Mark

Nothing real about "reality TV". If I ever ran into the gecko, he'd end up as a green smear on the underside of my shoe...

The roadster body is a '28/'29...very different from the '30/'31. Aren't both kits out of production due to whatever happened?

This is an AMT chassis, not the one used under the MPC funnies such as the Bounty Hunter and Soapy Sales kits. Back when all of these kits were first issued, AMT and MPC were competitors and not owned by the same company as is the case now. Besides the Mustang II, the AMT chassis was used under a '73-'74 Plymouth Satellite, a mid-Seventies Corvette, a Ford Pinto, a Chevy Monza, and a Chevy Vega panel (not the sort-of-stock looking one AMT did from '71 through '77, but another, longer one). The AMT Satellite body was blocky looking as I recall (I never had that kit). MPC did a Shirley Muldowney funny car kit with a '73-'74 Satellite body. Her 1:1 car ran the '71-'72 style body. MPC molded their stock Road Runner kit body with a molded-shut plain hood, and tooled different bumpers for it to make it look more like a one-piece fiberglass body. Nobody ever ran a 1:1 version of that (73-'74 style) body that I can think of, yet two companies made kits with it.

Just do a decent curbside chassis (one that is better than the flat slab included in the original kit), and an interior that is full-depth (unlike the shallow one with no driveline tunnel that the original kit had). It'll sell in decent numbers because of the accurate-looking Jo-Han body and trim. The trick here would be to not spend so much money on the new parts so as to make the kit unprofitable. Keeping things simple would go a long way in that direction.

It was the last Mopar to have a flathead, but AMC offered one in the American as late as 1965.

Lots of "I feel that"s and "could it be"s in there. Sounds like someone constructing a story for when it crosses the auction block.

The Mustang II was first issued as the "Champ", a fictitious car. That issue wasn't around long before the Trojan Horse appeared. Apparently AMT lined up a deal to put Larry Fullerton's name on the kit after the Champ was issued. The "name" funny car and Pro Stock kits seemed to be more popular than the fictitious ones back then. AMT issued the same few kits (Mustang II, Monza, Pinto, and the stretched Vega panel) with the beer decals later on; maybe they were trying to wring more sales out of them by doing that.

It was a '66 Chevy pickup, produced from the original SMP/AMT tool. Someone else produced 500 or so assembled promo models from that tool, but the kit never appeared.

I apply it and let it thicken a bit before putting the pieces together. When I'm applying temporary glue, I don't do it with the intention of handling those parts again until the next day so drying time isn't an issue.

I've always used Elmer's. Cheap, it holds, and it's easy to remove. Works for me.

If it's the one molded in dark red, it's the most recent issue. RC2 announced a reissue not long before they folded their tent, but it never appeared. The body was used in a couple of NASCAR kits (with that generic chassis) and some restoration was done to get it back to stock. A couple of areas aren't as crisp as in the annuals, but it's a serviceable kit. The reissue didn't have the station wagon conversion parts included, and it didn't have any stock wheels, but other than that it was pretty close to the '74 annual. Just the other day, I was looking at a built '73 annual that I've had for a while. When I got it, it had been converted to the wagon but the wagon roof and glass weren't part of the deal, and the hood was missing. I've since found a couple of hoods as well as the (used) wagon pieces. It's assembled fairly cleanly, should rebuild easily. I should get on that one.

The multiple-belt setup had to be molded with the "steps" in it. If it were molded with grooves between the belts, it couldn't be pulled out of the tool. You could scribe the grooves using the molded-in steps as a guide and then file away the steps, or just file away the steps and end up with a single wide belt. Other more recent kits have stepped areas instead of grooves on certain parts; if you have a Revell Deuce three-window kit, check the trunk lines on the body...

Revell-Monogram did, but that one is 1/24 scale and the engine is noticeably larger. The AMT Duster kit includes a six-pack setup, but the builder here wants a single four-barrel intake.

I'd wager that you couldn't find a person in that factory that has ever seen a picture of a '57 Chevy, let alone an actual one...

Those wheel covers are from a Monogram '58 Thunderbird kit. But, I have seen a review or two of that kit saying that they are closer to being accurate for '57 than '58.

#1 AMT '55 Nomad, #2 AMT '57 Ford.

The Model King issue Cyclone includes stock Cyclone Spoiler decals for 1970 and 1971, and also has the stock wheels on the plated tree. I don't have the Round 2 Allison issue, but I understand the stock wheels aren't in that one.

If you want a showroom stock Cyclone, get one of the Revell '70 Torino kits. The Torino and Cyclone are based on the same unit body, the Torino has the correct engine, and a lot of it fits very well considering the kits were engineered thirty years apart by different companies. The Torinos have separate door handles and side markers, the engine compartment is a good fit too. You'll have to do a bunch of work to convert the interior though. I'm working on one myself (using an original Cyclone interior) but I have seen another one done using a converted Torino interior.

Don't they say six more weeks of winter most of the time anyway? Chances are, there will be six more weeks of winter (which makes the prediction right), and if there aren't six more weeks of winter then you'll be happy about it and forget the "prediction" anyway...

Around here, one store had the MPC NASCAR '71 Cyclone, Jawbreaker, and Cosmic Charger, AMT '70 Impala, and a couple of newer Revell kits (I think they were the Foose Challenger and Camaro). They might add a couple more at some point, generally about eight or ten kits get broomed out every time they reset the stock.

One has the three-speed, the other a four-speed. A number of parts are identical but the block/transmission halves are different.

They'd give you a set (or a choice of a couple of other items) when you had to reorder something that was out of stock (which was pretty much every time you placed an order). A couple of the early catalogs had a set folded in half and inserted between the pages. Those sets were printed on slick paper without any adhesive.

Some Jo-Han kits had that air cleaner also. The '65 reissue '64 Dodge hardtop (same as the annual except with the Wedge swapped out for the Hemi) has it, as did the '65 and '66 Plymouth annual kits. I'm not sure about the '67-'68 Plymouths (don't have any of those other than already built) but they probably had it too. All of the Jo-Han units that I have seen are plated. Other MPC kits would include the AMT-boxed '65 Coronet (underbody and engine from it were reused in the '66-'67 Charger) and '65 Custom 880 convertible. The '65 Monaco hardtop, and '66 big Dodge kits, did not include the Hemi as an option so those do not have that air cleaner.

A lot of them were built like that. I'll bet the kid who built it had a blast back in the day. I couldn't bring myself to stick one together exactly like that, but I do have a couple of started Advanced Custom kits (including a '63 Merc hardtop) that I intend to finish using the kit's prescribed custom parts. In the case of my Mercury, I had to fix some overzealous trim removal and realign a few already-glued-on parts. But it's too far gone to save as a stocker, I've got a stock one already, and the butchered/customized one was cheap...

Did the words "screw bottom" appear anywhere in the listing?