Mark

If you haven't gotten the Dean Jeffries book, get it. It's split into different areas: pinstriping and painting (Jeffries was the "hot" paint/lettering guy at Indy for much of the Sixties), his cars, and his movie work including performing stunts as well as building vehicles. Each part could be a book all by itself.

The earliest kits had no cowl vents, windshield wipers, or other trim. They also had the gutted interior from the (first) NASCAR Daytona kit. Most ERTL issue kits have the trim added because they were done after the stock Daytona and 500 issues. All use the same body. Only the Round 2 issue has the corrected rear window. RC2 tooled that for the Fast & Furious version, but didn't think to include it in the Dukes kits they ran after that. Both Rc2 and Round 2 have issued different kits with the regular rear window and the 500/Daytona flush window, so apparently the tool can be changed back and forth. The Round 2 snap kit is unrelated, and has only the regular back window.

MPC '69-'73 Mercury Cougar kits have a 428 CJ, also the AMT/Ertl '69 Cougar. This is a different kit from the MPC '69 but the engine in it is the one from the MPC kit.

I'd test the clear pearl over a similar solid color, to see if it gives the desired effect. The "gold tint" on the original promos might just be yellowing of the original clearcoat. If you have absolutely all of the orange off, maybe just polish the solid color plastic and leave it at that? I did just that with a '62 Tempest convertible friction that was discolored, probably from being in a "smoking area" for a long time. Looks decent, probably not worth much but then again I've got a negative investment in it after selling the other three cars I got along with it...

I'd just repaint it in whatever color you want it. Its value is diminished to a promo collector, a repaint won't affect that very much.

The sort-of-Pontiac parts are from an old Aurora kit called the Fireball Pontiac. Aurora was trying to imitate an AMT kit but they did it in their own "style": the body was molded in sections that had to be assembled. The proportions were way off, it looked stubby among other problems. The decal sheet looked like a copy of an AMT '59 decal sheet. The large engine parts are from a Monogram 1/8 scale Chevy engine. Before they did the big scale car kits, Monogram did a Chevy engine by itself, but with numerous choices of headers and intakes. I believe at least some parts could be snapped in place and switched for other parts when desired. I had one of those, I remember one or two of the forward cylinders being molded in clear plastic so the internal parts were visible. There are a few 1/25 scale parts in that group too: those Ford script round things are end pieces for a custom gas tank (that tubular piece at the upper left goes between them), also there are a pair of custom taillights at the lower right.

One local hobby shop here (that was a wholesaler prior to opening their own store) used to get Canadian MPC kits every so often. They were probably leftovers, as this store would also have Academy kits with boxes and instructions entirely in Korean ("gray market imports"), things like that. The MPC kits were heavy on French/English printing (gotta take care of Quebec!). A couple of years ago, I had one of the '69 Firebird convertible kits from the early Eighties that was a Canadian-market kit.

WT Grant was closing out around here in that time frame. I honestly can't remember ever seeing any of the Nabisco-era Aurora products in any of the stores around here, and even prior to that I never saw very much Aurora stuff.

I had two of the 392 engines mint in box a long time ago, sold both of them. I've got another one that has been started; it's on the 1/16 scale pile, destination undetermined as of now. The Aurora stuff is better all around than the Revell kits, but in their time they were way too costly for most kids (or parents buying them as gifts). Revell having the "big name" cars was probably the tipping point back then. Today, with vintage kits, the "name" cars usually beat the generic/fictional ones value-wise even if they aren't accurate to the 1:1 car (which is often the case). There are exceptions, but not many.

If you blinked, you missed the Aurora series! Very few places carried them. Aurora didn't have the greatest reputation when it came to car kits. Having to buy multiple packs made building a complete car very expensive, especially compared to the Revell 1/16 scale drag cars which came out around the same time. Revell's kits built well-known cars while Aurora's only had generic decals. Aurora did offer complete car kits later on, but too late. Word is that production numbers on the individual packs were extremely low, well under 10,000 of each. The complete car kits are even tougher to find.

I'd bet on less Ford, Chevy, and Mopar, and more Ferrari, VW, Audi, and BMW.

Latin...the dead language that will live forever. Did the casino put up a sign with information on how many losers there were, and the average of how much each one lost?

Fred Cady made the Judge decals (including wheel arches) in multiple color combinations (two sets per sheet as I recall). Out of production, but you should be able to turn them up on eBay.

The green seat is MPC; "Street Savage" Camaro (1980?). Blue one is from the MPC '81 Turbo Z issue Camaro. The two-piece seats are likely AMT Camaro. The 1:1 Camaro seats were based on the Vega bucket seat but were wider. All of the MPC stock Vega kits had a one-piece interior bucket (seats molded in as a unit) so the only way to get the narrower Vega seat would be to cut them out of an interior.

The first-issue Revell '57 Chevy had the US Royal tires also. The center holes are a bit larger than typical AMT/MPC to fit Revell wheels. Keep in mind too, these tires are made of that nasty "plastic eating" vinyl. If you use original tires as opposed to modern copies, either mount them to resin wheels or use a good "barrier" on your plastic wheels where they contact the tires...

I was looking around on eBay, there are a bunch of miniature electric motors available. One was just over 1" in diameter and about 1/2" long (not counting the output shaft). It's just a matter of experimentation to find gears that would work, after figuring out which battery/batteries to use. A wind-up "build your own clock" motor would cost more, but should be even better because it's already set up to turn slowly...

Mix them before adding anything to them. If they are liquid, they should still be good. I'd mix each one (if you have multiples of one color, do them all at once) then keep an old paint brush and a piece of sheet plastic handy. Dab a drop or two from each bottle onto the sheet plastic and see how it dries. You might get a bottle that takes too long to dry; in that case either it's not fully mixed, or maybe that one shouldn't be used.

I'd rather see an old thread brought back, than see two or more on the same subject. Especially when someone cranks up a new thread without having seen another one that was started the same day...

Right up until it is finished, it still has the potential to be better. That's what might be at work here...

The chassis is from the '65-'66 annual kits. The '66 body was then used, with a new chassis, to create the mid-engine funny car kit.

More regulations, more safety features, more convenience features, and everything is more complicated. With more safety stuff, if you have a good driving record your insurance should be reasonable. I switched out of a fourteen year old truck to a new car last fall...insurance went up less than $100 per year. Are you talking actual prices, or sticker prices? Seems like GM in particular always has some sort of deal going where they're knocking about twenty percent off of the sticker. Why they don't just price the thing at the actual selling price is beyond me. "I got a $50,000 truck for a little under $42,000". No you didn't, you got a $42,000 (if that) truck. Thank Iacocca for those stupid rebates, they've been a noose around the neck of the domestic auto industry ever since. The second (and last) truck I bought was virtually identical to the first one...same truck, only sixteen years newer. Short wheelbase, regular cab, two wheel drive, V6, stick. Same color, even. I paid right around $10,000 for the first one, in 1988. The 2004 truck had power windows and air conditioning that the '88 lacked. Sticker was just under $20,000. Throw in two rebates that totaled $2,500, also the interest saved via zero percent financing, and a $1,000 or so discount on top of all that, and I figure I paid $15,000 or so in real money for that one. Figure in sixteen years of inflation, and the A/C on the newer truck, and I'm thinking the newer one was actually a better deal.

Check again...the Dream Rod was never reissued. What it is now, is what it is, and that's what it has been for fifty years or so. As for a resin conversion back to the Dream Rod, you'd need a ton of parts, the body being one of them. There were numerous changes made.

The chassis is based on the stock Cadillac unit. I was a bit disappointed with that, as I expected it to be a complete aftermarket chassis. I bought two of these kits. The "parts car" will probably give up its powertrain and wheels to an Eldorado Brougham (as soon as I can find a built one to cut up, to fix the proportions of the front clip). But the chassis will stay with the body, and there will be enough left that I can swap in another engine and wheels and have another complete (though different) car. The chassis would be an okay swap into another late Forties/early Fifties car, but under anything else it will look out of place in my opinion. Yes, someone could fabricate a chassis that looks like this one, but under a lot of cars it won't look like it was designed for that car. Again, just an opinion...that, and $1.79, will get you a medium coffee around here...

They used to...not any more. They tried to reinvent everything...gimmicky working steering in the Novas (steering wheel actually turned the front wheels) but to do that they ran the exhaust down the wrong side of the chassis. Weird wheels and tires, where you had to stretch the tire over a huge wheel. Metal plating that is impossible to remove, and sometimes dull. Photoetch hood hinges that are difficult to assemble and seldom work. And, in the Pontiac kits, too-thin hood and trunk outer panels that were warped while still attached to the parts trees. There just aren't enough people out there willing to pay the premium for a premium" car kit (the Fujimi Enthusiast Series being a prime example).

Pick up a Trumpeter car kit, build it, and get back to us...