Snake45

Very, VERY nice!

Dunno how I missed this before. Absolutely stunning work! The finish is perfect.

I have a near-mint unbuilt AMT '64 Cutlass kit. I think the only thing missing out of it is the supercharger. Go figger.

But probably poorer.

I believe that one's a Seafire XVII. I gotta do a model of one of those. BTW, did you know that the Spitfire XVI was basically a Spit IX but with an American Packard-built Merlin instead of a R-R Merlin? And then some of the XVIs got bubble canopies like this Seafire XVII, which I don't believe any of the IXs did.

The article was in the last issue of Mustangs International, but I don't think it's available online. Basically, when the RR engineers presented the blueprints and specs to Packard, the head Packard engineer laughed in their faces. "We can't possibly work to those specs. You have hundreds of skilled, experienced craftsmen on staff who can skillfully hand-fit parts to make them work. We build a thousand cars a day. If we worked to those specs the way you people do, we'd be lucky to build a hundred cars a week." The specs and tolerances had to be considerably tightened to match US production methods and practices. The author said that even to this day, you can take three Packard built Merlins, take them apart, throw the parts randomly into bins, and reassemble three engines in short order. If you try that with three RR-built Merlins, you can get one engine back together without much trouble, and maybe a second one with considerable extra effort, and you might NEVER get a third running engine out of the rest. Pretty cool!

Hey Ace, have you ever heard that the Packard-built Merlins were actually BETTER than the ones built by R-R? I just read an article by a VERY knowledgeable individual that explained why.

I prefer to buy locally, for cash. This is especially true of paints and other common supplies. These are a PITA to have to buy online. For new kits, I buy what I can at HL or Michaels (sometimes AC Moore) with 40% (or more) off coupons. I also buy a few complete kits at the local monthly toy show, in addition to cool, rescue-able glue bombs. There is no LHS in my town anymore. The closest is about 40 minutes away (each way). I'll buy kits online only as a last resort. When I do, I go to Model Roundup. Always had great service from them.

Bill, would it be possible to sili-clone the unique Thundercharger parts so you could convert a common MPC or Revell Charger to do your second one? Just an idea....

The Spitfire (Merlin) has also been kitted in 1/24. I believe the BF 109 has, too, which has an inverted V12 Daimler you might want for your collection. Also the Ju 87 Stuka--Junkers Jumo engine? You might score one or more of these by asking at one of the model airplane sites. Many modelers don't care about the engines and glue the cowlings solid, so there might be some in spare parts boxes. Also, there MIGHT be detailed resin aftermarket engines for some of these, which won't be cheap but shouldn't be near the $100 of Shapeways (maybe half that?). And don't forget, any airplane modeler who's bought the aftermarket resin engine now has the kit one left over in HIS spare parts box. Come to think of it, I'm gonna throw the question out on Hyperscale and see what happens. If I get any good answers, I'll post a link.

Got a New Ray diecast late model GT350 Mustang from Hobby Lobby. Will have to do some research to see exactly what year it is and what it's supposed to look like, but it looks like a late Mustang to me in the box, the dark blue paint looks pretty good, and I'll bet an hour or two of Snake-fu will have it on my shelf. I'm not enough a fan of the car to do a full kit build of it. Two jars of Sally Hanson "Made in Jade" nail polish at Walmart, marked down from $4.97 to $1.97. For almost 50 years I've wanted to build a '69 Mustang Mach I in Silver Jade and this stuff looks awfully close. Might do a CJ Cougar in the color, too. If it's not "close enough," I'm sure I can find SOMETHING to use it on. Bought a cheap bottle of generic white vinegar. I'm tired of paying Testor's outrageous price for their "decal set" (priced same as their outrageous paint). It smells like vinegar and I'm betting it IS. Gonna try to make my own. Just to be safe, I'll start with a 50-50 vinegar and water mix. Will let you know how it goes--with luck, I'll be applying some decals today.

Wow, I didn't realize these kits were gone. Seems like only yesterday I saw them on the shelf at KMart or Michael's (along with the black version of Badman), but I guess it must have been at least 3 or 4 years ago. I know I bought a second one at one of those places within the last decade, to go along with the one I bought in the '70s. I remember opening it up to see if the roof was flattened in on that one too. Yup, it was. At the moment I can't find either of them, but you know how that goes--I'll find them the next time I'm looking for something else.

I've seen quite a few 1:1 cars with Allisons, but I don't think I've ever seen a single one with the Rolls Royce (Packard) Merlin. This is probably because the Merlin's main advantage was its two-stage supercharger, which was for high-altitude operation. "Down low" the Allison was just about as good. Cars (and even motorcycles) have been built with radial aircraft engines, but it's more of a stunt than anything else. They're really not very practical for actual road use. Just as a thought starter: I have an old Revell 1/32 scale P-51D with some shape and accuracy issues. Someday I'm gonna put a 1/24 Chevy engine in it, and a 1/24 cockpit, and call it a 3/4 scale homebuilt in 1/24. Yes, this has been done in real life! (I need to find some good refs on the engine-to-prop interface on these things--the gearbox or whatever it is.)

You'e doing nice work! Drive on!

I think it looks good. It's 1/25 and shares nothing with the old Monogram 1/24. IMHO it's overall the best shaped '70 Chevelle kit you can get, though there are other opinions of course.

We really need an all new '65 GTO kit from somebody. The AMT kit wasn't great when it was new, and it's gotten worse with every reissue. I'm not a particular fan of this car, but I do recognize the fact that it's an absolutely iconic musclecar.

Yes, it's very similar to that. Not identical, but similar. I just hit it lightly with some polish on the top and the hood and it knocked a good deal of it down, maybe half or a bit more. The silver color is pretty good at hiding it, too. It would be worse in a dark color. I'm going to drive on. I think the idea at this point is to treat the build like it were one of my Toy Show Glue Bomb Rescues and just do what's necessary to make it look a little better and "git 'er done." We'll see.

Few years ago I decided I needed a silver '70 Chevelle SS on my shelf. I got the Revell snapper, prepped out the body to my specs, primed it, and painted it with some kind of Tamiya silver in a rattlecan (Aluminum, maybe?). Tried clearing it by carefully hand-brushing it, one panel at a time, with Future. Bubbles and runs. Stripped the Future with ammonia, tried it again, same thing. Stripped the Future again. Cleared it with something else (don't remember what), rubbed it out, looked beautiful except a couple spots where I rubbed right through to blue plastic. Stripped the whole thing down to bare plastic. Primed again, repainted again with the Tamiya silver, cleared it again (don't remember what with--possibly a Tamiya clear gloss, maybe Testor One Coat Wet Look, I don't remember), rubbed it out again. Finally, it's beautiful! At this point the project stalled for lack of good SS stripe decals. Onto the Shelf of Doom it goes for three or four years. So I came up with some decals and yesterday got in the mood to dig the thing out and drag it across the finish line in the very near future. And NOW guess what, the clear is cracked! Not like you're probably thinking, the cracking is like subtle alligator skin, or like dried-up mud. The cracks are wide, but not very deep. And they're not real obvious, you almost have to look for them to see them. And oddly, they seem to only be on the horizontal surfaces (roof, trunk, hood) and not the sides. The hood and trunk stripes should cover a good bit of them. Might try to see if I can polish them out of the top, but will have to be careful--I don't think the clear is very thick after it's already been polished once. Could prolly re-clear it, but I'm not gonna. I just want this thing DONE. We'll see how it goes, I guess, maybe this weekend if I get the time (I already have the interior, chassis, and wheels built; it just needs the body finished.) Wish me luck.

You could actually make a cool "T-shirt car" model out of that, if you could find some giant slicks!

The fit of the front end is pretty bad. Takes some fitting. The roof on both examples I've seen was flattened in. Requires fixing. The front frame is weird. As I recall, the axle/shocks mount to...what would be sheet metal, not to structural members. I have one I've worked on off an on for years (decades?). Recently got in the mood to play with it, and can't find it. But I remember at some point comparing the body to the Revell '67 and finding them remarkably similar in size. This was of interest to me because I eventually want to do a '67 Elky by grafting a Revell Chevelle front end onto their '66 Elky body. But I'm cheap and frugal and wondered what I can build from the leftovers. It occurred to me that I could graft the Mono '66 rear end onto the leftover Revell '67 body to make a nice '66 without dealing with the Mono '66 body problems. Now, Confession Time: I love the '66 Chevelle, and have a couple of the Lindberg kits in the stash, but about a decade ago I bought a cheap (Maisto? Welly?) '66 Chevelle diecast that looks SO good that it's been happily holding down the '66 Chevelle slot on my shelf ever since. Most of these you see are black, but mine's a lovely Marina Blue.

Wouldn't it be great if the '65 Chevelle and the '66 Skylark could be converted back, too?

Wow, not what I was expecting when I clicked. You exceeded my expectations! That color looks great. It's very similar to, what, F5 Green, which looks SO good on these '68-'69 B-bodies. Well done and model on!

Different and therefore at least somewhat interesting. Do I have any desire to do one? None whatsoever.

And, apparently, most promos were doomed from birth to execution by firecracker, BB gun, .22 rifle, lighter fluid, etc. anyway.... (Or so I've heard. I've never deliberately destroyed a model of any kind in my life. Just ain't built that way.)

Not just primary education, but secondary and even college-level as well. Yup, it's a problem. Good luck trying to get it fixed. We're getting stupider and stupider because the powers-that-be WANT us stupid.