Snake45

Clean build, but you've got the front axle on upside down. Put it on right and your stance will look a lot better.

I too live less than a mile from the local airport. I know most things by sound and don't even look up for Cessnas, Beeches or Pipers anymore. But every now and then I hear a T-6 or Stearman--those are worth looking at! The Air Guard shoots touch and goes on our place in C-130s. They are among the QUIETEST airplanes using the place. I never hear them inside the house, and hardly ever outside--most times I will see them before I hear them.

Raising Arizona, very high on my Top 10 Funniest Movies of All Time list.

Looks good--love the color! Is that Testor Mystic Emerald?

I've never seen the original, but I have the remake on DVD, and think it's VERY good. Not sure I'd like the original any more, even with John Wayne in it.

What a clean build!

Outstanding work! Tell him I said Model On!

Looks like you've got it surrounded. Drive on!

I believe on all these, the bodies are stock, but the interiors and chassis are pretty generic.

YOU GO, BOYEEEEE! GITTER DONE! I just finished that nasty little IMC Beetle. Pics up soon, I hope.

The problem is the A-pillars are not only too thick, but the lower rear edge isn't the proper curve, but more of a straight angle. You're right that the "chrome" helps camouflage that shape a little by visually blending it to the vent windows. I THINK there's enough meat in the A-pillars that I can file that whole rear edge back to a better looking shape. But that will have to wait for sometime I'm in the mood to actually DO it. As I said, I'm not a HUGE '62 Chev fan, or I'd have already built one of the AMT or Revell kits in the stash. Just thought I could get the shape on my shelf for a relatively small outlay of time and money with this thing.

Yah, shipping was a pretty steep bite, but overall, I thought it was worth it, considering his prices, which aren't that bad compared to today's MSRP on even common kits. IF what I ordered had been available on eBay as restorable glue bombs of the relative rarity/desirability of, say, an AMT '66 Skylark or almost anything JoHan (which they're not), I'd have almost certainly spent AT LEAST what the MCW order cost me, shipping included. So IMHO I thought I got fair value for my hobby dollars. He makes a stock '64 Chevelle HT, but not a '65. If he'd offered a resin repop of the AMT Craftsman '65 Chevelle, I'd have ordered one of those, too.

Don't remember the quote, but wasn't Animal Mother from Full Metal Jacket?

I ordered some MCW bodies on November 27, not really expecting to see them until sometime after the first of the year, and they arrived TODAY, December 15! That is IME OUTSTANDING service from a resin supplier. One of the things I got was his '65 Olds 4-4-2 kit. Have only had a quick look at it but it looks VERY nice--looks very buildable, unlike the one I bought from Resin Realm a few years back. Hope to get pics of it up soon. Now I think I can build all the Olds A-bodies from 1964 to 1972. Very cool! Dave was also very easy to work with and good with communications. By contrast, at the same time I started talking to him about this, I also sent an email to Bandit Resin which so far has not been answered. Their website is up and they seem to be in business--does anyone know if they actually are?

The only one of these I've seen is the '66 Pontiac, and it's obviously NOT from the original MPC molds but it's pretty clear that it was pirated from it.

Had never heard of or seen this when I spotted it at Hobby Lobby a couple months ago. Didn't buy it the first time, because although the overall shape wasn't horrible, something about the windshield A-pillars put me off. (And I'm not a huge '62 Chevy fan to start with.) It was still there the next week, and I couldn't find anything else to spend my coupon on, so, WTH. The chrome reverse wheels and decently sized tires were sale points, as was the black paint. I've stumbled into accumulating quite a collection of black diecast Chevies, and besides, black is always easy to touch up if necessary. Here's what comes out of the box. Size looks good; the wheelbase is spot-on for 1/25 scale. The roof seems a little off somehow, but I can't quite pinpoint it. The A-pillars seem to be too thick, and the front bumper is pretty much a featureless hunk of plastic, but otherwise the shape is fairly good. Nowhere near perfect, but good enough for some Snake-Fu. So I sanded the tire treads, cleaned off some of the silver tampo overages with acetone free nail polish remover, and Silver Sharpied all the trim, including the compete A-pillars. I black-washed the grille, then masked off the rear bumper and the chrome surround strip of the rear panel and shot the rear panel with several coats of Krylon Clear Matt to dull it a bit. Looks a little better now. The headlights didn't have the typical stems; I had to paint the radiator wall behind them white to brighten them up. Decided there was just nothing I could do to improve the front bumper, so I left it alone. At some point I might revisit this with some second degree Snake-Fu. This would involve removing the windows and filing the A-pillars to a slimmer, more accurate shape. As with their '64 Nova, the vent windows are molded as part of the windshield and don't open with the doors. These would need to be removed and either repositioned or replaced entirely. And here it is with the Revell AG '55 Chevy. Coupla badasses in black. As always, comments welcome.

HAS to be some kind of Brad Pitt movie. Inglorious Basterds or Fury? Probably Fury.

That whole area, both sides, has been a mess in all the reissues, as well as the window frames on the door. And then the lower edge of the quarter windows is wrong, too--too rounded. It's like somewhere between the '68-'72 shape and the '73-'74 shape. Revell got this area right.

Cool! The "jet outlet" looks like a CO2 cartridge.

Looking good! Drive on!

When looking for '68 Buicks the other day, I discovered that Perry's Resin offers--or at least did at one point--a whole range of resin Mavricks, including 4-doors. I don't know how his delivery is these days, though. http://www.perrysresin.com/catalog.htm

'71 Cuda convertible. Did I pass?

Hard to tell, but it looks like the kit is the same hot mess it's been since the '80s reissues. You CAN make a nice Nova out of it, but it takes a LOT of careful work. This kit is still a parts mine, though. I have a couple in the stash but (sigh) will probably buy another one.

Another thing that really helps this body (and the MPC '69 Camaro as well) is to knock down the top edge of the rear fenders a little, so you can get the correct contour between the bottom of the rear quarter windows and the top of the fenders. The circles in these pics show how I've done this on an MPC '69 Camaro body. It's a bit hard to describe, but look at the MPC Firebird or Camaro body and compare it with either pics of real ones, or even the Revell '69 or '67 Camaro or '68 Firebird bodies (or even the AMT '68 Camaro) to see what I mean.

It's what's left of the old Mako Shark, with some alterations. I'm planning to build one someday as a '70s street-driven Shark clone.