Snake45

Sweet! I have one of these ready for paint, but you're making me want to start ANOTHER one!

Wow, never heard of that recipe before. Whatever, it just flat-out ROCKS!

I haven't seen this video, just this post--but I saw something in the news last couple days that instantly reminded me of this video title. Not gonna say what.

Fabulous save! Aren't these even more fun than a fresh build of the latest state of the art kit? You should be proud of this one. Well done and model on!

I've passed on a couple of these because the roof looks just too flat for me. I see from your pics that they made the same mistake at the lower corner of the rear side windows that AMT did, and they hosed the fender crease line on the quarter panel, too. The Johnny Lightning Nova doesn't look right to me, either. What a shame. I'd be a customer for a decent 1/25-1/24 '68-'72 Nova, as both the AMT and Revell kits have problems that aren't easily fixed. Good luck with it. You do nice work, so if anybody can put lipstick on this pig, it's you. Drive on! ETA: I just realized that I'm pretty sure I have a Maisto '69 Firebird from the same Pro Mod series. It has problems too (being copied from the bad MPC kit). I'm trying to do something with it, but it's slow going and will never look great.

Drive on!

Optivisor here, too.

Well, I have the stupid kit, but just since I need to look at it, of course I can't FIND the evil thing. Sigh.

Yup, and they made me cry. The original annual kit had the most beautiful set of Keystones you've ever seen.

My impression of the Revell '68 Firebird is that the body is so good it shouldn't need much primer at all. I'd think one coat of the cheap Walmart flat white--which is actually excellent stuff--would work fine. I've never used Tamiya primer but I hear it's excellent stuff. But the Walmart flat white is SO good I really doubt the Tamiya could be THAT much better to justify its MUCH higher price.

Okay, now who else has Curtis Mayfield playin' in their head?

Very clean! Love the color. Is that supposed to be Classic Copper? What's the paint? Whatever it is, I NEED some!

Just what I was about to say!

I agree with much of the above. It's all about pre-paint prep and post-paint polishing. I know of few IF ANY modelers who get a great finish straight out a spray can (or an airbrush either, for that matter.)

What scale are they? They look full size. Also amazingly realistic.

Personally, at this point, I'd strip and start over. I'd go with one coat of cheap Walmart white primer, then airbrush it with Testors #4 red (if you're going for a factory color). The Spaz Stix doesn't seem to be working for you. That paint buildup around the rear Pontiac nameplate is WAY more than you should have to deal with.

Very nice! Looks like you managed to fix most of this kit's most egregious problems in the roof/window post areas. This might be the best build of the AMT Nova I've seen in a long, long time--maybe ever. Wasn't there a movie of this book? Was the car in the movie? ETA: There was a movie, but looks like there was nothing like the book's Nova in it. http://www.imcdb.org/movie.php?id=117894

Dug this up because I'm working on one of these and I wanted to see how others had handled this kit. Color is great on yours! I wish I'd seen the "pre-decorated" ones. I'm working on one supposedly molded in Garnet Red but compared to yours it's more of a washed-out Metallic Rose. I'm polishing the plastic, despite the swirl marks, just to get this different color in my Polished Plastic collection. On the other hand, I was able to deal with all the mold line issues, and there were a LOT of them on this body. I probably had three nights' work just on those. Trying to figure out how to handle the headlight area. I've just looked at dozens of google images of real ones and I still don't have a real good handle on what's going on there or how I should paint it. Oh well. I'm driving on and hope to have it on the shelf by next weekend at the latest. Anyway, yours looks great! Hope mine comes out as well.

I'm gonna have to get one of these just to build the custom version. I'm currently working on a custom '66 Vette roadster, using the annual kit custom parts. Then I could do the '66 T-Bird and Wildcat as customs. Maybe the Mustang, too. And I think I've got a full set of leftover '66 Skylark parts I could use to convert the dirt tracker into a nice custom. Hmmmmmmmm......

Here are three recent acquisitions. The Elky and the Monte aren't all that "gluey" or "bomby" but still need a lot of work. I've now laid the standard Snake-Fu on them and you'll see them Under Glass as soon as I can get them photographed and written up. The '72 Chevelle is a real mess. The orange paint (probably hi-temp engine paint) shrugged off both Easy-Off and 91% alcohol--no afffect at all--and is even rougher than it looks in the pic. I'm currently working on sanding it off. I'm only doing this purely for the challenge of it, as the model really isn't worth saving. I just want to see if I can.

Airfix has a new Sea Fury out that's much better than the Hobbycraft, which I've built two of. I'm gonna do a Cuban Sea Fury someday and got that book mainly for pictures of them. The B-26 is also one of my favorite airplanes (my Dad flew them in Korea) but the BOP ones don't really spin my windmill (either side, although they looked similar). I've got the Monogram kit about half built, which I'm doing as a USAF Farm Gate airplane in VNAF markings circa 1962-3. So far I haven't figured out how to fix the nose, which is wrongly shaped. But someday I'll figger it out and git er done.

Beautiful! Thanks for the heads-up about the high sit. Inspired by your build, I started working on one of these, and have it just about ready for paint.

Lindberg did it. I won one at a door prize at a club meeting a while back, molded in Hot Pink of all things. It's not really great, but it's something. I'll bet you could find them on ebay right now.

Very interesting! One of my future modeling projects will be a USN A4D Skyhawk with all the markings hastily painted out with ship gray. To the best of my knowledge, no photos exist of these airplanes. At least none have surfaced. BTW, I just got a new book on the Bay of Pigs called Playa Giron. Excellent text and many great photos.

Glad to hear it. I would have bought it last week, but couldn't remember if I'd already built one. What I'd built was the Italeri M24 Chaffee, another light tank. And did do the M41 in ROCO HO scale. (These are fun!)