Snake45

I don't think there are huge differences between the different issues. I have an older one, and a more recent issue, and I believe they're identical.

No airbrush, no compressor, no Xacto, no Colt 1911A1. Won't work for me. Everything's pre-painted, though. Hmmmmm.

Very nicely done, and that's an authentic color too. I was just researching '69 Pontiac colors yesterday. There was a question about this kit on here last week. Made me dig one out and look at it. It's not perfect but it's better than I'd remembered. It's definitely better than their '69 Camaro. I'm thinking of building the thing, as soon as I can decide on a color. You did a nice job with it. ETA: Forgot to mention, nice job on the black between the front bumper and the body--good little detail on this car.

First couple cars I built as a kid, I carefully painted all the wires and hoses on the firewall in silver. Don't remember if I was going for bare wire or Conduit or whatever. I'm not the only one--I've bought glue bombs on eBay that were done the same way. I've even seen it on models in magazines.

Brown (some call it "tobacco" or "saddle"). Or a darker shade of tan than the exterior. Or white with black dash and carpet. A dark green would be an out-of-the-box option.

If it's just "fogged" and not cracked or glue-damaged, it can be polished out. Glue damage is deceptive. You can file and sand it off and polish several thousandths down and it's still in there. It goes right to the bone.

I have a glue bomb AMT '69 Mustang where the guy glued the red taillights on the hood. But the body shape of that kit is so much better than Revell's that the poor backbirth is worth trying to save.

Very clean build! Nicely done!

Hmmmmm....time to look at what clear 1/24-1/25 slot car bodies might be available...

Very nice, and really captures the look of the early '60s Comp jobs. This might be the best use I've ever seen of the Double Dragster rail frame.

Modelhaus also sells very nice vacformed replacement glass for a number of old kits. Quality's very good and the price is right, too.

Almost certainly an AMT. Some of the AMT airplane kits have been sold under the ESCI label.

Like others, I enjoy bringing a rare old kit or promo back to life. In most cases I simply can't afford an unbuilt kit of the subject, but have in many cases been able to find an affordable glue bomb or "distressed" promo on eBay for a fraction of the cost. As others have said, it's much more satisfying to bring one of these back than to build even the best brand-new kit. But generally, if a kit's still in production and available new, I won't waste time or effort on rebuilding it.

I took another look at this last night and would like to revise and extend my remarks. The AMT ex-MPC body is not quite as bad as I remembered (was looking at an original MPC annual, not a more recent reissue). The wheel openings and fender creases are still too low, but for some reason they don’t seem to be quite as bad as the MPC ’69 Camaro. Maybe it’s because the ’69 Firebird isn’t as familiar a shape to us as the Camaro, maybe it’s because there’s no better ’69 Firebird kit to compare it to, maybe MPC actually did a better job on the Firebird than the Camaro (they did have the Pontiac promo contract but not Chevy in ’69), I dunno. The width problem isn’t as bad as I remembered either. The AMT/MPC ’69 body is noticeably narrower than the Revell ’69 Camaro at the rear, but at the front, it’s not that bad. I think the Firebird bumper etc could be grafted onto the Revell body without TOO much trouble. (I know the MPC Camaro body is much narrower than the Revell in this area.) I’d forgotten about the front fender vents on the Firebird. If bashing up a Revell Camaro body, you’d have to graft those in in some way. In summary, I think you could bash the AMT ’69 Firebird and Revell ’69 Camaro bodies and build a more accurate ’69 Firebird. BUT I’m not sure it would be worth all the work. When I get around to doing mine, it’ll be with the AMT/MPC kit body, probably with a few tweaks around the tops of the rear fenders.

I think that's Damm Yankees, but I don't know the title. (I think I actually have the cassette and have listened to it many times but never paid any attention to the song titles.) ETA: I remembered this song title: High Enough, I think.

Thanks for the definitive word, Harry. Now we all know what to do. (Step One: Accept that it's gone, and get over it. Step Two: Start moving on.)

As I understand it, the active ingredient in CSC is lye, same as in oven cleaner. I've stripped paint from clear plastic with oven cleaner, no problem.

Just the big stupid wheels. The rest of the kit's not awful, for what it is.

Some of their airplanes are quite nice, some only so-so. Only car of theirs I own is a SWB Ferarri in an AMT box and it's awful.

Yup. There's a lot of that kind of stuff they could do. They could do both '65 and '67 GTO snappers that could use the full-kit '66 GTO chassis and engine if desired. Quite a few other things they could do in that line--I bet such kits would be good sellers, too.

What Revell should do is kit it up as a snapper, like their '69 Camaro snapper. Those who wanted to could then kitbash the accurate body into a full detail kit, if they wanted.

There's not much in common between '67-8 Firebird and '69 except the roof, tulip panel, and trunk lid (and glass, and possibly cowl--I'd have to check). The AMT (ex-MPC) '69 Firebird is pretty poor. It was retooled from the fairly accurate '68 molds, but unfortunatately you can't get an accurate '69 body that way. The whole sides of the car are wrong. (The same is true of the MPC '69 Camaro, too.) To get an accurate '69 Firebird, you'd have to start with a Revell '69 Camaro body and then mod the fronts of the front fenders, the front and rear panels, and so forth. Now it gets interesting because the MPC '69 Firebird body is singificantly narrower than the Revell '69 Camaro. Which means you can't just plop the MPC bumpers, grille, etc onto the Revell body. You'll have to widen all that stuff--or narrow the Revell body. And THEN you'll prolly want to use a Revell '68 Firebird for the chassis or at least the engine. I've given a good deal of thought to all this, but the truth is I don't like the '69 Firebird enough to go through all the hassle. It WOULD make a spectacular model if you could pull it off, though, and instantly make eveybody else's '69 Firebird and Trans Am builds look like garbage.

I'm going to be heavily modifying my Fruit Wagon cab to get the shape I want, so basically it's just raw material to me anyway.

Yeah, SBC. Not a great example but quite acceptable and usable. I'm gonna use it in the two I'm building.