Peter Lombardo

Hey, Congratulations.....that Ferrari you built is certainly worthy of publication. Great job!

Well John, I have to agree with most here, your build is magnificent, but the actual car....the real car is really not.....well, let's just say, not all it could be. Congratulations on an impressive build.....it is a sure winner.

I have the same kit....one of these days I want to build it along with the Ford GT40, in the Gulf blue and orange. I hope it looks half as good as yours. Very nice.

There are some really amazing and wonderful "cool" stuff here....I am impressed....guys, keep them coming. All too often there are "silent Hero's" among us and unless you drag it out of them, they will never let on. There are some inspiring and courageous deeds all around us.

Well I guess I have to respond to my own posting question…that is only fair if I am asking for your “proud momentsâ€, I should reveal mine. In 2005 my daughter was getting married…..I have to say, there is nothing, and I mean nothing better in the entire world than walking your daughter down the isle on her wedding day. It is a special and proud moment to be sure, but I digress…. So for months my daughter was bugging me to give her the title of the song I wanted for the father/daughter dance after the introduction of the wedding party. I kept telling her to not worry about it as I would “take care of itâ€. Well she kept on bugging me and I kept on stalling her. I had a plan and I needed time to pull it off. On the Don Henley CD, “Inside Jobâ€, there is a song written by Larry John McNally entitled “For my weddingâ€â€¦maybe you have heard the CD and this song…anyway, it is a rather slow and thoughtful song about how important his wedding day is to him and his bride and how he is praying that they will get through their life together when so many around them have failed to succeed with theirs. I thought it was almost perfect for what I had in mind. The first thing I did was get a copy of the “song tab†on the internet so I would know the guitar chords and lyrics. Then I re-wrote a number of the lines to be appropriate from a father to a daughter on her wedding day….I basically changed it from “For my wedding†to “For your wedding†and changed it so it was a pray from a father wishing his daughter a wonderful married life and hoping that she gets everything in life that she wants. Then, one of the perks of co-owning an advertising agency is that we have a small recording studio in house that we use for cable and radio production. Our engineer, at that time was a pretty good musician and a great engineer. I play a little acoustic guitar; well I did more back then, so he recorded my basic acoustic chord structure of the song, and then he laid down a keyboard layer, some additional guitar work over the top to round it out. I then recorded the vocal sound tracks for the song and he put it all together. Now mind you, I am not a singer by any stretch but I can carry a note and not be too off key. When it was completed, we recorded it on CD and my plan was well on its way. I told no one of what I did, not even my wife, who was getting a bit upset with me because I kept telling her and my daughter to not worry about the song for the dance…I would take care of it. I guess they just didn’t trust me completely. So on the day of the wedding I gave the band that was playing the wedding the CD and told the leader what I had in mind. When he announced the father daughter dance my daughter looked over at me with one of those looks likeâ€what is going to happen now?†The band leader said, to everyone that Melissa, my daughter, had no idea what the music for the dance was going to be and that she was in for surprise…you can imagine the look she shot at me at that point. As to be expected, everyone in the place was looking at us and wondering what was about to happen. Well the music started and we began dancing and after about 30 seconds she realized that it was me singing the song and as she realized it, everyone there finally understood what was happening. It was just an amazing moment. She was crying…my wife was crying and I was just so happy that I pulled it off. It was one of those special moments in life where a little plan that you hatch and plan and work on for months works perfectly. Later in the evening, she made me dance with her again to the song. She used it as the lead music for her still photo CD of the wedding and of course it is in the video of the wedding where we actually danced to it. She has a CD of the song and it is very important to her. It was one of my happiest and proudest moments…I was able to give her something very special from me on her wedding day that no one else on the planet has.

I am curious…………what is the coolest thing you have ever done? I mean, look, none of us are celebrities, with the possible exception of Gregg, after all he did start a magazine that is sold worldwide which brings enjoyment to thousands, so that has to be counted as “pretty coolâ€, but the rest of us are a rather â€average†bunch of guys. So I am curious….what is that one (actually, maybe you have a few things that are special to you) thing that you did that when your head hits the pillow at night and you close you eyes it kinda’ floats through your sub-consciousness and makes you smile to yourself and helps you relax? Think about it….what is that thing that you are publicly or even privately most proud of? Maybe something you have written? Maybe something you have built (not model related)? Maybe something that you created? Something you said at the right moment? Something you did to help someone in their “hour of needâ€? Maybe something that no one expected you to do. Something that maybe no one else knows about. Maybe that little something that helps define you to yourself…or to others who know you? Is there something that while you are laying there in your twelfth hour that you, will look back on with a small internal smile? Don’t be shy here……we’re all friends here.

Nice job on the conversion...nice idea to do something rarely seen...makes it rather unique, and I like unique builds.....so finish it this time around.

It makes me smile.....I like it...it should look pretty cool when done.

If you remember, on my 1936 Ford Roadster posting of a week ago or so, I experienced the same problems with ghosting on many of the panel lines. I used all of the known methods to attempt to remedy the problem. Nothing worked as the plastic the car was molding in was just too soft. My experience is that the softer the styrene used in the molding process, the more difficult it is to stop ghosting from occurring. I think it is just one of those weird little things we have to deal with. At first I was loving the soft plastic for the modifications and opening panels I was doing, but soon realized that I should have been suspicious of the soft plastic.

I have to tell you….if I had the cash; this is a car I would really want to own in real life. I could see this “cruising the boulevard†on a warm summer night with the neon lights dancing on the shinny upper surfaces of the silver pearl paint……yeah, I really like this one. I love the idea of classic style with modern running gear. The only thing standing between me and a real car like this is a winning Lottery ticket…..so I will keep buying ‘em.

Then when the Bondo was fully hardened, I sanded off the rough edges and the end result is a nice smooth transition from the panel to the door. Next I took a pair of rearview mirrors from a Prowler and drilled a small hole up into the stem. I super glued a piece of brass rod into it. Then I drilled a corresponding hole in the door panel and glued the mirror in place. I thought about using the Corvette mirrors but thought they would stick out too far and maybe look a little awkward, so I went with the smaller Prowler mirrors, just to be on the safe side. Next, I added a section to the chassis to make the wheelbase line up with the Belair body. I cut out the tube that connects the engine and transmission and replaced it with an aluminum tube. I cut out the molded on front inner fenders on the Belair body to be replaced with the one piece Corvette unit. Since I decided to use the Corvettes interior rather than the Belair’s, it needed to be stretched so I could add a bit of a rear seat. The interior was enlarged and I found a rear seat from an old Firebird that could be adjusted to fit the little space on either side of the rear transmission bulge. I trimmed the seats and added an extension between the two seats. Next in line came the engine which I did not want to leave as a stock Corvette V8. I thought about building a supercharger like the ZR1 has….but decided on a set of twin turbochargers with an intercooler because I think all of the plumbing will look pretty sharp under the hood and because the engine sits toward the back in the engine bay, there should be enough room to house the units and plumbing. Besides, I have never scratch built turbo’s so it was another “first†for me…..and I love “firstsâ€â€¦.I need to keep expanding my limits. I will scratch build the components that I need for this. I know a number of guys have posted a “how-to†on turbo’s so I will only explain what I did to make mine. We all know there are many ways to accomplish these, so I am explaining this method…you use whatever style you like if you build these. Most of the turbo’s I have seen usually have a larger diameter turbo for the exhaust side, which is the turbo that drives the boost. Because of that, I used two different thicknesses of solder to make the turbo’s. I wrapped the solder around a piece of plastic tube which was cut to have a little overhang on either side of the turbo. The two units were built as mirror images of themselves so there will be a left and a right side unit. I am reversing the exhaust manifolds so that they direct the burnt gases forward where the turbo’s will be located. Then the exhaust will be routed to the rear of the car where the four tail pipes will come out the center of the rear.

How does inspiration for a build come? I guess it hits us all in different ways at different times. This is a build that came to me in a series of unrelated thoughts. First I always loved the 1962 Chevy Impala. I think the ’62, ’63, ’64 and ‘65’ Impala’s are just the four best looking cars, with uniquely styled bodies, in a row ever built. I know many would argue this and show why they think that four other consecutive year cars are the best looking. And that is fine….we all have our favorites, and these Chevrolets are mine……you are free to list your picks as I am sure you are thinking of them now……but that is not the point of this post…and on top of that, it is not even an Impala that I am building here, but the impala was the seed that started it all, and after all, I just want to point out the string of unrelated thoughts that lead to this build. Back to this build and it’s inspiration. I was in the middle of building my 2 seat roadster runabout which had a stretched Corvette chassis. Then one day I was at the local hobby shop one day and saw the Revell Impala coupe kit and just had to pick it up…..it looked so nice, it had to come home with me. Once home I was looking it over and figured I would cut open the doors while waiting for some paint to dry on the 2 seat roadster. Since I had the 2 seat roadster chassis on the workbench, I just for the heck of it, put the Impala body down on top of the chassis…..surprisingly, the wheelbase was almost exactly right for the Impala body. Well, it gave me the idea to build the Impala on a stretched Corvette chassis with all Corvette running gear. I thought a modern running gear ’62 would be really nice. You know the classic lines of the ’62 with modern road hugging underpinnings….sharp paint and a nice low stance…hey that works for me. So, it was back to the hobby shop to pick up another Corvette donor car. They had a C5 Convertible (the Indy pace car edition) so I picked it up for its chassis, interior and engine. Well, while I was looking at the Impala on the longer Corvette chassis from the 2 seat runabout, the thought occurred to me that this might look better with a Belair bubbletop coupe body rather than an Impala coupe with it’s more “formal†roof line. I dug out one of the AMT Belair coupes that I have in my stash and thought this was a better basis for the modern retro coupe mainly because the bubbletop roof line. First, I cut out the doors, and I have to tell you that the area around the vent windows was very delicate and difficult to cut around, but it came apart with no mishaps and the doors were opened. Then I shaved almost all of the trim off of the body. I want it to be as smooth and clear of frills as possible. This car is getting a two tone paint job that is silver on top and a custom mix of 4 different Jacquard pigment powders mixed with clear lacquer on the bottom half. I used silver, turquoise, medium green and green-blue duo to make a nice pale greenish, grayish, blueish pearl to cover the bottom half of the car. The engine and suspension running gear is highlighted with bright turquoise to set off the subtle silver and custom mix greenish body. I attached the inside panels of the Corvette to the Belair doors. I thought the plastic on the doors was a bit too thick to be realistic so I grinded away excess from the inside so the doors would be thinner. Notice there a two red marks on the doors and the interior panel. I “dry†assembled the interior into the body to test the fit of the doors. I lined up the door panels to the interior and put two small marks on them. Here you can see the thin door lip I made from very thin sheet styrene. I glued them in place around the inside of the door opening and then cut and filed them smooth so there is just a small lip to hold the door at the proper depth when in the closed position. That way I could remove the doors and be confident that I could glue the inner panels in place and not have them misaligned. After the glue set up, I mixed up a small batch of Bondo to fill the gaps between the inner door and the panels. Once the Bondo set up, but hadn’t finished curing, I cut away the bulk of the excess with a sharp knife blade.

This is a pretty neat Nomad. I think the "Nomad" name has been the genesis of more iterations than any other auto model nameplate. Very nice execution and great color.

very nice start....I love the color combo you have in mind for this....this will look great when done.

Brian, very nice job....the blue is a nice "calm" color on this and it sets the wagon off nicely. I love the opening doors and rear....I like to open doors whenever I can. I would, if you don't mind, like to suggest one little addition that could help this very much. Looking at the second picture.......looking through the open engine compartment, you see way too much "daylight" coming from the open passenger door. I would recommend that you insert a piece of plastic painted flat black at the firewall area, both left and right side, so there is a "wall" completely between the engine bay and interior. But other than that, this is a very well done build.

I, also just saw this today...very nice. I am particle to the "56 model, as we had one when I was a kid, but your conversion to the '55 is first rate. The colors just scream 1950's....impressive.

Pretty "darn" (not the word I want here)slick! I like the simplicity of it...meaning that it doesn't have stuff going on all over the place....just a great stance, slick color and a serious power plant. Nice "core" Hot Rod...the feel of a rat rod only finished very well.

This just keeps getting better and better.....you keep raising the bar for the rest of us....just an amazing reproduction.

Very nice....I really love the color and the contrast with the top. Very clean and tight.

I just got to see this posting...very well done, indeed! Nice and low...very "dream truckish" I like the flow on this.

Not for long!!!!! your first build posting is due on Jan 11th![ /font] I want to thank all of you guys who have very nice things to say about this build.....I really do appreciate it. I really enjoyed it so the kind words just add to the pleasure of it.

Perhaps you saw the “on the workbench†posting for this build. Anyway, here it is completed, my first of 2011. This build began life as an AMT kit #6924, a 1936 Ford 5 door coupe. Every panel on this car has been modified or completely changed from the original kit. I will start at the front and work my way back. After a false start with the kits headlights, I opted to remove them all together and smooth out the front fender area. The headlights and the two small grilles under them were removed and smoothed over. The hood was cut into two halves and hinged with small brass dollhouse hinges. The hood front “center†was opened up for the small chrome accent piece. The kit comes with two sets of hood side panels….one with louvers and one without. Starting with the plain pieces I cut out the area for the Prowler headlight panels to be molded in. Under the hood, I installed a Ford Cobra 289 small block V8 with the Cobra finned head covers. The engine was topped with 6 carburetors and set back behind the front axle. If you recall, the top is a separate piece in this kit. I cut the door tops free and glued them to the body. Then I cut the windshield free also and laid the windshield posts back….this effectively lowered the top, gave the car a sleeker profile and allowed the top from the Boyd Smoothster to fit better. The top and seats are painted with Krylon “Make it Suede†textured paint. It was such a great deal….I picked it up at Michaels on the clearance rack…originally $8.99, marked down to $2.00. The stuff is great….it goes on easy and smooth with no clumping and dries to a slightly rough flat finish with a small and very appropriate amount of texture. Truth be told, it is worth the $8.99. Both the front and rear windows are clear acetate cut and glued in. The two doors were enlarged and reshaped. I hinged them from the back, ala suicide style with the rear turning into the car. The rear view mirrors, dashboard and steering wheel were lifted from the same Prowler kit that donated its headlights. The interior was completely reworked, I will be the first to comment that the seats are a little too high in the interior. They looked fine in the dry run mock-ups I did, but for some reason in the finished car they look too high to me. I may lower them later…we’ll see how much this bothers me….if it gets under my skin, I will fix them. The “offending†seats came from the Ford GT, I am currently converting into a GT2/3 race car (it is coming along very nicely, thank you), any way, the seats were painted with the Krylon Suede paint and the center inserts where the little chrome air holes are was covered with real leather. I used a small piece of orange wire I had to add the contrasting piping. The door panels are covered with the leather on the upper part and the same material as the floor carpeting on the bottom area. The trunk opening was reshaped and the license plate area was recessed into the trunk deck. The trunk is upholstered in the same ribbed cloth material as the interior floor. The two taillights were cut into the rear fenders. The were painted white on the bottom panel and later filled with two part clear 5 minute epoxy mixed with some Tamiya clear red paint. The epoxy was dropped in and allowed to harden in place. The wheels and tires came from the curbside Dodge Copperhead concept car kit. I painted the spokes cream to match the side color on the car. The brake calipers were painted orange to match the contrast color on this car and the raised letters were touched with flat white Tamiya paint. I have always loved the look of the raised white letters on tires (both real and on models) and since they are so well molded onto the tires I could not resist painting them. The chassis is a combination of the ’36 Ford rails and all of the running gear coming from the parts bin. I don’t recall where these parts originally came but really, I don’t care, I like the way they look on this car. The exhaust is made from aluminum tubing and the mufflers are increasingly larger diameter tubes glued over each other and painted clear red to replicate a version of the old “Cherry Bomb†muffler. The car is painted a two tone combination of GM Cream Beige on the sides and Mopar Char-gold on the top surfaces, fenders and chassis. I can’t claim to have come up with this combination on my own. A few years ago the Ridler Award winning car was a 1936 Ford 3 window Coupe finished in this basic color combination….I can only claim the orange contrasting color….that was my idea to help set the two colors off better….well, to my eye anyway. Char-gold was a feature color back in the early 1990’s offered on many Chrysler products. It was very popular on the LH front wheel drive cars…Chrysler LHS, Concorde along with the Dodge Intrepid and Jeep Grand Cherokee’s, just to name a few. Depending on your viewing angle, the color looks either dark greenish gold or dark silver gunmetal. I love the contrast between the cream beige and the char-gold and the vinyl hand cut orange stripes between the two really set them off very well, in my opinion. Once the top coats were on, I covered everything with clear lacquer top coat, and once the car was completely assembled, I carefully brushed on a coat of Future to seal the stripes and the entire car. This was a pretty easy build with the one exception of a few of the former panel lines. I said, back in the under construction posting that I was really enjoying the “soft†and easy to cut plastic on this kit….well, that statement came back to haunt me big time. No matter what I did, I could not eliminate a few of the “ghost†lines from showing up. I used the liquid glue trick…did not work. I used the super glue and baking powder trick, to no avail. I used the “future†as a barrier trick….it also did not work. I used two part putty, one part putty; the best putty of all, Tamiya putty….still no luck. I tried a few undercoats, different colors….still no luck. Finally, I just surrendered and accepted the minor defeat. The soft plastic beat me. I threw in the towel and just undercoated the area one last time, sanded it smooth, under painted it, top painted it and gave up.

Whoever built this could have sent his time better at the dentist having all of his teeth removed without Novocain.

Impossible to find fault with this build.....very, very impressive. Great job....the body modifications look perfect.

It makes me thirsty just looking at it. Really nicely done.