John Goschke

You'd need a time machine, but Trenton Hobby Center, in Trenton, NJ circa 1965, and around the corner from there during the same era, American Radio & Hobby. Also in the '50s and '60s, Jenkintown Hobby in Pennsylvania. Today, there's Penn Valley Hobby in Lansdale, PA, but hours are very limited.

Outstanding work as always, Darryl!

Beautiful build of a true classic hot rod.

Cool subject! Beautiful work on the paint and the graining on the steering wheel.

Thanks, John. Tamiya Silver Leaf under the red. The spoon in the first post was my paint test.

Thanks for the comments, guys! Much appreciated! Took it all apart and shot primer last night along with the base coat on the lakes pipes. Hope to shoot the silver on the body tonight, then, if everything goes right, mask the coves and shoot the Tamiya Mica Red primary color (spraying it over the silver results in a great "candy" effect that's more subtle than shooting clear red over the silver.) Bill, the best '59 Corvette is Revell's recent modified reissue of Monogram's "Pro-Modeler" 1/25th '58 Corvette. I've not seen the '59 version but the '58 is superb. Apparently '59 comes with a hardtop not present in the '58. If you can deal with the multi-piece body, Revell did a nice '59 Corvette in about 1959 or '60, that's been re-issued a couple times, most recently in the "Skip's Drive-In" series. MPC did a '60 in the 1960s that's been reissued several times. It's a detailed kit with many virtues, but is hampered by a lousy interpretation of the shape of the side coves.

Some detail painting adds a little life to a pretty crude chassis, including one of the more ridiculous interpretations of a Chevy V-8 and trans ever seen! Cutting the floorboards out and replacing them with sheet styrene is the quick way to get rid of the HUGE injector pin marks that are usually on the floors of old AMT and SMP kits. Cutting a panel line for the inside door panel adds a little bit of realism to the interior. The tires are from a mid '60s AMT Craftsman kit with the WWs painted with Polly S acrylic. The wheels are from the original Corvette kit but a 3/64" spacer is needed behind them because the inside of the tires is deeper than the kit tires. A little Tamiya Pearl White brushed onto the chrome headlight lenses helps a bit.

Yeah, I know there at least three better kits of the '58-'60 quad-light Corvette, but there's something satisfying about taking an old unbuilt kit and trying to get the most out of it without getting bogged down by "Advanced Modeler's Syndrome (AMS)." I was fortunate to acquire this nice example of AMT's first Corvette kit from a member of our model club for a fair price. Because AMT's '60 kit has been re-issued so many times over the years, the price on first-issues of the '59 and '60 aren't nearly as crazy as those for the other vintage annuals that saw only one issue. For my purposes, the virtue of the original '59 kit was that it didn't have an engine or opening hood, in addition to being different from all the reissues of the '60 (including the one labeled as a '59) in that it had a correct '59 interior (however crude.) Here it is mocked up after quite a few hours of mold-line cleanup, fit, and stance adjustment, including moving the left front wheel forward about 1/16" and the right rear wheel back a similar amount! It also takes a lot of work to get the windshield to fit properly in this kit, and like many AMT/SMP kits from '59 and '60, the clear parts suffer from internal stress cracks (so, the windshield may get replaced with some clear sheet before final assembly.) The little dummy spots are from a '62 Ford kit, and the Lancer caps are from a 1960-vintage AMT kit. The lakes pipes are scratched from styrene rod, strip, and hex rod -- they'll get a coat of Alcad. The paint job will be similar to a '58 Corvette Larry Watson painted for LaVonne Bathke in 1959 or '60 -- candy red, silver insert, with off-white panel outlines. I'll be skipping the red and gold flames Larry did in the coves!

Amazing work!

Nice builds and I love the subjects you've chosen!

Table is 4' x 8'. Usable work space that isn't covered with stuff and miscellaneous BLAH_BLAH_BLAH_BLAH is about 24"x12". Enough for my 12x12 glass surface plate and the scattered tools, paints and brushes I'm currently using. As the project goes along the work area gets smaller, then I get fed up and clean up enough to get back to work. No pictures! Believe me you don't want to see where the sausage (or, since this is Pennsylvania, scrapple) gets made! Well, here's ONE, but assume that the clutter extends WAY beyond the borders of the picture!

Turned out nice. Beautiful color combo, too.

Outstanding concept and execution!

Just perfection! Love the worn and scratched red gas can next to the clean and shiny red Coke cooler. Outstanding workmanship and detail at every level, including the photography.

This little video is pure stupid fun!... http://vimeo.com/55832820 Thanks to Ryan over at Jalopy Journal for turning us on to this in yesterday's post.

Oh, bwaayy-bwweeee! Love it!

Beautiful result of excellent workmanship!

Looks great! Excellent color choice and nice details. The '58 is definitely my favorite fifties Ford. Looking forward to seeing yours completed!

As I understand it, overall "driveability" and ergonomics were an important judging factor this year. Seemed like there were quite a few more "traditional" appearing cars among the candidates and less of the smoothed, stretched and re-proportioned design exercises that bear only a passing resemblance to their origins.

Nice to finally see a hot rod in the classic tradition win the America's Most Beautiful Roadster award! '27 T by Roy Brizio for John Mumford. Powered by Ardun-equipped Ford V8-60!

Outstanding build!

Just beautiful!

Good start! Looking forward to further developments. Is it going to be a Fairlane or Fairlane 500?

A corrected body for the '58 Plymouth Belvedere kit would make me happy.

Superb in every respect.