Mark

I've stripped paint from parts molded in red, said parts ending up pink or a very washed-out red. Something is coming out of the plastic in those cases. That's not to say that red plastic cannot be sealed effectively, though.

Still rough as a cob, though the Model King issue is molded in white which was a first for the sedan. Building one of the Revell '53-'54 Chevies, and one or more of the '55-'57 opening-everything Chevies, is a sort of rite of passage that everyone should attempt if they haven't done so yet. If you've been there and done that already, you are officially excused...

I sold an original kit years ago; the guy who bought it told me he wanted to convert it to a Mercury Bobcat wagon because he owned one. There's another conversion idea; I'm surprised nobody mentioned it yet...

I found this out too just the other day, and posted it on another forum. I hadn't paid attention to it in the past. Every so often, there are differences like that. The '62 Galaxie convertible kit has the front bumper and grille as two pieces, while the hardtop has them as a single unit. The '62 Buick convertible has dated bumpers ("1962" in the license plate area) while the hardtop parts are blank, even in the original annual kit. Sometimes the custom parts differ in small ways too. There are the (then) $2 hardtop kits which had a bunch more custom parts than the $1.49 convertibles. I'm not talking about those; the hardtop in those instances usually have the same, more basic items that are in the convertible, and then have a bunch of stuff over and above that. But sometimes things like the custom wheels differed between hardtop and convertible versions of the same kit.

I was in a Target store the other day, they had the Rock'em Sock'em Robots. I thought those had been produced again in recent years, but hadn't seen them anywhere. I thought that they were a limited-run "nostalgia" thing.

I'm pretty certain a couple of the earlier MPC Pinto kits had extension pieces for those exhaust pipes, to direct them to the sides of the car just ahead of the rear wheels. Perhaps there is some part, or parts, in the wagon that used the space in the tool where those parts were in the earlier versions.

The local guy probably has to place a minimum order with the wholesaler that he's getting his stock from. Often, when he is out of something and won't be placing an order with the wholesaler right away, he'll tell you that the product isn't available, so maybe you'll buy the next closest thing (which, by coincidence, he does happen to have on the shelf). With the Tenax product, lately when the shop around here gets it in, it sells out fast because customers see they've got it and they don't want to run out of it themselves. If no other product will do, get two bottles next time, and when you open the second one, it's time to keep an eye open next time you are at the shop.

The original annual kit was SMP, not AMT. The two companies were joined at the hip (AMT was part owner and had invested some of the startup funds), but they were separate companies, at least on paper. AMT bought the remaining interest in SMP in 1961. The buyout must have been pretty late in the '61 model year; some '62 kits did slip out in SMP boxes (mostly Valiants, with a handful of Imperial convertibles and possibly some Impala convertibles). All of the '62 Impala annual kits have "SMP" lettering on the little chrome license plates, and I think the Impala bodies have an SMP logo somewhere on the underside. It's worth noting that the '61 four-door hardtop wasn't issued as a kit even though the cost of the tool would have been paid for by that point, by Chevrolet. I would assume that someone at SMP knew what they were doing back then, when they passed on the idea of offering it as a kit. Even at that early stage, the model kit manufacturers were figuring out that the four-door cars weren't high on anyone's want list, even one as nicely styled as that Chevy was. If you do manage to luck into a four-door promo (I did!), the body is not molded in acetate and shouldn't be warped unless it was improperly stored. The hood on the four-door hardtop promo body is molded as a separate piece too. I'm rounding up stock '61 kit engine and underhood parts, mine will be "the kit that might have been". A buddy of mine printed a few "phantom" boxes a few years back; one of them was for the '61 four-door hardtop, as a Craftsman Series kit.

Typical late RC2/Ertl box art...built MPC kit on the box, AMT kit inside. The AMT chassis uses wire axles at both ends, but I'm pretty sure the engines have notched oil pans as opposed to gaping holes through the engine blocks.

Revell has a "preferred partner" program that allows some sellers to get new kits about two weeks earlier than the rest. From what I have gathered, those sellers have to stock every item in the catalog, and they only get two copies of each new release early. Only one shop (now gone) in my area participated in that program, he was charging full boat for everything, probably because of the overhead involved with having to carry everything in the catalog. I'd guess that the eBay sellers are doing pre-sales now...you'll probably find that in the fine print. The kit should be available through "normal" channels around the end of the month.

Both AMT and MPC made stock Mustang II kits that had V6 engines as stock. Both companies first tooled their Mustang II annual kits as '74 models, the only year that you couldn't get a V8 Mustang. AMT's Capri II kits had the V6 also. AMT made a "mid-year" '74 Mustang II GT racer with some speed equipment. MPC's '74 and '75 Mustang II annuals, and a couple of the AMT Capri II kits had some speed equipment also. If you want to fab up a Ford V6, there was a mid-Eighties engine called the "Essex" V6 which is pretty much a Windsor 302 with two cylinders lopped off. I once looked at an '84 or '85 Capri with one of those under the hood. That one would probably drop into a Pinto more easily than a V8, and provide a bit more grunt than the narrow-angle V6 that was eventually offered by Ford.

The reissue still has four-lug wheels. These five-slot, four-lug wheels are the only ones that were ever included in any MPC stock/annual Pinto kit. There isn't space on the plated tree for a second set of wheels, as in most other kits.

MPC made BFG radials in two sizes, small and smaller. Some of the annual kits had them starting with the '82s. The Camaro and Firebird had the "bigger" ones with the really small ones going into the Ford EXP and a few other kits. Every one of those tires I have come across is made from that plastic-softening vinyl that does damage to everything it comes into contact with. Decal sheets, clear parts, and taillight lenses seem to magnetize themselves to those tires, leaving backwards "BF Goodrich Radial TA" lettering wherever they go. Buyer beware when it comes to sealed kits. A couple of months ago I replaced a set of those tires on a '72 GTO that I had built in the early Eighties, from one of those molded-in-red street machine kits. The tires wrecked the inner wheels as well as the "honeycomb" wheels I had taken from one of the MPC '75 annual kits (Dart, maybe the Chevy Monza) for the original build. Both halves of each wheel were painted wherever they contacted the tire, still the plasticizer in the vinyl attacked the edges of the wheels. You might get away with these tires on resin wheels, but I won't bother with them in the future.

Cheaper insurance...for someone back then, that probably meant the difference between owning a Camaro and not owning one. The sixes are rarer now, because back when those were just used cars, they'd be converted to V8 power when a V8 car got wrecked or beat to death by someone.

Fictional, obviously patterned on the Auxier car. Maybe MPC wanted to do that one but couldn't get permission.

Apart from the body/wheelbase mistake, the 2+2 is actually a pretty comprehensive conversion. The interior upholstery patterns were changed, the instrument panel was changed to 2+2 spec, and the steering wheel is different (Bonneville has a two-spoke wheel, 2+2 has a three-spoke unit). The 2+2 grille lacks the Bonneville lettering that shouldn't even be there on a Bonneville (should be on the hood). But because of the difference in body length and wheelbase, it's incorrect, and shouldn't have been done.

Both versions of the '55 sedan should include the "street machine" parts (Weiand intake, unplated Centerline wheels, snorkel scoop). The stock issues will have the stock version parts as the alternate version. The "street machine" issues will have the gasser parts from the Nomad kit (injection setup, American Mag wheels, gasser front axle). The gasser front axle parts in the sedan kits aren't plated like they are in the Nomad. The rear axle isn't plated in the sedans either.

I picked one of these up recently on eBay. I had seen one for sale at a show recently, but didn't buy that one because it was pricey and had been picked over (looked like the leftovers after someone had used it for a project). There is also a pickup pack that shares a couple of parts trees with the van pack. I've had the pickup parts pack since maybe a couple of years after they were released. I remember seeing these in a store, only once, when they were new. I don't think too many department stores carried these because they were parts only and not a complete vehicle. The parts listing on the box for the van pack includes fender flares for both Chevy and Dodge vans, however only one set is included. Checking the packs against one another, and against the description of the parts included that is printed on each box, I think they screwed up and got some of the parts switched between the two packs.

Apparently didn't get off the ground. Promotion effort had to be nonexistent; this is the first I've heard of it...

Split-window Beetle! Fiat Topolino (there is a stock one in 1/35...1/24 isn't that much bigger). Ford Model Y and Anglia (first three generations would probably sell well).

Why would you want the original body? There are a number of issues with the original kit, the first being incorrect front wheel openings. The hood was also too flat, because it was made to use the underside tooling from the Duster hood. If you have an original Demon and a Duster annual kit, the underside of the hoods in both kits are the same, the Demon's hood having the Duster center bulge on its underside.

That hood doesn't have the normal "cut line" engraved on the underside; instead, the whole cutout area is recessed, much thinner than the rest of the hood. Even just painting it can cause that area to sink in if you aren't careful. The way to fill the recess would be with a piece of plastic that would build the thickness up to that of the surrounding area (or maybe a little bit thicker). Attach that with either super glue or epoxy, grind it to the thickness of the surrounding area if necessary, then putty any gaps that appear. Make sure the "top" of the filler piece fits the underside of the recess area without leaving a gap. For hoods with the usual recessed cut line, if you aren't cutting out the hole it's a good idea to fill the line to help eliminate "ghosting" on the top side when you prime/paint. Thin lines can be filled with putty, thicker ones with thin strip styrene. Whatever cement you use, try to jam the strip into the cut line. After everything sets up, you can file/trim/sand to match the surrounding areas.

Ford did build some great high-performance Falcons...Ford of Australia, that is! If you've never seen them, do a search...they built some hot ones, with engines as big as the 351 Cleveland. Theirs were all four-door sedans, but the later ones based on the North American '66-'70 body had some great graphics and wheels. Their station wagons were different from ours too (better looking).

It's amazing too, the guys who don't have time to get your parts to you still manage to struggle to the bank to cash your check. Other than Modelhaus, I can't remember the last time I bought any aftermarket stuff by mail. Well, there was that order of photoetch sets that the incompetent mailman lost, stole, or mis-delivered, but that's another deal altogether. When I was in the business, the last day before leaving for a show I'd open the mail and make sure that I pulled items off of the stockpile and set them aside to fill those orders, so I wouldn't sell something out from under someone at the show.

All of the road test equipment was included only in the first two issues. The third one (original Grand Slam) deleted all of it. For that issue, the clear parts tree was trimmed back to only the window unit. The first two issues had a bunch of other clear parts including side glass, headlight lenses (including stock ones), and a "glass" fuel measuring bottle for the road test version. The Prestige issue returned the road test parts except for the fuel bottle because apparently the clear parts taken out earlier no longer existed. I gave the new Grand Slam issue boxes a brief look at a high-priced local shop; looks like the fuel bottle and the big vertical clear headlight shrouds for one of the custom versions have been retooled. I'll be picking one of these up, probably the expanded version in the larger box. The Grand Prix and Bonneville didn't share any parts other than tires and wire axles, though the engines, chassis, and interiors have a similar parts breakdown. The GP has some neat optional parts for the engine, including a GMC blower intake with an adapter that keeps the carbs under the hood.