jbwelda

just bumping this back to the top so its easy to find to update in the next couple of days. chassis is done, wheels and tyres done, and the motor in the final stages (ignition wiring currently). stay tuned for updated pics and thanks for looking!

it would be even NICER if they would reissue the big drag!!!

heres some pics of the infamous IMC Ford GT header system. i didnt think it terribly difficult though it had its moments and you really wanted to be able to get just one more finger down into there but then again as you can see i probably didnt do it to the standard many others do. to tell the truth i was just glad it was done and looking decent at least. i could have removed that frickin seam on the muffler end piece though!

hadnt yet had my coffee so maybe that was a little overstated but honestly it is the bringing to production of a concept that does dumb down and cheesy up what might have been a far better original concept. i do like some of those drawings and do think they show some imagination but it is still in restyling the past. and i do have to admit i like the looks of the current mustang, esp the more muscular incarnations, but i am 58 years old. i just dont think the classic designs appeal so much to younger people today as to us elders, and they dont even appeal to *me* enough to really champion them or for that matter, build models of them. and i think that reflects in the sales numbers and ultimately the health of the corporations. the bread and butter of these companies isnt in its prowlers, or its retro camaros or mustangs (though i suppose the mustang is approaching the PT Cruiser in terms of mass market), its in its everyday cars and most of those have been jelly bean bodied, generic "cars" for the masses. all those generic, one size fits all, jelly beans seemed like half hearted attempts to sell cars. a car can be made to be inexpensive to buy, inexpensive to run and still *look* good. and inspire pride of ownership which is what its really all about and what i cant imagine anyone developing toward, say, a ford taurus. i mean, japan, for one obvious reference, has made some pretty sharp looking cars that were meant for the mass market, and did it in a country with much worse regulations than even california. and makes them go too...the main thing US manufacturers seem to have forgotten is that you put a modest powerplant (say 200 horses) into a lightweight car, and you got a rocketship, one that will get good gas mileage while blowing off the camaros and mustangs (for the first 200 feet anyway) in a straight line and total lose them as soon as they come to a turn in the road. and thats my comparison point for my opinion: that it was fine to make big heavy cars and then overcome all that weight with a huge gas guzzling 400 HP back when gas was cheap and no end was in sight, but today it doesnt work especially in the face of the alternatives. so back to the camaro, even *if* it appealed to me aestetically, which it only sorta does, i would still have to say its not a step in the right direction for the company making it, that being of course GM. it really doesnt lead anywhere forward, it mainly recalls a good old time that fewer of us remember or participated in. and thats the biggest problem with it for me. for these companies to be reborn, they are going to have to get some fresh ideas and actually carry them out instead of just reskinning the same chassis over and over again (a big exaggeration i know). all that said i parked next to a new corvette that was gussied up in a street racer fashion and i immediately started running figures through my head about how i could afford one. reason (and the gf) dictates however that i just went and got a model kit. i gotta watch where i park more carefully from now on.

treehugger dave, did you build TWO of those chassis, or is that some trick photography? because i am in awe of that build even though its not really my style...but to build two of those chassis? almost unbelievable.

and the prowler? someone mentioned the prowler? that thing looks like a *really* bad lindberg kit designed by tom daniels or one of those cartoon minded people. it even looks plastic. i crack up everytime i see one of those on the street. almost as bad as a PT Loser but for entirely different reasons...just looks cheap, juvenile and very very poorly designed...like a chezoslavakian (sp) idea of what a hot rod was supposed to look like. sorry but its true.

its another sign of the bankruptcy of ideas that has haunted the US manufacturers since oh say 1969 or so. and for me anyway, a 69 camaro is just a pile of junk worthy of juvenile high school dropouts. isnt there a camaro already parked behind every gas station in the country, up on blocks with primer all over it? sure is around here. if only GM could have hired some decent designers whose minds werent back in 69 forever, they might actually sell some cars.

wow the big tub! what a surprise! but i see from the photo there are no 4 wheel cycle fenders. wonder if those are included? any other parts included ala the big deuce reissue? couple of other cool ones there too, but nothing that really gets me going. maybe that hemi dart.

i would love to see some pics of the ala kart!

yeah those headliners are too much! how did you do that distorted checkerboard design? are those decals? or did you somehow mask those squares off complete with distortion? wow.

bill: WOW! i would have thought the turbine car would have come close? that was another fantastic project!

it depends on what you mean by "hardest". my "hardest" was probably some pile of cr@p that didnt fit together at all and i eventually gave up or ended up with nothing to show anyone because nothing fit! but as i recall from my childhood, trying to build the orange crate was probably what i would call the most challenging out of the box build i ever tried. dont think i ever got that one done properly either! by the way, while i was looking for orange crate images this site popped up, check it out, an EXQUISITE build up of the orange crate. incredible! http://www.warpedplastic.co.uk/cars/orange.../crate-main.htm probably my most involved would be:

i would think about putting that tamiya mica blue over a lighter undercoat, maybe even white. ive shot a few cars with it and it turns out pretty dark even over a light colored primer base coat. spraying it over black i would think would result in a near black that was only really blue in direct light. model master makes a close color but i forget what they call it. for ease of spraying though, tamiya is the ticket. too easy to overdo the MM if youre not careful.

mike, show him a photo of the contents of the motor kit. its incredibly simple.

well possibly contrary to popular opinion, what i would do if you had the space is take them out of the box, but be careful opening the box and save all the packing material, just put it in the box. then stick the box up in the attic or wherever and enjoy the diecast out on the shelf! if or when you end up with a rare treasure, you got the box and can put it back in there!

very beautiful TR3! i dont recognize "masterkit"...is that a company making kits? is this the gunze TR3? i built a lemans racer of of the gunze one that i should post up but havent taken photos of it!

aluminum doesn't rust, it discolors, oxidizes and eventually might corrode away. but if you want to rust something, theres a company who sells special rusting kits (like "rust-all" or similar, look in the ads of our hosts' magazine) or you can use salt like you say and then experiment with browns and blacks and washes over baking soda or over panels youve taken your dremel tool to just enough to slightly break through, giving the appearance of corrosion inside the panel. rust in other words. that might even look right if they happen to be iron stacks youre talking about. if its really for aluminum stacks, like injector stacks left out in the weather, maybe half fill them with blued epoxy to look like water collected in them and then some dullcoat and light weathering to make it look like aluminum corrosion from exposure to the elements. good luck and post some pics!

does it have to have something to do with a mouse?

thats just what i was gonna say: you bought a HOUSE on a piece of LAND for 500$???? wow. ive heard of low but thats less than you pay for a fixer upper CAR! good luck to you; it'll be work but in the end youll have a place you like and control of your own destiny (no landlords i mean!)

another blow mind build!

wow that is sharp. i love those cheetahs and i really love the cox magnesium chassis!

X 10 i just noticed this woodie and right from the start i thought kemtron or pittman big motor in the back! thats very incredible work and more so with it being "just" a slot car. ive been very tempted to get back into building a slot car, a fairly scale slot car, but not having close access to a track is cramping my style.

just by coincidence one of these went by me today on the freeway. i glanced back and saw it coming, it kinda looked like a bulged out japanese wedge nosed rocket but as it got closer it began looking more exotic. it seemed to have a body kit on it too, maybe even like the koenig, just didnt get a long enough look at it. it sounded nice, probably going 65 or so in 2nd gear i would bet, we were in a real congested section of I80, and it was just revved up enough to let you know theres a lot of machinery under the hood. it looks a lot better in motion than standing still i think. never really loved these sort of designs but i have to admit that diablo looked and sounded MEAN!

thanks bernard, i will get some of that glue this weekend. looks like it really serves its purpose well.

wow that looks great! and you bombed right through it in record time, seems to me! great interior detail too.