StevenGuthmiller

Thanks guys! No such luck Bill, unless you consider North Dakota a warmer climate! My wife was getting frustrated with the Mayo Clinic. She has been a nurse there for 30 years & has always been looking to improve herself. Just a few years ago she received her doctorate in nursing thinking that it may help with her ambition of moving up from her nurse managers position. She was getting really tired of all of the headaches that go along with that position & she seemed to hit a brick wall in the advancement department. So she decided to take advantage of Mayo's 30 year retirement plan & retire. She's only 52 years old so we knew that she was too young & financially it was a little too early for full retirement, so she began looking for new employment opportunities. She found one in the Roger Maris cancer center in Fargo North Dakota, part of the Sanford Health system, where she will be a supervisor of nursing. She actually starts her new job on Monday. So until we do the house swap & move, we will be living apart during the week for at least a month. I'm going to keep working until the 1st of May & then I'll be focusing all of my attention on the move. The bad news is, even though her new position is a step up, she will be taking a reduction in pay compared to her old job, at least initially. The good news is, if we can manage it financially, I may not have to take a new job after the move! It would be glorious to be able to retire at 54! But, as she says, "you'll get bored" so I'll probably wind up having to look for something. But, as we all know, it gets a little more difficult to find a decent job as we get older, & in my case, not having much in the "marketable skills" department. Anyway, that's the scoop. Wish me well! Steve

Here you go David. Steve

Well, it's finally done. The usual extras were thrown at this one. Parts pack tires, embossing powder carpets, resin window cranks, door locks, etc. I also added a modified transparent steering wheel & eliminated the console in favor of a bare bones floor shift. The 421 motor comes directly from the AMT '62 Catalina kit with a few added details.. The antenna is scratch built & the mirror was lifted from an old Johan Mopar kit. This build is a little bittersweet for me. The wife & I are making a move this summer, so this will likely be my last build until we get settled in the new place. I'm quite confident that by the time I'm able to start building again, hopefully in the later part of the summer, I will be exhibiting heavy withdrawal symptoms! It's going to be very difficult to not have a project going for several months! Steve

This is shaping up to be quite possibly the nicest example of this kit I've seen since it was introduced, & I've seen a lot of them! Here is another prime example of how a factory stock build can put all of the customs to shame! Absolutely beautiful Geoff!! Steve

One of my absolute favorite tips as well Bill! But I can't take credit for it. I picked it up from someone else a long time ago. So long ago that I don't remember who! Steve

There are going to be a lot of "unhappy campers" with a lot of things now that Modelhaus is gone. Ross Gibson had a full 1961 383 with the ram intake, but he has since passed on. I have no clue as to whether or not anyone has taken over for him. You're only option at this point, may be to keep your eye on ebay for an old Johan kit with the manifolds & air cleaners included. They were included as a "custom" option in all of the Chrysler 300 annuals from '62 all the way until '68. I recently built another one in a '62 Chrysler. Steve

I concur. If it's that small, a dab of matching paint with a brush will make it nearly imperceptible. Steve

My knees are fine but I think at this point in my life, I'm done with manuals just because they're a pain to drive in every day traffic. I have a 2007 Honda Civic coupe that I bought new & I thought it would be fun to go back to a manual after a few years of an '03 Dodge 1500 pickup with an auto. I was right, it was fun......for about 3 months. I got tired of it real quick! My next one will be an automatic. Steve

I think I may already have it covered Bill, but I'll keep that in mind, thank you! I appreciate it! Steve

I bought my first pickup with a manual back in 1988 having no experience at all with them. I had ridden a motorcycle for several years at that point, so I had the basics down. With the truck, I had to learn fast. I bought it as a work truck on a Saturday & had to be to work on Monday. My wife was raised with manuals, so she knew how to drive one long before me. She actually taught my son to drive our 6 speed '05 S-2000 several years ago, & just taught my now 27 year old daughter how to drive a stick last summer. Needless to say, my 22 year old son thinks he gets to drive the S-2000 every time he comes home now! Steve

I found this gracing my door step this afternoon. The original annual with the Polara trim is getting very difficult to find these days. I won't say I "stole" it, but it didn't break me either. Missing the hood & the glass is broke, but I think I have pretty good prospects for nearly anything I need for this one. The body is good & that's all I really need. Steve

Sweet! I love these cars! I think the Johan New Yorker was a better looking car than the '60 Desoto. Just an over all cleaner look. I'll have to check Bill, but I don't believe mine had any of the stock caps left either. I think it had the custom wheels which were a rudimentary version of a Pontiac 8 lug wheel. I went with a set of Modelhaus wires on mine. Boy I miss Modelhaus!! Steve

That would be great as the last time I had parts done, I just boxed them up & sent them to Bob. If there's a new boss, I'm sure there is an address change at the minimum. I would really like to stick with them. The finished product was miles above Chrome Tech. All of the info you can muster would be appreciated Kerry! Steve

That I didn't know! I hope that they will be using the same plater! They did spectacular work! Any info on the new operation would be greatly appreciated! Steve

Still plugging along. Getting some more finish detail work done on the '63 today. I think I've finally settled on a pretty good technique for scratch making head light buckets & lenses. I drilled out the original head lights with a Dremel to the correct size to fit a piece of .5mm styrene tubing. I then cut thin rings of the tubing to slip into the openings, backed them with pieces of styrene sheet to form a "bucket" & then used the Molotow pen on them. The lenses are still made from "Laser Bond" but I discovered that they look better if you reverse the mold. I cast them with the ridge detail on the back of the lens versus the front. This seemed to give me a shinier, clearer lens. I also followed up with a dab of clear acrylic on both the front & back side of the lenses. This seemed to help "clear" them up a bit as well. Steve

Acrylic craft paint. I use Ceramcoat paints, mixed a darker shade of the body color, thinned & applied. You can clean up any flubs with plain old water on a cotton cloth. This works best after the paint has dried for a while. Steve

Fair enough. Just wanted to make sure that everyone knew that paint markers are available. You don't have to go through the hassle of filling an empty pen if you just want to do tires with them. Personally, I've never liked working with paint pens anyway. I can get much better control with a brush. These pens have a tendency to puke out too much material at inopportune moments. Just my opinion. Steve

Wouldn't it be just as easy to buy paint pens at a craft store? Steve

I've had this happen when I've clicked on the "Submit Reply" button after composing a post & then nothing seems to happen. Things kind of freeze up. So I back out of the page & when I come back to it, the post is there......twice for some reason. It's easy to remedy though. Just delete or "hide" one of them. Steve

See Richard Manson's post. I do it exactly the same way. Do you thin the glue a little Mike? If you thin it first with a little water it will flow better. Steve

These are just directly from the kit. Re-chromed & detail painted of course. I had several sets re-plated the last time I sent out parts. I have a bunch of Pontiac builds coming in the future & most of them will have these wheels. Steve

It's a good idea, but not really necessary for embossing powder. You can just dump the powder on, shake it around a bit & pour off the excess. Flocking is a little more finicky, but embossing powder is simple just to pour directly from the container. Steve

Believe me, there is no shortage of good ideas out there. But as long as Hollywood can get people to pay to see these glorified television series, they'll keep pumping them out. It's all about the almighty dollar. Steve

Exactly my point. If the public would demand better films and would just ignore the stuff we're getting & stay home, they would have to produce a better product to stay in business. Just a pipe dream, I know. Steve

It's not so much that this particular series of movies is a poorly acted string of pointless excuses to race & wreck cars as it is the fact that Hollywood has become lazy producing nothing but an endless array of sequels, remakes & spin offs. Every year we get a multitude of bad super hero films, stupid comedies, & a bevy of remakes, with the occasional "good" movie mixed in. It reminds me a little of why I have 75 cable television channels with nothing to watch most of the time. Steve