Snake45

Very nice, great color! Drive on!

Yes. My people will let you know where to send the royalty checks.

Well, ONE good thing came out of that movie. Paul Shaffer was off Letterman for a week (or was it two?) filming it, and the late great Warren Zevon filled in for him all week as Dave's musical director/sidekick. Warren Zevon songs for bumper music every night--it was Fantastic! I believe it was during this stint that Zevon created the rare and beautiful "Licked by a Stranger." How rare? Performed exactly once, and never even finished. You can see it here about 8 minutes in. What comes before is just the comedic lead-up to it, necessary to fully appreciate the song:

A hemi's at home in anything. It's the Torq-Thrust wheels of engines. Drive on! Copyright Snake45 2018

Bought this sad looking AMT '62 Vette glue bomb at the latest toy show. I know this isn't a great kit, but it seemed to have "good bones" and the poor thing just spoke to me in some way. I thought it could be "rescued." Except for the graphics, I actually liked the decals and would have kept them; unfortunately, they weren't in good shape (lots of chips) and I knew I'd have to polish the paint out. They came right off with a thumnail and hot running water. Here's what it looked like after teardown, decal removal, and a light polish of the paint. I have no idea what this paint is. It's a bit darker and purpler than it looks in these pics. And as you can see, it's chipped in quite a few places (white spots). Testor Purple Pearl is kinda in the ballpark, as is Model Master Burgundy, but those of those are metallics and this paint is solid. At AC Moore I found some Folk Art "Berry Wine" water-based gloss "enamel" that looks darn close. Here, I've tested the Berry Wine paint by filling in a small white chipped-out area on the rear deck. Xacto points to it. It's a little lighter than the surrounding paint, so I'm going to prime all the whitespot chips with flat black enamel, and then cover that with the Berry wine, spotting it in with a toothpick or something. It won't be perfect but it will be good enough for this job. I was able to save all the glass, and I can fix the windshield frame with Fauberglass. I'll be reusing the chassis, the slicks, and all four wheels, but will replace the wide front tires with something taller and thinner. The front pan, grille, and all bumpers can be reused. It will get headlights from a new kit. It came with some of a SBC engine--no induction, no exhaust. That hood just cries out for a big tunnel ram setup, so I'll be building either a 2x4 SBC or BBC for it, depending on what I have floating around. The idea is to get it back on the shelf with less than 10-12 hours of work. So far I have maybe 3-4 hours into it. Also need to decide whether it's be a Street Freak or a straight-up Modified Production racer.

Here's the Time Machine Resin '69 Cuda coupe/hardtop. He sells on eBay as TMR (I don't think through the website anymore, though). Shape looks pretty good to me, but I'll let the Mopar mavens give their judgements on it. Casting isn't quite as nice as, say, Motor City or Modelhaus, but it's better than Flintstone and several others I've seen. I'm trying to figure out whether it would be easier to clean up the lower/main part of this body, or just cut the roof/trunk/upper body area off of it and graft it onto a kit fastback body I have with a crushed roof. Extra pic of the included interior tub. Sadly, it doesn't come with rear glass, as the backlight on this car is VERY oddly shaped and won't be easy to make. They also sell a short-track version. Only reason I have both is, when they came up on eBay, they were ending at almost the same time, with the short-tracker ending first. I wasn't sure I would get the full body, so bid on the short tracker figgering I could always graft its roof onto a fastback body if I had to. This would actually be very difficult, as the short track body doesn't have the stock cowl area or rear panel area, but I suppose it COULD be done. If the stock body had ended first and I'd scored it, I wouldn't have bought the short tracker. Looking forward to getting around to this one.

Very cool projects both, and you're doing great with them. Drive on!

I've never had the slightest interest in Ghost of Red Baron, but when I just saw these pics with the glasses, I realized I could turn one into "Old Velvet Nose," the logo/symbol of the late great Warren Zevon: http://warrenzevon.wikia.com/wiki/File:Skull.png Now I MUST have one!

Good enough for me. Thanks!

Bought this '95 "LAST ZR1" Vette promo for something like $2, maybe $3, at the local toy show. Already have several C4 Corvettes on the shelf, but I loved the color (even though it was filthy) and couldn't resist the price. The plan was to polish the plastic and lay the usual Snake-Fu on it, but when I took it apart, I discovered it's not molded in this color, it's PAINTED, and very cleanly, too. It's molded in regular red, but the paint is sort of a brick red or burnt orange color. Here's the mystery: The interior was painted the same color as the body, and obviously (from what wasn't painted), it was slipped into the body shell at painting time and painted WITH the body. Then it was taken back apart, the glass added to the body, the interior installed, and the usual mounting stubs heat-sealed in typical promo fashion. It was obviously a "factory" job. I checked the Corvette Promo website, which talks about some of the '95 promos being painted, but none in this color. When I realized it might be some kind of ultra-rarity, I just put it all back together and didn't do anything else to it. Gonna contact that website and see if it might have any particular special value. So this one is a true "restoration," meaning, I returned it to original condition with no mods or improvements. As always, comments or ideas welcome.

I'm restoring an old glue bomb Ferrari 250 GTO molded in red and black. Would this be an original Aurora issue, or the Monogram '70s reissue? I've looked carefully and can't find any of Monogram's typical trademarks on it, so I'm thinking it's original Aurora. If so, were all Aurora issues molded in red, or just some?

That's still $1.10 an ounce vs 13.6 cents. And I still doubt it's eight times better. Don't knock the Walmart white primer until you've tried it!

I like this a lot!

Different and therefore interesting. I don't think I've ever seen anything like this before! Well done and model on!

There are many paths to the top of the mountain.

Saw the Tamiya primer at Hobby Lobby today. $11.00 for what looks like 6 ounces. Found it online for as little as $8.80 but you'd have to pay hideous shipping for it. The Walmart Color Place primer is $1.50 for 11 ounces. So the Tamiya costs $1.83 per ounce, and the Walmart costs 13.6c per ounce. I'll concede the Tamiya might be better. But I honestly don't see how it could possibly be MORE THAN TEN TIMES better.

I feel your pain. My closest full hobby shops are also about an hour away, though I do have a Hobby Lobby which is good for some stuff. Do you have a credit card? You obviously have internet. If you have the net and a credit card, the world is your hobby shop. Yes it's a pain to have to special order things like paint, supplies, and tools and materials, but sometimes there's no other way. I don't mind ordering kits or buying cool old stuff from eBay. Probably 80% or more of my non-paint supplies and materials come from Walmart, drugstores, and places like that. I've become pretty good at finding stuff that works great for modeling, and often costs only a fraction of what equivalent "hobby" or "model" products cost.

I now have four "chrome" tools: foil, Silver Sharpie, Molotow, and old-school Testor Silver Chrome Trim paint. Each has its uses. My standard go-to for things like windshield trim is the Silver Sharpie. I probably use it for 90% of my chrome work these days. Large areas like rocker panels get foil; also some larger emblems. I've also been playing with the foil-under-paint trick for nameplates and small emblems. This works well. Sometimes Testor Silver on a small brush is the only thing that will do. Molotow replaces my beloved Silver Sharpie for trim on a silver-painted model, as the SS doesn't have enough visual difference with the silver paint to catch the eye. It's also great for touching up small areas on chrome parts. I recently "re-chromed" the spokes on a set of Cragar wheels with Molotow and they came out great. No one of these tools solves all my problems. I glad I have all four on hand. Try it and I suspect you soon will be too.

You gotta love a man with a plausible story!

No! Leave it here! Lots more views and comments and ideas! For example, I'm now trying to imagine what I could possibly do to a '69's front end to make it actually look good.

At one time this Jeep would have caused a scandal on the public highways. But today, with The Walking Dead the #1 show on TV, the reaction is more likely to be, "Hey, looka that! Cool!"

Very nice, very clean! Well done and model on!

Believe me, I've tried them all. None of them carries this particular set or any comparable sticks to that black one in this set.

I bought a kit from them five or six years ago, and it was just like it is now--you couldn't really tell if they were in bidness, or had it in stock, or whatever. But I took a shot. Got the exact item I ordered and it came fairly quickly. Looked it over carefully and decided it would take FAR more skills and/or time than I had either of to get a result I would be happy with. Emailed the RR owner (named Steve, IIRC?) and he offered me a full refund no problem, but I'd have to pay return shipping & insurance. Ended up selling it to another modeler on another board (he might be here, too, I think) for what I had in it, including shipping, or close enough to make me happy. Never heard any complaint from him, so I guess he was okay with it. I say give it a try. I believe their models are mastered by several different modelers, so what you get might be better than the one I did. Good luck!

For some reason, those guys just started playing War's "Lowrider" in my head.