Robberbaron

Kinda disagree with this, depending on your definition of "kids". Plenty of young guys are in the "rat rod" movement (hate that terminology), which has been going on for about 15 years now, and fortunately a lot of these guys have transitioned into building more traditional, period correct rods vs. the "buncha junk thrown together to look radical" method (even though there's still too much of that going on). Most magazine sections in the local stores around here have just as many various "rod" magazines as the import/tuner magazines. If you've surfed around much on the H.A.M.B., you'll also see that there are plenty of younger guys involved in the traditional rod movement. So the "traditional" rod engines have dual appeal to both the graybeards and the new generations of guys who have an appreciation for tradition. Automotive interests are just like so many other elements of today's society: fragmented. For every guy that wants to build a stanced Honda, there's another that would rather build a pro-touring 69 Camaro, and another guy who wants to build a chopped and channeled "A". One of my co-workers bought a 51 Merc coupe when he was 28, another guy at our company had restored several 442s with his dad over the years. When he worked at our company, he had recently bought a 69 W-30 from the original owner in Canada, and he was only 24 at the time. You can't use too broad of a brush to paint an entire generation as "they just don't care" about this or that. Speaking of "A" coupes, it is kind of amazing that a car that is so popular in the 1:1 car world is pretty much MIA in the current model world. I believe the Monogram 1/24 is the only styrene version ever made, and when was the last time they cranked that one out? I believe the only other option is resin right now. Kinda amazing that they never produced a coupe variation of the 1/25 Revell kit.

Trying to make SRT a separate brand seemed dopey from the start. Same goes for splitting Ram off as its own brand, no point to it, IMHO. Always thought the 300 SRT8s were cool, so too bad those are going bye bye, though I suspect they mainly cannibalized sales from the Charger SRT8s.

Gorgeous! Love the color combo, too. Wouldn't change a thing.

You took all the lines that I was going to quote!

Sorry to hear about more Chicago area hobby shops closing. I didn't even know until recently that there even was a shop in Valpo, never had a chance to go there (don't get over that way much). Do they have much of a selection for car kits? I normally go to G&G in Griffith. They still carry a great car kit selection (almost the whole east wall of the shop. Parklane in Dyer is still going, but barely has anything except train stuff anymore. Ownership has changed a few times, and the last time I stopped in afew weeks ago, they had maybe only about 2 dozen car/truck kits...

C'mon: it's a new factory-built 427 Camaro that'll run rings around almost anything else that costs twice as much, and it's available to the general public (albeit in limited numbers and that $75,000 tag). This car is the most concrete proof that GM is definitely no longer "government motors"!

Lots of great ideas here. Tim, Luc: I totally agree on the GTOs: the closest thing we have right now is the MPC 72 GTO, which is a real pig. I think the last time the MPC 70 was available was the late 80s, and it's a challenge to build a decent shelf model out of that one, too. I personally would love a 78 to 81 Malibu, I like the clean styling of these and they make great street machines and drag cars. One of the drawbacks from a marketing perspective is that there was never a factory performance version of these cars, and I'm not sure if they would have enough appeal to the general public. I've also owned 1:1 versions of the 77-79 Caprice coupes and 73-77 Chevelles, so I would personally probably buy a case of each if they released a kit, but unfortunately these cars don't seem to be on the radar of the general public very much. Even many "car guys" don't have much appreciation for these. The 2nd car I owned was a 77 Monte Carlo, so I was overjoyed years ago when Revell brought out their snap kit of that one, but it seems like the days of those type of new releases is long gone.

Well said, Tom. My original thought process was focused on kit subjects that currently aren't available at all, but so many people mentioned a modern, full-detail 1/25 first generation Mustang. That got me thinking of some of the other cars that are currently available, but only as sub-par kits. First and foremost in my mind is the lousy selection of 2nd generation (68 to 72) Chevelle kits. For the 1970 Chevelle, what many people consider one of the apex 1:1 muscle cars, we have the old 1/24 Monogram with the "something's not quite right here" front end, the backdated 1/25 AMT kit which is 44 years old, and the fairly new Revell 1/25 snap kit, which I'm told is actually quite accurate proportionally, but a lot of folks have no interest in it since it's a curbside snapper. For other year 2nd generation Chevelles, we also have the inbred-looking 72 Chevelle that RC2 created based off their 1970 Chevelle, which itself was backdated from the original (decent looking) 72 annual. Rounding out the mix is the old pair of AMT 69 Chevelles, both the hardtop and the convertible. Again we're talking about 45 year-old tooling, but these are even worse than the 70, since there's a laundry list of accuracy problems with the bodies of these kits, especially the butchered, asymmetrical taillights. (I support a lot of what Round 2 has been doing with their recent releases, but they should be ashamed for trotting out that 69 convertible without fixing that bumper/taillight assembly). We haven't seen a styrene 68 or 71 Chevelle available since the 1:1 cars were new. Imagine having a new, modern, full detail 70 Chevelle LS-6. I think that would rank right up there with the new Revell 70 Cuda. Mechanically and chassis-wise, all the 68 to 72 Chevelles are pretty much identical appearance-wise (a 454 block looks the same as a 402, which looks the same as a 396). I believe the interior remained pretty much unchanged from 70 through 72. So it would be possible to field a whole roster of Chevelles with just body/wheel changes, plus new interiors for the 68 and 69. If you really want to run with this idea, you could even use the basic chassis for B-O-P variations (new 70 GTO Judge anyone?)

My apologies if I'm rehashing a topic that's already been covered. Well, I know it's KIND OF been covered before, but I don't recall the emphasis on "practicality", if you will. If that was Luc's angle, we'll just say that great minds think alike!

OK, I've kicked around starting this topic a few times, but I've hesitated because of what I fear it could degenerate into. Nevertheless, this issue came up again in the car kit news & review section regarding the new Moebius kit announcements. The issue is the fact that most new kit subjects are selected so that multiple variations can be created from the same basic tooling platform: a factory stock car may be followed by either a NASCAR variation (i.e. Revell '57 Ford) or a drag variation (i.e. Revell '70 Cuda). As others have said, this isn't a bad thing: we are getting some great new kits, and the manufacturers need to function this way to be profitable. With that in mind, can you think of some possible new kit subjects that would not only have enough mainstream appeal to sell well initially, but could also generate multiple "spin-offs"? I'm hoping for everyone to resist the urge to throw out the fantasy wish list: I'd love to be able to build the family cars from my childhood, but let's be honest: nobody in a million years is going to tool up a 68 Impala 4-door sedan with a straight 6 or an 84 LTD station wagon. However I do have a short list of possible model subjects that I keep thinking: they could really sell a lot of kits of a _______ if only they'd make it. A couple examples: I think a first generation 67/68 Cougar kit has a lot of sales potential. I believe the original (MPC?) annual got turned into a funny car kit, so I don't think a factory stock plastic kit has been available for over 40 years. The same body could probably be used for both 67 and 68 versions, and there are a huge variety of different factory trim levels that could be offered: base cougar, XR7, XR7G, GT, GT-E, probably some others I'm not thinking of. These cougars had a huge presence in Trans Am, so a Bud Moore racing version would be a no-brainer. I'm sure there could be a drag car variation, too. Another one I keep wondering why it hasn't been done yet: 81 to 88 Cutlass Supreme (RWD). I realize there are rumors that this one is in the works now, and there was a stillborn diecast offshoot that was shown years ago, but never released. As of right now: nothing in our hands. These cars were the best selling cars in America for several years, so there's automatically some built-in interest from so many former owners. In addition to the basic Cutlass Supremes, there could be 83/84 Hurst Olds variations and 442 variations. The basic body was pretty much unchanged throughout the run, so the only differences between years is taillights, grilles, and the 87/88 had a different nose with the aero headlights. A lot of these have been turned into drag cars, so there's interest there too. These cars are hugely popular in both the low rider and Donk movements, so those are also possible offshoots. Anyone else have some similar examples? Pretend you're a model company decision maker, and your job depends on whether or not the subjects that you select could turn a profit.

Dave, thank you for sharing your insider information with us on the board here. It's a pleasant surprise to have someone in your position not only actively participating on a forum like this, but giving candid responses to people's questions whenever possible. Although not all of Moebius' upcoming releases interest me personally (such as the Ford pickups), I can see from others' posts on this forum that there is strong demand for these kits, and Moebius is obviously doing their research to confirm what kind of market there is for these upcoming releases. I have recently purchased the Chrysler and Hudson kits, and was very pleased by the quality, so I'm looking forward to these new releases.

Wanted to support my LHS so I stopped in there today on my lunch. Wanted to support Moebius, so I finally got a 52 Hudson kit.

Yikes! That thing is going to be sinister!

Nice job!

Nice work, love your color selection. I built one of,these wagons when I was a kid and have it stashed away. Need to dig it out one of these days to redo it.

What everyone else said. Very clean build. Especially impressed with the mounting holes for the trim, and that grille just draws you in...

Another gorgeous build. Really nice job on that upholstery pattern.

Nice start you're off to on this one! Quite a few of these cars got this treatment back in the day. It would be nice to see a Monza reissue to make it easier to put something like this together.

Can't wait to see this one together. Nice color selection.

Looks like this will be nice, gonna keep my eye on this one.

I've seen the original Gone in 60 Seconds, but only about half the remake, in bits and pieces over the years. The original is exactly what it promises, and to me there is a certain charm because of that, and it was created independently. Growing up reading Car Craft, it was drilled into my head by the writers for that mag that Two Lane Blacktop was the ultimate gear head movie. They never showed it on TV when I was growing up, and it was unavailable on video for years. They finally released it on VHS in the late 90s I believe, so I bought a copy and.....it was a total let down. I was prepared for an action-packed street racing movie, and there's really about 10 minutes total of the content I was expecting. It starts out promising, with the main characters' '55 Chevy racing a Hemi Cuda when the cops show up, but after that it's pretty much a snooze fest until midway through when they end up racing a '32 Ford. Don't get me wrong, there are some cool moments, and plenty of vehicular eye candy, but don't go in expecting an action movie. It's still something worth watching once, to cross of your car-obsessed bucket list. Part of the novelty is that the '55 Chevy in this movie later got converted into Bob Falfa's car for American Graffitti, but most motor heads I know seem to agree that the original version in this film is much cooler. That might be another redeeming grace for Two Lane: the primered '55 in it is pretty brutal. I just wish that more car guys would stop denying that the emperor has no clothes, and admit that the actual plot sucks.

Almost didn't click on this thread, but I'm glad I did. That just looks "right", this is exactly how these cars looked when you saw them all over the place in the mid to late '80s. I especially like the red interior - I think that's part of the charm on this one.

Perfect! This is how I like to see these cars customized: the styling was so great from the factory, no radical body mods are necessary. Your clean building style is icing on the cake.

Good job, Liam! This '63 Vette is also the first model I built with my stepson (we got the version with the Torque Thrusts). He liked it so much that we got the Revell '57 Chevy snap to do after that. They both are very well done curbside kits that an adult modeler could also make into very presentable shelf models with some paint work and foiling.

Wouldn't change a thing - great work there!