Billy Kingsley

Here is one I just finished up recently. It is pretty rare to see a convertible come off my workbench, at least one that doesn't have an uptop as well. The last full-blown convertible I think I did was the Model King 70 Pontiac when it was released! This is a Jo-Han USA oldies kit I got at a model show somewhere. I don't remember where or when I got it, it's been a while. A long time ago, or at least it seems like it, in 2006, I started the build, painting the red and BMFing it. But then, it stalled. I still had the engine and interior to do, but it came to a halt as I was missing the windshield. I tried to get a replacement kit windshield for a long time, but couldn't. So I finally broke down and got the vacuuformed replacement from the Modelhaus. I have never liked vac-formed parts and generally every attempt I have made at them has ended in utter failure. So I kind of put this off. I basically didn't touch it from 2007-2009. Now, I am trying to cut down on the number of in progress builds I have going. It's about 200, although I don't have an accurate count. Maybe a little less as I have been knocking a few out. Anyway, I tried the window, and it worked good! After that, it was not hard to paint the interior and do final assembly. In fact, all told, doing the rest of the stuff after the window only took me about 2 hours. I should have done it sooner, this one could have been done in 2008, when I got the replacement window! Anyway, here are the pictures. It's only the 6th Jo-Han model, from original, Seville or Okey runs combined, I've ever built, and oddly enough, it's only the 6th Plymouth I've ever built, too! It actually has an engine! Another rarity for me these days, although the blue and gold was already painted when I got it... One question: Should there be any color on the wheels? I can't find any good photos. I am still trying to figure out how I can do the red white and blue logos and not mess it up, too... Thanks for looking, and enjoy!

I like that a lot...the F40 is actually my all time favorite Ferrari!

Jeff, you are killing me with these Fords!! That missing bumper may not be the only thing that comes home from the NNL East with me at this rate! Now, will I go for the pickup or the wagon? Decisions!!

White plastic, eh? Surprised me, I figured it would be black, again. I was planning on getting another, anyway. Love this kit!

That is what they look like out of the kit molded in purple...

Who wants to place bets on weather or not somebody does a smashed into a wall runaway diorama? Me, I'm conflicted. I want nothing to do with a Prius, yet I also have a strong desire to do something insane with it, like put it on a monster truck chassis, or shove in the largest real engine I can find. (Real being gas or diesel) I probably will not do that due to funds or lack thereof, as it would require multiple kits...but the desire may outweigh the costs!

My favorite show covered was MassCar...

Good job stifling the constition. I didn't curse, I never do, a moral ground I have always held myself to for my entire life. LAME.

You're darn right Bob! I first joined the model forums 9 years and one day ago, long before this forum existed. When I joined, I was brush painting stuff if I painted it at all, and it looked like ######. Now, My models actually look like what they are supposed to look like, and I've had a half page in MCM solely on one of my models. OR, for those of you too lazy to read, I went from THIS: To THIS: And none of that would have happened if I did not post on the message boards.

Al, good to see you getting started in the resin buisness! What are you getting for the Amphicar? I've always liked them and I have tons of great reference shots, as one has "docked" at the Saratoga Automobile Museum for quite some time now.

Very cool. You did a great job on the build and few models of race cars actually get to be ON the car they are a model of. You should be proud of that one!

Interesting stuff. I have not been on the forum in a while. I may or may not get the Bus, I will wait and find out if it actually is a new tool, once one is in hand. I will DEFINITLY be getting a Trabant though. I have long wanted one of those original kits, and have never been able to find one. Now I will just wait until they come up for sale new and get myself one. I will be building it Factory Stock, too.

Ouch...don't you hate when you go crazy looking for something and it's not there, then later it is?? It is worse though to go crazy looking for something and never finding it, though, Way back around 2000 or 2001 I was working on my first AMT 59 Edsel when I dropped the front spindle. I have not found it, and I've been over the area many times since then. My only theory is that it hit the floor and bounced into the heating grate. The odds of that are nearly impossible (considering it's a good foot off the floor, and I was sitting between them!) but it is the only option I can fathom. Unless, of cource, as it fell it vibrated enough to travel to a different dimension! Luckily, someone on the ModelCarList, I can't remember who, had a spare and mailed it to me, saving the build!

Ouch...sorry to hear that! In time...years possibly---you might could look back and laugh, at least at the green poodles bit....a former Poodle owner myself...

I must have one! My dad was a postal employee for more then 20 years. He didn't drive the trucks, he kept them running and did the body work. Are you going to get one of the aftermarket decal guys to come up with some USPS markings for it?

Attention my model car building friends: I will NOT be attending the NNL Nationals in Toledo in October. I have been making the trip out since 2003 but I will not be there in 2009. I may be back in 2010. Thanks for six years of good times.

Thanks for the comments! Tommy, no I am not a big fan of the HoK clear. I use Model Master Lacquer (MML) clear on all my paints-yes, even the Testors Enamels. There is quite a bit of it on here, neon just keeps sucking it in! (The 34 Ford I just posted has almost an entire can and should still probably take more, but I was starting to loose detail so I said close enough!) I have not had good luck with washing panel lines....I've determined it's better for me to do without then put them on there. That's why I like building 80s through current NASCAR models-no panel lines!

Here is my last completion for a while. (My 8th of this month, 9th of 2009. My 2008 total was 5). It is the old AMT 34 Ford. I had been trying to think of something to do with this kit for a few years, and I needed to test the paint, which is Black Gold/House of Kolor Neon Honey, so, this build was born. It is the paint sprayed directly onto the plastic, NO primer. I finished it early this morning, in fact. There was some parts box diving here. The wheels and tires, as well as the lights and license plate frame are all parts box items, as is the steering wheel. I am really happy with the way this came out! Wait until this build starts showing up at shows. The color does not photograph at all. The green did, this does not. It's MUCH more intence and bright in person. It will make it's finished debut at the Goodguys East Coast Nationals later this month in Rhinebeck, NY. I still have to do some work on the running boards, there was a lot of clear put onto the body, and it messed with the look of the running boards.

Either guts or just plain crazyness! This is my version of the Mercury, pretty much box stock. The body is Black Gold/House of Kolor Neon Green and Tamiya Gold Leaf. It's pretty much box stock, although not quite. The distributor is from a Monogram NASCAR kit. The bullets on the wheels may have been from the kit or the parts box, I can't remeber. This model has been sitting almost done since last September, when I lost all desire to build anything! Now when I got back into it, it took me maybe 10 minutes to finish. All I had to do was paint the transmission, touch up some of the black...and that was it. I should have been able to finish it long ago but I just couldn't. Now, it is done, and it will go down in history as my first model I've ever built where I painted neon (somewhat) successfully! Overall it turned out better then I expected. I am happy with it. It'll be at Rhinebeck for the Goodguys East Coast Nationals later this month, where it will make it's debut since it's been finished, although it did make the trip to Toledo almost done. This is also the first model I have displayed at a show unfinished, and actually finished it! That's been like a curse to me, if I take it out to a show it never is finished. This shot proves that yes, at least SOME of my models do have engines and full undercarriages!

Here is quite possibly the earliest "in progress" NASCAR model I have...or, now, had, left. (that can actually be finished). I decaled this body back in 2004, and it was I believe, the first time I EVER used Tamiya White. Yeah, that's a long time ago! If my memory serves me correctly, which it may well not, this was the second time I ever used Cartograph decals. We are sure going back a ways. This paint scheme was run by Dave Blaney at Daytona Speedweeks in 2004, running both the Bud Shootout and the Daytona 500. I chose to build the 500 version, just mainly so I could put the "Welcome Nextel Innagural Season" decals. I think only two or three of these have been built or shown on the forum since 2004...which is kind of sad. The decals are excellent (although my unskilled hands didn't do them any justice, and the bouncing around in boxes for years didn't help, either!) and it's a cool, obscure solid color car. This is the only set of decals in my collection, I think, that shows all seven flags. I did a GREAT job centering Dodge, didn't I? Well, that's all for now. There is one more new completion that I don't think came out good enough to post. But if you hit my Fotki in my signature, go to "All My Models" album, and go to page 12 into 13 you will see the 2006 Jeff Green Best Buy Chevrolet. The orange New tag will last for 6 days.

Yet another long time in progress build. I had originally planned for this to be Kasey Kahne's rookie car, but I didn't think the paint came out good enough, so I chose a red Dodge I liked less to do; I had just gotten the JWTBM decals for this car and thus, the build here was born. For some still unknown reason I did one of the wheels in it's entirety back then and didn't do the rest until later, although I had finished the tires...which was a bad idea, as the crappy new hollow tires have "issues" when you try to get the wheels in and they have already be finished. Nothing too special about this one. Although I did note that I chose it because I liked it less then the rookie car, after looking at it so much over the past few years in several failed attempts to finish it, I've grown to really like the paint scheme. Enough that I am debating building the 9 and 19 Vegas cars to have the complete set. I can never get enough of these Dodges, I love them! I've taken this one to Lake George at least two times, not to mention countless times moving around in my house, inside the box. Doing that to it has taken it's toll, some of the decals got a little beat up and chipped.

Here's a build that has been kicking around forever! I joined the NASCAR modeling forum in July 04, and this decal sheet was purchased from one of the members there. This was probably one of the first 5 sets of decals I bought after I joined...and I did the body up not long after. And then the poor thing has just taken a beating! There are more scrapes and dings on this paint job then any other model I have finished! It's a good thing the kit was molded in white because I took it down to bare plastic in several places to get the bigger marks off. I also had to practically redraw the numbers with Sharpie because a lot of them had gotten knocked off! This was first experience with inkjet decals, too. This was a one-race deal, in promotion of Speed Racer joining the Speed Network programming. By time I actually got Speed in 2006 it was off the air again. I have not been able to find a reference photo of the real car, all I had was the drawing on Jayski. I like to use real photos but I didn't have that leeway, I hope it is right. In retrospect I should not have done the air dam with Sharpie. It worked great with the 1/64 version I did of the basic unsponsored car, not so great on a larger scale. I don't even know if it WAS blue, but I know the basic unsponsored car had that, so I used some artistic license. Also, I lost the baggie with the axles, so this is the first model where I glued the front wheels to the spindles to get the stance I wanted. I like that, and I may do it more in the future. I had a rear axle in my parts box that I used. I had glued the wheels to the axle casing (the plastic part) but I thought they were too far into the body so I pulled them off. It would be kind of cool to build the Mach 5 and the Bobby Labonte CoT and have a Speed Racer trifecta, hmm....this is definitly one that looks better from a distance, that is for sure!

Here's another one that I started years ago, and finished the body, putting off the chassis. (All the NASCAR models I finished these past two weeks are the same story). I've always liked this paint scheme. It debuted (at least the basis of it) as a special paint scheme in 2000 and became the standard paint scheme in 2001, lasting until 2005 which was Sterling's last year in the #40. I painted the car Model Master Lacquer Sterling Silver and it wears kit decals. (with the addition of the Winston Cup logo from a contingency sheet-either Slixx or JWTBM, I don't recall at this point) Even though I decaled this in 2004 or 05, I had actually kept track of the tiny little 40s for the wheels and used the ones provided on the same sheet that did the body; I didn't have to cut into another sheet, although it would not have been an issue as I have 14 of them, give or take. (I am debating doing that anyway to fix the roof number) I did this so long ago I didn't even know to remove the mold lines. All these I finished were from that time when I was first starting, except for the one that came out crappy and I'm not going to bother posting! (go figure!) This is one of the few models where I got those thingies on the inside of the A pillar to work. I have a bunch of them in my parts box, and I saw on the boxart that the car had them, so I figured, I will try and see if they fit, they did. Oddly enough, this body somehow ended up in a Ryan Newman kit box, which provided the chassis. It is likely from the last time I had all my inprogress kits out which was 2006. .....I found it funny, anyway!

Hang on to your hat Chris, I am about ready to post all but one of them (it does not meet my standards-it's on my Fotki though, 2006 Jeff Green) I was working on posting them all when a major thunderstorm rolled through and I decided to turn off and unplug my computer, I didn't want it to get fried after 2 hours worth of surfing!!