Impalow

Thanks guys! its coming along... i'm going to try and do an update-a-day here this week... just for fun-sies. Last night I managed to get the carpet (embossing powder) down also test fitting everything: Then i knocked out the grill detail, headlight lenses and bulbs... that was fun... I used the lenses from a Revell 1966 impala kit, they looked a bit crisper than the comet ones, and fit like a charm. They are GM, T3's but i doubt anyone will notice... haha.

Hey guys! Thank you for all the positive words! The clock is ticking on this one, and I spent most of the weekend thrashing away.... good news it seems pretty manageable to get together by Saturday... just assembly at this point. Here are some weekend highlights: Body decal-ed ad cleared.... need to buff it out. Interior pieces piped... and detailed. Turned all the pulleys on the lathe... made belts from printed paper... Turned the engine coupler.. wired engines.. and assembled it all to the chassis... Still need to add some photo-etched bolt heads here and there to make it pop. note to self... no more multi engine/ multi blower builds... hahhaa

Fink Shift Knob

Thanks guys! Looking forward to seeing everyone in a week and a half... yikes... I'm progressing... got the base-coat shot last night (Custom Shop, Magenta Pearl from TCP Global) Tonight, I'm going to knock out the little bits of BMF and then clear, it should realllllllyyyy pop then.... In the down time of the paint and body work, I'm steadily working on the chassis/engine assembly and detailing. Here a few teaser photos... hopefully more soon.

Thank you all! Your support keeps me motivated! Im very excited to be working on wrapping this thing up! Fined tuned the body work last night, ran out of primer.. so I decided to shoot a ton of Moltow chrome out of the airbrush, now going to wait 48hours then I can clear with the SpazStix Ultimate Clear.. (per mr. downies new article) Lets try a video... forgive my chrome hand and dirty floor. IMG_6734.MP4 Finally I made an itty bitty little front bumper..

Thank you guys!! Its slowly coming together... lots of pieces and parts on this bad boy. Oh that's just primer... they will get a nice coat of tamiya matte black here soon. Heres a mini update: Tons of parts ready to paint/ prime... Then cleaned off the bench for body work.... Bondo flyin.... me getting scared... haha Initial sand and re-prime.... not perfect, but it will get there. and finally some accent color on the engines... Testors Diamond Dust/ TCP Global CustomShop Silver .002 Metal Flake in intercoat clear / Bobs Paint Candy Purple / UPOL Rattle-can Clear.... worked out pretty good... I realized my pink and purple candys were a bit too similar for the look i wanted(bottom left of above photo).... so i decided to go a different direction on the main pink color... a single stage pearl pink basecoat... this will be easier to get into all the nooks and crannies evenly as well.

Thanks guys! I love this thing as well... Im down to a little less than a month.. and paint is about to fly. Exhaust is done... Zoomies out the bottom... and pipes in the engine compartment to make it looks like it all connects. The bumpers are made... hopefully the next update has some color on it.

Thanks guys!!! Oh that helps! Thank you! Honestly i just used the body lines and kinda guessed... its not perfect, but its close enough to work well.... I got incredibly lucky with the angles of the beatnik bandit pieces... Got this bad boy freestanding last night... made a driveshaft and the drag link for the poseable steering.... I decided to not worry about the upper links in the front and rear suspension for the sake of cleanliness... after all this is a show rod and will mostly be pushed in and out of trailers. still need to figure out that exhaust and bumpers...

Thanks guys! Its coming along... interior and suspension progress this weekend.. I would really like to get all the fabrication done by the end of the week to stay on schedule. Interior fab is pretty much done.... parts box seats... pleats added with .060 half round. Then used some old wheel lips to make the scenes unlimited rear wheels a better depth.. Front spindles made. And a few more mock up pics... planing on knocking out the suspension links tonight and getting it self standing.

Thank you guys!! Oh you know I clean it off before the photos... haha... Still framing out the chassis pan, interior tub, engine(s) compartment Hard to believe this was just a stack of .020 sheet... haha. Interior details, exhaust, steering... and suspension mounts to go.... then body work and paint... yikes... tick tock

Thanks guys!!! Making little steps of progress here and there.... Thanks to Mr. Dave Battista I have all the blowers I need! Posable steering check. Grille narrowed: Starting to work out the interior tub and engine compartment panels: Exploded View and a Mockup:

oooooo.. I love it!!! the color is super close to my 1:1...

Nice stuff! Glad to see you back at the bench!

Thanks guys!!! this one is quite a large amount of fun... I was thinking about it... but im just going to have the bubble top open up instead... these blowers are going to stick way out and keep that from working. Hopefully i can get this bad boy done in time.... the interior tub is the next major hurdle. Here is a couple shots of the one double blower setup.... its going to be pretty wild.. haha.. Im using the flywheel from a scenes unlimited clutch park Ive had laying around, just to sprinkle in some extra detail.

Thank you guys! Yeah.. I have to something there.. I honestly had a brain lapse on that one... both on the rear and the front.. Doh. Oh well, i get something in there to sure it up. Thank you! Yeah I had that thought! May or may not work with the angles, I shortened the arms last night so they tuck up into the frame now. Here is a glimpse of the last couple nights progress.... I'm having a hard time getting large chunks of bench time...Hope to get more of the fabrication done this weekend, maybe get the chassis freestanding. Front axle and spring cups made, going for poseable steering on this one... so ill have lathe time on the hubs and spindles. Then onto the engines.... I sourced the blowers from the old blue-printer parts packs, its the Pontiac one... I still need 1 more ... so if anyone has one laying around they don't need, please let me know. For the manifolds I went with a 1:1 Showrod trick... hiding a carb inside it.. haha.. Using the regular old 4brl manifold from the mustang engine, and customizing the double blower manifold from the 1953 Studebaker kit. Its coming together... slowly..

Thanks guys! This a really fun one.. the engines are going to be pretty crazy as well... thinking (2) blowers on each. fun stuff. Last night I worked on setting ride height (shocks) and made my rear links. Since the pinon angle is a bit wonky, they are a bit long, so ill be shortening them. But the RB motion rod ends are just awesome, probably overkill for this build since everything will be chrome... but eh.. oh well.

Thank you guys!! Making some progress here and there.... hopefully more soon. First up I made some motor mounts, and worked out the engine placement. Then cut out the chassis pan to accept the frame and engines. Test fitting and opening up the "hood" so that everything fits.. will still need to notch the front for the blower belt... I also trimmed up the wheelwells/body openings, that should all make sense once the axle is in place. Then tossed some primer on the 3D printed tires... one coat and some light sanding .. really smoothed out the grow lines. The wheels aren't quite deep enough yet, im going to work on that. Then mocked up the rear end assembly... need to make links and shocks... but that is the Winters change from RepMinCo, with scratchbuilt spring/link mounts.

Or one of the older full detail C5R race cars... lots of good suspension pieces in there.

Glad you like them!! They finish up quite nice... I really need to get in gear and model more stuff to toss on shapeways.

so clean... so nice... great job as usual john!

Oh man... awesome stuff Pico! This is outstanding... subscribed.

Ha! Thats awesome! I love seeing people change the perception of a cars "type"

Check out page 2 of this... I have a silhouette cameo and use it for almost everything.

I was wondering if this was going to show up here... could send ripples throughout the hobby... as well as many others we have an interest in.. They own TowerHobbies as well. Via Wikipedia The company distributes over 150 brands of hobby products including about 30 proprietary product brands. Proprietary brands include: Axial, ARRMA, Dromida, Team Durango, dBoots, Revell, Monogram, Top Flite, Great Planes, AquaCraft Models, FlightPower, Heli-Max, SuperTigre, O'Donnell Fuel, Duratrax, RealFlight, MonoKote, Carl Goldberg Products, ElectriFly, Coverite, Dynaflite, Flyzone, MuchMore Racing, LiFeSource, Tactic, VS Tank, Estes Industries, Proto-X, TrakPower and others. It is the exclusive distributor for Futaba radio control products in North and South America, for O.S. Engines in North America and HPI Racing, Italeri, Novak Electronics and Nine Eagles in North and South America.

Thanks Don! I love that build, i remember watching the build log here on the forum! You are pretty much correct with how the scrapbook cutter works. What I'm doing in a nutshell is creating a body with traditional modeling hand work, then scanning a flat side view and top view of that body into a computer program. Then I draw/design the chassis and other components directly on top of those scans with lines.... because this is all done at full size, it minimizes the need to measure every little thing. those lines then become the cutting paths for the computer controlled scrapbook cutter. I feed .020 sheet styrene into the cutter and it scores it per the cutting paths trace all those paths by hand with an xacto until the parts separate. then layer and assemble by hand. Its still a ton of work, but it allows you to layout and see how things fit in advance of cutting, and also helps you make multiple pieces the same shape easily. here are a couple screen shots of my computer layouts from my last few projects: