Mark

The V8 engine was added to fill the kit box and provide an alternate building version. It's a not-too-detailed engine with characteristics of small-block Chevy (oil filter location), small-block Mopar (front cover and water pump look like other MPC engines) and Ford (exhaust port spacing). The stock version of these Dodge Daytona kits is actually pretty decent. The earlier the kit you can find, the better: the later hidden-headlamp versions have raised detail on the front fascia that should be recessed (Pentastar emblem, etc) while the earliest ones are very good all around.

Yes. Jo-Han never did a "good" '64-up Cadillac V8 engine.

Hope he got those diecasts cheap, they'll be throwing them in the hole with him...

I don't need another one, especially if it's molded in black. The original AMT company didn't mold it in black, only Lesney and Ertl (later production in this same box).

Is this issue molded in black? The one I looked at says "molded in white" on the box bottom...

The '59 engine isn't correct for a '66. Cadillac brought out a new V8 in '64, the 472/500 series, and it's quite a bit different from the first series engine. The Jo-Han '68 convertible was the most recent kit with a usable chassis, but who wants to break up one of those now? Other than working steering, everything is molded as a unit, and the engine isn't that good. I was sort of waiting on this reissue, but the body and interior molded in the color scheme of the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile kills it for me. I'll look around for the earlier issue if I want another one.

He's still open...I was there last Saturday!

One change you can make that really improves the look of the body, is to trim the windshield opening higher at the top. You'd file the actual opening higher by the thickness of the trim around the windshield at the top, then scribe new trim above that. There are other issues (headlights are too small, for one) but the windshield opening makes a big difference. I fitted the underbody and interior from a Revell '69 Camaro into one of these bodies (at the time I did it, Revell hadn't released the '68 Firebird yet). The underbody needed some minor trimming at the outside edges due to the MPC Firebird body being thicker, but it does fit pretty well. That would suggest that the overall shape of the body is pretty good (though some of the sculpturing isn't as good as it could have been).

You might be able to scrounge something cheaper right now, with Christmas shopping season in full force. I bought a Ingersoll-Rand "pancake" compressor earlier this year at Home Depot, I think I paid $100 for it. Depending on where you live, if the compressor turns out to be noisier than you would like for indoor operation, you can carry it outside and fill the tank. I wouldn't pay more for a particular brand name either; most of these things are probably coming out of the same industrial complex anyway, with the last step in assembly being to slap the brand name sticker on...

I don't remember those pins, but I do have a 50th Anniversary hat. I also had a key fob, those were given to anyone who correctly answered a trivia question in one of the Blueprinter contests. Those were made of a really soft metal though, I put it on my key ring and it broke pretty quickly. I don't remember how I got the hat, I don't think I would have bought it.

I rake leaves to get them off of the lawn before the snow starts falling. If they aren't removed, the snow packs them down against the grass, leaving bare spots the next year. If everything were nice and dry after the last leaves fall, I'd get the mower out and mulch them, but they're always wet by then.

Body is '65 Fairlane, dashboard is from a second-generation Buick Riviera (custom version), chassis is from a midsize GM car ('64-'65 GTO or '64 Olds F-85, possibly '64-'65 El Camino). Not sure about what is left of the interior, it's not the Fairlane unit as it appears to be too wide for the body. I'd be tempted to do something with that, there's a lot of work in smoothing that body off. Just needs the panel lines rescribed. A Modified Stocker Fairlane kit can provide a hood, chassis, and interior bucket that will fit better. I've got an original AMT '62 Impala convertible like that, that I bought because the windshield frame was straight and all the leftover stock parts were included. I bought it to part out, but after looking it over I decided it should be kept as-is.

If anyone is looking for the Revell Foose FD-100 '56 Ford pickup kit, HL is restocking those. I saw them at a store in my area the other day.

The Maverick could conceivably be tooled as both Stock and Pro Stock, but the Vega would have to be done as the drag version only. It's just too different from stock. A stock Vega kit would be a non-starter anyway.

Nice save. The slicks are Jo-Han, the front tires are actually original to the kit. Ertl did some strange things early on, they hadn't gone through the tool crib and identified everything yet.

Yes. In addition, #1 is from the Revell '56 Chevy, #2 MPC '69 Mustang, #3 appears to be the Revell Henry J/Willys pickup/Austin seat, #4 AMT seventies Camaros, #11 AMT '55 Nomad, #12 MPC Mustang II, #14 MPC Vega pro stocks (Jenkins, Larson). The upside down seat might be from the Monogram Hurst Hairy Olds.

They might do 30% off next week, and alternate with the 20% until after Christmas. If you absolutely have to have something, hold off until then.

The Revell Willys pickup, Austin, and Henry J kits have the fiberglass seats as pictured (though the upholstery pattern is probably different). The new-tool Willys coupe has one seat. (The old, opening-everything Stone, Woods, & Cook coupe kit has different seats altogether.) The Revell Anglia and Thames panel truck have what look like 'glass seats, with headrests molded in. Their '53-'54 Chevy kits have similar seats, but those look like crude copies. Other kits I can think of would include the AMT '33 Willys, and MPC '69 Mustang (those seats are a lot smaller than the others). I've got a set of MPC seats that look a lot like the "Ted's Aircraft Interiors" units pictured. I think they are from the '73-'74 Challenger and Barracuda annual kits with the gasser version included. Not positive about that, not that you'll trip over one of those kits anytime soon...

Those particular seats weren't fiberglass, they were some sort of solid, lightweight plastic, molded around some steel inserts here and there for mounting purposes. Those were first used by the dune buggy crowd, with drag racers later picking up on them. I remember first seeing them in Pro Stockers early on. Those were really light. A guy I worked with bought a '58 Corvette with a pair of those seats in it. The seats were mounted without tracks and couldn't be adjusted, so he decided to replace them with stock seats. I bought those for my brother, who was putting together a Ford Prefect at the time: rectangular tube chassis, aluminum interior floor, the whole bit. I hauled those over to his house in my hatchback, and remember those things were really light even with the upholstery on them. If I remember right, the upholstery was pretty easy to remove, but I don't remember how it attached. Fiberglass seats for drag race cars came in in the early Sixties, around the time 'glass bodies and body panels came into widespread use. (There were T-bucket bodies and other parts in the mid-Fifties, Dee Wescott started making early Ford fenders in the late Fifties, but IMHO it was Cal Automotive that really got the ball rolling around 1960.) Cal Automotive made fiberglass seat shells; if you have any of the Revell parts pack body kits, all of those include at least one.

The same body side tooling is used for both the hardtop and convertible. The original '69 El Camino (unrelated to the current '68) used different tooling for its body, so it didn't have that trim.

I've got a couple each of the X-Acto right angles (the "L" shaped one, and the triangular one). I've also got several stainless steel rulers, one is thick and heavy so it stays where I put it. I thought I had one with cork on one side, but I was mistaken.

The plastic stubs go in front. Ertl eliminated the front wire axle and filled the holes in the engine block halves years ago. The stubs should be shown for the front suspension assembly, unless someone at Round 2 scanned/copied an early instruction sheet.

Nope, the driver is on the right side. Judging by the Holden in the other lane, that car was in Australia.

None of these kits ever had recessed areas or cut lines for the windows. The pre-1975 issues all had open side panels on the body, and separate inserts (with/without window openings) that went into the body from the inside. The early bodies had a separate hood also. The revised body had the open side panels eliminated, round portholes added to the quarter panels, the rear door window openings eliminated, and the hood molded shut. The A-Team van had the quarter panel and roof ribs added, sunroof and spotlight holes added to the roof, and portholes filled in.

To make the body "more like the earlier versions" which didn't have the ribs. Only the A-Team issue had them. No big deal to add them with Plastruct strip stock, but then again I would have just left them on.