites told us that all would be fine. Well most of us now know it is not fine. Our standard of living has been in decline for almost 20 years. The median wage in this country in 1999 was around $60,000.00 and the last measurement I saw it is in the $52 - $53,000.00 range. This data might be a year or two old. But one cannot say we have much improvement when our labor participation rate is stubbornly stuck at about 62% The sad part is that I am not sure we have the will as a country to turn this around. Neither political party has the stomach for the effort it will take, nor am I sure the public can find the necessary common ground to force the required change based on how divided the country is.

I really have a difficult time understanding the angst with this auction. All of us buy things most every day. If the seller prices the item in line with what we are willing to pay, we will buy it. We will look for a substitute item or forego the purchase altogether if the price is too high. This seller has a fifty year old item and thinks it’s worth $300.00. If he gets that price, then bully for him. If he does not get that price, then it should be an indication he has it priced too high and should lower the price. Time will tell.

Looks real good!

He may be trying to replicate race damage. As I recall, Jr.'s car got beat up a bit in the 2014 Martinsville race. You are off to a nice start on this one.

When I was a teenager, I really liked the Gatorade McLaren Indy car. I bought it and never finished it as it was far beyond my skills. About 10 years ago, I found the kit on Ebay and bought the Fred Cady decals for the kit. It almost beat me again. It took a lot of work, but I finished it and it looks pretty good.

Hubris seems to be something that is hard wired in humans. We tend to think we are greater than we are and need a kick in the pants to find out that we are not as wonderful as we think. Self-driving cars, which is a component in the wider universe of the internet of things will be next. We once thought a ship was unsinkable and it sunk on its maiden voyage. We once thought it was safe to put civilians in space and then a space shuttle blew up. We will find out that the internet of things is not all that it’s cracked up to be long before self-driving cars hit the roads in large number. I saw a commercial the other day for a television show that I do not remember, but the person doing the voice over for the commercial stated that the most dangerous person in the world is a hacker who is bored. That may be a bit over the top, but one day soon a car will become a 1.5 – 2 ton brick because a hacker will render it useless. A home with a thermostat that is internet capable will be hacked and the home’s HVAC system will become non-functional. If this happens to a few cars or homes it will be a blip in the news. However, if the hackers can do this on a wide scale, it will cause mayhem. Only then will the hubris surrounding the internet of things and the sliver that is the self-driving cars will be put in its place.