Mark

I don't think anyone is promoting the use of putty to fill whopping huge holes or gaps, just smoothing the transitions from the as-manufactured part into the modified area. It's just the way I do things (not speaking for anyone else) but I do use styrene to fill the huge voids, then rout out slightly the area between, then use epoxy putty to smooth out the transition. Two-part filler is used to finish the area to a greater degree. I generally only use one-part putty for final finishing, filling ejector pin marks, and other minute flaws.

Might not be the actual wheels moving from one kit to another, but the same masters used to cut tooling for several kits. Most, if not all, of the Monogram Early Iron Series kits have similar wheels also.

Thinking about it now, it is kind of surprising that AMT didn't issue the stock sedan instead of the phaeton in 1969. That was right about the time that they converted the Willys double kit to eliminate the sedan and add the pickup conversion parts. It would have been natural for them to piece it into the Victoria kit just as they had done by creating a new phaeton body for the same kit. Then again , look at Rod & Custom issues from around then...Thirties Ford phaetons were hot. A number of bodies and cars were being bought in Australia and shipped in. AMT's kit was supposedly scaled from an Australian body, which did differ in minor ways. Note too, the original issue AMT box art refers to the phaeton as "rarest of the Fords"...not so. The B-400 convertible sedan was produced in fewer numbers, and is rarer than the phaeton.

They're designed to be added after paint. They are thin enough that most paint jobs would bury them.

Yes, the body in the one-shot Street Rods release is from the double kit. If I remember right, you can see traces of a couple of the locating pins that were molded into the double kit body for attaching the custom fenders. AMT did tool a new three-piece hood for that kit however.

The AMT roadsters and five-window coupe each have a unique (though similar) chassis: rear suspension and axle molded in, separate front spring/axle with backing plates molded in, no height adjustment built in. Victoria/phaeton/one-shot stock sedan all use the same chassis, fenders, engines and wheels. All bodies are height deficient at the cowl, and all kits have too-small stock wheels.

I'm not aware of any Craftsman series kit that included customizing parts, other than spotlights, mirrors, and such. The original annual kits did include some custom items like fender skirts and a Continental tire kit. I believe the first reissue was called Junior Trophy Series or something like that. Those kits were molded in color, often more than one over the production run of the kit. I've seen dark blue Buicks but the one I have is red. I'm not sure the Buick was ever issued in Junior Craftsman or Craftsman packaging. There was also a late Sixties reissue, molded in white, again without the skirts or Continental tire parts from the annual kit.

AMT's '69 and '70 Mustang annual kits were totally different, not a single part shared between them. I don't think even the tires or metal axles were the same from one to another.

For the sedan, I figure the sides were tweaked to make the bucket a little bit narrower, to slip inside the sedan body. The rear door lines were definitely wiped off the sides. Undoing the width alteration (if it was done) to make the interior fit the phaeton body again would make the interior not fit the sedan again. The door line apparently wasn't an issue, as I don't think that was reversed for the phaeton reissues.

The old Car Model Magazine ran a series of articles on kitbashed versions of the original Moon Scope kit. Not my thing, but a reissue of it as originally produced with the six wheels would probably do okay.

That sedan used the phaeton interior bucket. I never got around to comparing them, but I'd suspect that it was altered to fit into the sedan body. If so, Ertl having made it fit the phaeton again would have made it (again) not fit the sedan body. That said, maybe now it would be possible to just tool a new sedan interior, copied from a sedan kit piece. If anyone at Round 2 thought there would be enough demand for a reissued sedan, that is.

It's worth learning, especially if you have several unique or hard to find items that you would like to have multiple copies of. Just a thought.

There are five versions of that four-wheel SMP (later AMT) trailer that I can account for: -the first version in the Chevy pickup kits -second version as a stand-alone item. The stand-alone trailer does not include the fuel can boxes, there are other differences too. -third version as included in the late Sixties drag combo sets. Side skirts deleted, new deeper open wheels, trailer generally looks more up to date for the time. -fourth version as included in the Modified Stocker Hauler set, with the tire rack and "wind breaker" up front. -fifth version as sold via the Ertl Blueprinter mail order offer: chrome slotted wheels replacing the previous open wheels.

If you are making one, two, or three standard size mufflers and intend to use them in multiple projects, casting them should be considered also. Make one of each, make it as perfect as you can, then make castings of them as needed.

Any two part filler should not shrink, as it cures by the chemical action of the two parts being combined. Many other putties are at their essence extremely unthinned primer. Those cure by the evaporation of the small amount of solvent in them (compared to primers) so naturally those will shrink as they cure.

The Longnose body is a '69, probably modified from AMT's '69 annual kit. Not the "AMT" '69 that has appeared in the last twenty years, that is an ex-MPC kit.

Looks like AMT '59 El Camino to me.

For Stock class, it's shipping weight / advertised HP, not cubic inches.

L/Stock would be way up there for a six-cylinder car, wouldn't it? No factory installed V8 for '63, you could get installation parts over the parts counter from day one but those conversions weren't legal for stock classes...

I'll have to pull that out again and check the instruction sheet. I've been wanting to take some measurements off of some of the parts, to scratch a copy of it built as the display base.

The SMP "mail order" trailer, which is the four wheel unit from the '60-'61 Chevy pickup kits. I got two instruction sheets, two decal sheets, and two chrome trees with mine. Notice that the chrome trees are not identical, they are mirror images of each other. That would seem to indicate that these were molded separately from the pickup kits, at least for the mail order version. I wonder why they didn't try to issue it as a stand-alone kit in a regular box.

The separate trailer was mail order only. No box art, just shipped in a mailing box. I'm pretty sure it has a unique instruction sheet though. I've got one, if I think of it I'll get it out and take a picture of it.

The crazy stuff is changing hands between collectors. That Mustang isn't even a particularly accurate kit. It had some unique parts but not enough of them. Someone wanting to duplicate it as a builder could get 90% of the way there with currently available parts, and with a small amount of work would have a more accurate one to boot.

The Dyno Don issue Maverick hasn't been $85 or less in about thirty years, at least in unassembled form. So much for that value guide. Between the Maverick and Comet pro stocks (same kit, few different parts) the generic pro stock Maverick went OOP way before the Comet did, and thus has been harder to get. Now, with any real Jo-Han kit production being twenty years in the past, expect everything to go through the roof.

It's probably traceable to its promo model origins. To make the seats one piece, they would have been engineered to have hollow seat backs. The core part of the tooling that forms the seat probably had to be a certain thickness, which added to the thickness of the seat. Had they tried to mold it solid, the seat back would have been relatively thick, possibly the hot plastic injected into the mold would have taken too long to cool enough to allow removal from the mold. This also happens when an interior is re-engraved over last year's upholstery patterns. The area is smoothed off and the new pattern engraved further into the tool. That would make the seat thicker too. This didn't happen with the Wildcat though, as it was new for 1965 and was not reworked or updated for '66.