StevenGuthmiller

Thanks guys! Beginning some of the less glamorous, but necessary changes to the chassis and engine bay. The body of the donor '66 GTO appears to be a bit narrower at the bottom than the '64, so I felt that some fillers were needed to deal with some of the gaps. Some filling was also required with the firewall to get rid of gaps and holes as well. Steve

Not even sure where all of the seat belts are. Crumpled up under the seats somewhere most likely. Steve

When I jump into the seat of my 1969 Pontiac Grand Prix to take it out for a spin, the absolute last thing that enters my mind is how "unsafe" it is. Don't care, and never will. I don't even wear a seat belt!!!!! Steve

They had to have stolen that '59 Chevy for this comparison! I certainly can't see anyone in his right mind donating it, and if they bought it, they absolutely didn't tell the previous owner what they were going to do with it! Steve

I use pre-wired distributors from M.A.D. all of the time. Nothing better or worse about doing them yourself versus buying them pre-wired. It's just a matter of what you would rather spend your time on. Personally, I see no reason to spend time on wiring a distributor when I can buy one that's better than what I'm going to do anyway, is cheap, and allows me to spend that time on other things. Wiring distributors feels a lot like "busy work" to me, and yes, I have done it many times in the past. Steve

I get that. That’s pretty much the same reason that I used it for a number of years. The biggest reasons that I stopped using it were, A... the caustic fumes that it pumped into the air every time I used it, (really nasty stuff) and B... when I discovered that Super Clean was actually much more economical due to the fact that it can be used over and over again, (I’m still using the same gallon that I bought probably more than 4 years ago) It’s just much more user friendly in my opinion. No muss, no fuss. ? Steve

The Revell ‘66 GTO has a pretty nice engine. The AMT ‘62 Catalina and Moebius ‘61 Pontiac kits are also nice depending upon the era that you’re looking for. The GTO and Moebius kits have tri-power intakes, and the AMT Catalina a dual quad, but of course you can modify the intake as you see fit. I used the ‘66 GTO engine with a single 4 barrel intake for my ‘64 Bonneville, and the ‘62 Catalina engine with the tri-power from the GTO for my ‘64 Grand Prix. Mind you, neither of the engines shown are straight out of the box. Both have had numerous modifications performed. Steve

It’s helpful to plan a little further in advance. It would have been infinitely easier to remove the kit distributor and prep for its replacement long before any paint was applied. Steve

Sodium Hydroxide, (lye) is what almost all of these cleaners have in common, and is the ingredient that is most responsible for its effectiveness. The concentration of the sodium hydroxide in the solution is the key to the extent of that effectiveness. I feel as if I’m constantly trying to make people in the Facebook groups understand that virtually all of these cleaners/degreasers, (Super Clean, Purple Power, Easy Off, Totally Awesome, Simple Green, etc,etc) all have comparable ingredients, and their effectiveness is directly related to the concentration of the “active ingredient” and the circumstances of the job that they’re expected to perform. Your success or failure is much more likely to pivot on what materials you’re trying to remove and how they were applied than the product itself. There seem to be a lot of guys that for some reason have the impression that their product of choice is made of fairy dust and unicorn farts and is the “only” one that works, which is absolute BS, but there are some that will work better than others on some of the tougher jobs. If you’re just stripping basic chrome or simple enamel paint, one is as good as the other. The lacquer under chrome or lacquer paints can require a little extra oomph! Steve

One of the things that I like about using Super Clean over oven cleaner, (there are several reasons) is the fact that it can soak for as long as is required to remove stubborn things such as this. With oven cleaner, what I've found is that the majority of the activity is early in the process, (maybe the first half hour to an hour), and then it begins to loose it's potency. Not due to the fact that it's ineffective, but just due to the much lower volume of the solution used. If you spray a couple of tablespoons onto your parts in a plastic bag, there's much less of the active ingredient, (lye) contacting the parts, than the half a gallon of Super Clean that they're floating in, which maintains it's potency for months. The parts can be left to soak for a week or two if need be. With oven cleaner, it will require a number of reapplications, and I could very well be wrong, but back when I was using oven cleaner, it seemed as if the huge bulk of it's effectiveness ended after the first application. I remember vividly trying to strip paint from bodies, and having it look like it was working quite well after the first dunking, but subsequent applications seemed to do very little. It was almost like it went so far, and that was it, regardless of how many times I re-applied. Just my observations from my personal experience. Steve

Or you could just take your chances like I do. I kinda like livin' on the edge. Steve

My problem is that when I'm working on small details such as linkages, plug wires, etc. I have to get the assembly as close to the magnifier as possible so that I can really see what I'm doing. If I taped a stand to me bench, I'd have to put a chin rest on the edge of it, and my back would look and feel like a pretzel after a few minutes. I guess I've just learned how to manage with one hand holding the assembly, and the other manipulating the parts. Short of holding the engine in my teeth, I really can't think of a way to do it any other way. Steve

I just use my third hand. Steve

On to some other modifications. I started looking at what needed to be done to the engine compartment, and as there are differences between the '66 GTO compartment that I'm using, and the '64's compartment, I began investigating what changes had to be made. The most glaring difference was the radiator guard/shroud. As I had to remove the '66's guard, I discovered an issue that I needed to find a solution for. The radiator from the '66 GTO is molded to fit around the guard that I was removing, so I either needed to find a replacement for at least the upper tank, or I was going to have to modify what I had. Look as I may, I couldn't find a radiator tank that resembled the tank from the '64/'66 in any of the kits that I had. So, into the shop to basically scratch build a radiator tank. This is what I came up with. Steve

If you start with a simple airbrush, it will make it that much easier to clean as well. I have an old Badger 200-NH single action that I've had for many years, and it's my go-to for virtually everything. I break it down and clean it after nearly every use just to ensure that it remains squeaky clean, but it's just a matter of removing the tip and needle. I dip one of those little between the teeth flossing brushes in some lacquer thinner and run it through the tip, wipe the needle with lacquer thinner on a Q-tip, and then dip a pipe cleaner in lacquer thinner and run it through the paint passages in the body. From start to finish, including disassembly and reassembly, it takes me no more than 3 or 4 minutes to clean the brush. You can usually find these simple single action, siphon feed badgers for somewhere around $60.00 or $70.00. They're extremely easy to operate and maintain, and they'll basically last forever. Now, if it's really cheap that you're looking for, you can buy a set such as this, complete with 3 airbrushes, cleaning brushes, a compressor and a color mixing wheel for $130.00! Of course I'm not going to vouch for them at all. Steve

Give Duplicolor primer a try. They can also go on a little thin and transparent to begin with, but I find that the “fan spray nozzles” do a fabulous job of atomizing the paint and getting into those little recesses. I know everyone seems to rave about the Tamiya spray nozzles, but I have never been particularly enamored with them. In my opinion, you’ll get better overall control, and more even coverage with the Duplicolor nozzles, and they don’t have the tendency to hose on the paint so localized and heavy. You’ll still need to do a few light coats rather than trying to do it in one heavy one, but that’s best practice anyway. In my personal opinion, even if you’re doing a light color, I would start with a couple of light coats of light gray Duplicolor primer to get some coverage over the blue plastic. It will give you something for the white primer to adhere to, to help keep it from drawing away from the high points and pooling in the low points as in your photos. A couple of light coats of white primer, followed by a medium coat or two, and you’ll be golden. Don’t worry about spraying a number of coats of primer. The Duplicolor primers dry extremely thin and won’t exhibit any detail hide, even with 5 or 6 light coats. In the end, depending on what type of paint you’re using, more primer is much better than less to protect the plastic from a potentially hotter paint anyway. In conclusion, never expect to be able to get great primer, paint or clear coat coverages in one coat. My opinion is that this is one of the greatest mistakes that many new modelers make. The idea that you can take short cuts and do it fast and cheap is almost always a loosing strategy in my view. Steve

As Ace says, spraying the body and hood separately for the initial coats to get color on the engine compartment where applicable, followed by taping the hood in place for the final coat or two is the best approach. That said, I don’t always do it. Probably out of laziness more than anything. Now if I were doing the model as a curbside, I would absolutely glue the hood in place prior to paint. If you’re having issues with filling in the hood gaps with paint, you should be having the same problem with the other panel lines. If not, that tells me that you need to do some additional work on the hood gaps so that they match the door and trunk gaps. If you are having problems with obscuring the other panel lines, you either need to use different paint, or less of it, or you should be scribing to make all of the gaps deeper. Steve

Honestly, all that you really need is some thin, narrow plastic strip for the molding separating the top from the body at the base of the C-pillar. My recommendation would be Evergreen .010 x .030 styrene strip. It’s extremely thin and pliable and will look in scale. If you prefer to go thicker and sand down to an acceptable thickness, that’s fine as well. Measure and mark the location of the moldings and then glue them in place with a MEK glue, or plastic cement of your choosing before any paint is applied. Then it’s just a matter of masking and painting. My suggestion is to paint the body first and do any cutting and polishing of the paint before doing any painting of the top. This ensures that you won’t inadvertently polish or sand portions of the finished top. I will usually mask the top off after priming and keep it covered until all of the work is completed, and then unmask and mask the body for top painting. If you plan on doing the top in black, I find that Duplicolor black sandable primer is an excellent choice. Once the body is masked, I’ve discovered that an excellent solution for the top seams is to measure and mark their location, and then mask the outer edges of the roof, and to spray a couple of coats of paint down the center. Whatever paint you choose, as long as it can be over sprayed with the Duplicolor primer will be fine. You’re just using the paint to add thickness to the center panel to create the seams. I recently tried this on a convertible top and it worked beautifully!! Once the seams are finished, unmask the outer portion of the top and give the entire top a couple of coverage coats of the black primer. Finally, the texture stage is achieved by spraying a fine mist coat or two of the black primer from a couple of feet away over the entire top. This is one circumstance where a fine orange peel is a good thing. ? Once all this is complete, unmask the body, and foil the C-pillar molding. Another great trick is to rub the top lightly all over with your fingers. The oil in you skin will “polish” the surface of the little bumps in the texture, leaving the background more of a flat finish and creating contrast and a very realistic looking finish. I know.....a lot of information there. But it’s really pretty simple, and in the end, will net you a MUCH more in scale and realistic looking top than most other techniques, such as using masking tape for the texture. In my view, masking tape is FAR too heavily textured for a 1/25th scale vinyl top. If you should choose to use my method, feel free to PM me at anytime should you need any further suggestions. Steve

The only real difficulty would be adding the chrome molding between the top and the body. Other than that, you should be able to add it without disturbing the paint if you're careful. Steve

Yes. Steve

I'm not certain about all of them, but I do know that some of the AMT '58s did not come with stock wheel covers. Case in point, the '58 Bonneville kit did not include stock covers. Why, I don't know, but the '58 Bonneville promo did. I was lucky enough to get a set of stock wheel covers for my '58 Bonneville from Modelhaus before they closed their doors. I really miss those guys! Steve

That’s why I’m thinking the ‘66 Barracuda is probably coming.......because I have one! ? Steve

I understand that. I’m not comparing every pro and con of modern cars vs. old ones. I’m merely pointing out how much more robust the construction of the cars from that period were compared to the flimsy cars of today. Put the same safety equipment available in today’s cars into one of that vintage, and you’d have something akin to a Sherman tank! ? Steve

I just have the feeling that the ones that I posted would be viable alternatives based on the fact that the molds of all three still exist to some extent as they were all offered as altered versions some time later. The Cyclone as a NASCAR only kit, the ‘66 Buick as a “stocker”, and the Barracuda as the “Hemi Under Glass”. There should at least be a fair starting point with all three, which seems to be Round-2’s MO as of late. Who knows what remains, if anything, of the ‘70 Cougar. Plus, it just seems to me that the Barracuda, Cyclone, and Grand Sport have all been very sought after kits for many years. The Cougar strikes me as being a little bit more of a “niche” kit with probably less of a following than the others. Round-2 will be looking for kits to reissue that will give them the biggest bang for the buck as possible. Steve

Very good idea! If you decide to go that route Jeremy, I would be more than happy to offer any help that I can. Steve