Russell C

Aargh, that sounds familiar. If I'm thinking of the same one, it was part of a 4 car set (or maybe more), where they all had shared what looked like black baby moon center caps. thin whitewall tires, and a somewhat jacked-up stance, and it was an Eldorado, a green VW Beetle, a candyapple red Jaguar XKE coupe with silver racing stripes, and a 4th car that escapes my memory at the moment. **Edit: All I could find for Eldorados were Hot Wheels and others. I remembered the 4th car, though, a purple Ford J-car. So when I dropped "J-car" into an eBay search, it showed what I had, and on the bottom the photo showed "Marx - Hong Kong." So when I put the word "Marx" into a Google images seach and an eBay search, it turned up these and other Marx brand diecasts, in various colors with different wheels. Saw at least one purple Eldo.

Ditto. I build this Diamond Reo in the summer of 1980, nearly 42 years ago (pardon the dust), took this photo a few minutes ago. BMF'd over the putty dome-created air horn snow caps, primered balsa wood grille shell, and plastic sheet/cardboard strips bumper. No cracking, no yellowing, no deterioration otherwise. If I'd had better skills back then for making the surfaces smoother, that's where the improvement to the shine could be found. Probably just a bit of polishing with Simichrome polish would bring back the brilliance, since those items haven't been cleaned in any way all this time.

More downforce on the back?

Must have been a bit windy along the way. (cars sez, "tumbleweeds - good to eat!)

"Ya don't have to be crazy to drive this road, but it helps."

Fabulous items!

At the grocery story this afternoon, somewhat hotrodded from the sound of it when the guy drove away later.

Confirmed this morning that my cardboard template was right on target for how much to add to the frame of Revell '29 Ford Roadster in order to accommodate an inline engine. Sliced off the highboy frame in the kit ahead of the engine mounts and added about "yay much" (hold your thumb and index finger about an inch apart) of the channeled frame to the front, wire-pegged for added strength. This is for the 2023 GSL-XXVIII Contest's "Revell '29 Ford Roadster Common Kit Class" - most guys' entries will likely have V8s, but we'll have to see how far into the minority of inlines I'll be. When I get a bit more done on this, I'll start up a WIP thread here.

I think it was at the GSL 2019 contest, Don showed me a bunch photos of his other hobby, garden railroad stuff. I just found this online article he wrote dating from only 5 days ago: https://www.trains.com/grw/how-to/large-scale-layouts/the-fairplex-garden-railroad-2/

Seeing how a couple of other guys here have builds going for the GSL-XXVIII Contest's "Revell '29 Ford Roadster Common Kit Class" (4th class description down at this page for those who don't know about it), I needed to get something going for that myself. Sliced out the deck lid tonight using my thinnest razor saw. That took a while. Clamped in the sides temporarily since they hold the floor down, was wondering what the trunk floor looks like with the lid off ....

Nice! Small detail that only the locals might mention, an opportunity to put another decorative plate on the front if you wanted one? Arizona does not require front license plates.

Out my somewhat spotty side window at the gas station midday today ....

And my daily driver from the mid 1980s just experienced another hike in value. Yay!

I remember when that 3D illustration came out, the tragedy there is the illustrator incorrectly assumed it was a camper on a shortbed pickup, so the camper unit is stretched a bit behind the doors, and appears off in quite a few other spots. Ironic about the lower 1:1 illustration I use here -- this full size rig, Chalet #1683, is the exact rig used as some kind of 3D scanning template for the 1:43 scale '77 model year diecasts (4th one up from the bottom of the page here) allegedly for sale out there. I'm guessing the European folks (?) used the dozens of photos from this 2017 website ad for it as a means to create the 3D model, they even exactly replicated the camper unit's much faded vinyl stripe colors and the missing parts of what were originally complete unbroken diagonal stripes on the back. I use the word "allegedly" there because the maker's page says it was a limited edition of 150 models, but I've seen way more ebay and other ads for them, and nobody I know has actually bought one to show beyond any of the maker's own photos. Btw, I used to own Chalet #1747, I'm the caretaker (meaning, I pay the bill to keep it online) of the old BlazerChalet site. These are individually designated by the camper unit serial numbers.

Durango Colorado to Ouray Colorado. I've driven that route literally every single summer for the last 18 years to arrive at my favorite vacation spot, know it like the back of my hand. Particular emphasis on the Silverton to Ouray stretch, I tend not to adhere closely to the speed limit in my VW GTI. Don't tell the local cops that.

At first I thought the Monogram kit had the fenders forward enough relative to the front face of the headlight bezels to the grille, but now I see what sets the fenders too far back -- it's the sheer thickness front-to-back of the bezels themselves, just like the way-to-thick front bumper, as seen in this side view of the "Smokey Bandit II" General. Probably since this was a snap-together kit, Monogram over-engineered the parts so that they wouldn't be too fragile for kids to press together.

Since I purposely avoid most pop culture like the plague, I don't have the first clue where the original images come from, but this one is a favorite since it is so endlessly usable.

Ditto. That's what gives any scale light a good reflective effect, an actual parabolic reflector behind the lens. My 911 Turbo illustrates that, where the wide central piece on the 1:1 car has no reflector behind it since it doesn't light up, while each individual light does. So what I did to recreate that was a bit of a chore in such a small space, but still worked out well, was to use adhesive backed chrome mylar sticker material (which is good for mirrors, too) within really tiny rectangle boxes for the backup lights / stop lights. Then I carved out a 'bowl shape' in the body for the turn signals and covered that with Bare Metal Foil that I buffed out to a super shiny chrome appearance with SimiChrome polish. You'd have to experiment a bit on how to create a reflector behind the lenses you have, but at least it's a bigger area to work with.

Pretty much everybody who uses rocks to carve model car parts would have to be. ?

One way is a site-specific search here, although it works the same with any website, where you put the word "site" in combination with a colon mark, and then the website address, followed by a space, and then the word you want to search for. In this example (click here), I've put your user name in and then did the next step at Google and clicked on the "Images" link. If you spot what you see afterward, you click on the result you want. If you want to see just text, here's a representative example of a two-word search, your user name and two words you mentioned in one of your posts. When you put words between quote marks, Google searches for that specific combo of words instead of turning up all results possible for each separate word. site:modelcarsmag.com/forums customsrus "v-16 motor"

Dodging a consistent identity.

For flat uninterrupted panel areas, I cheat: cutout areas from magazine pages that show finely grained wood, doublesided taped to the interior.

A reason why I'm keeping my 36 year-old daily driver. A Mk2 VW mechanic guru told me a while back that the simplistic computer in 'em never malfunctions, which is nicely reassuring. Also nice that Mk2 VWs from '85-'92 were popular enough for hotrodding that lots of aftermarket parts are made for 'em, compared to other run-of-the-mill cars. Plus, I can see where the spark plugs are in it. Good luck finding any of those in the latest computer-enslaved vehicle mayhems.

Appears to be one of those types that have the completely retractable landing gear? ?

Ernie Adams, Dwarf Car Cruisers: https://www.dwarfcarpromotions.com/