CapSat 6

Most of them, at some point or another!

NICE!

MYSTERY MEN!!!

WOW. That looks the biz!!!

This one has artwork that is way, way cool though!!!

I have an Ed Roth T Shirt that came in a box styled after a model box. I still have the shirt and box untouched. I'll have to post pics when I get home.

New-ish Corvettes and Challengers, too. No promo contracts lately, though.

Pictures of the custom parts and instructions.

What Rob said The annuals were produced for 1977 and 1978. Promos were offered as well (I think in silver, dark blue, dark red metallic and green metallic). The "Force 440" kit used the same basic car, but instead of custom parts, police parts and super wide steel wheels, NASCAR tires, and dog dish hubcaps were added. Force 440 bodies had small holes in the roof for mounting the light bar. The light bar was a very nice Twinsonic, which only appeared in the Force 440. All of the later 4 door Monacos got a vastly inferior lightbar, but it looks like the Twinsonic is making a comeback in the upcoming CHP Monaco. All of the other police parts (push bar, gun rack with guns, radio, spotlights, computer) have carried over to the 4 door kits. Before these kits, the same tool was used for the annual 1975 Plymouth Road Runner (which was based on the 2 door Plymouth Fury that year). The 1975 kit came with optional skis, roof rack, snow tires, and very nice Cragar mags. Another Fury-based Road Runner was offered in 1976, although Plymouth did not base the 1976 Road Runner on the Fury that year. It was essentially a carry over kit but instead of optional ski parts, it came with a six pack manifold, hood scoop, slicks, and some other custom parts. The Monacos varied a little in custom parts from 1977 to 1978. The cars themselves were unchanged. One year (I think the '78) came with a custom wraparound "motorboat" windshield. One or both years came with a mini bike (with carrier mounts for the rear bumper), much like the one that recently came in the Dodge Pickup kit. Cragars were the optional wheels both years. Both years came with custom scoops for the c pillars and fenders. The ones for the fenders looked a lot like the stock ones used on the '77-'78 Firebird Trans Am. I think these were the same ones that came in the MPC Monza kits. Custom front and rear pans were supplied to replace the bumpers. Racing bucket seats were carried over from the '76 "Road Runner" kit. The chassis is more or less a carry over from the '71-'74 Road Runner kits, except that it was revised for single exhaust & catalytic converter. It's the same big block engine that came in the older Road Runners, except that a crossover pipe was supplied to make the exhaust manifolds connect to the single exhaust. Appliques were supplied for the opera windows- they look like the stock ones for one of the higher trim Monaco models from those years. These only came in the annual kits, the Force 440's did not have these parts.

The story I heard was that Pontiac developed it as a "Commuter" car rather than a "sports" car. Yeah- right. Pontiac really wanted a sports car as they considered themselves a Performance brand, but the only way they could get it into GM's production plan was to represent it as an advanced (steel space frame with plastic panels- an ancestor of the Saturn, if you will) economy car. They had had this go-round with Chevy before, first with the Banshee, then with the Firebird (which fortunately, was allowed to live begrudgingly). Somehow, Pontiac pulled it off this time. It was likely pressure from Chevrolet (as it would be competition for the Corvette that would undercut it in price, and, if left unchecked, performance), that kept it an economy car for the first few years. Even the literature and ads for the car mostly referenced it's economical virtues. "We drive excitement!" came a little later. The first ones were striking for the time, although slightly plain. I knew a guy with a first year Fiero, neat little car. It did almost seem like "3/4's of a Hot Rod" back then. Every year after, once they were in production, and too late for anybody in Corporate to do anything about it (for awhile, anyway) Fieros seemed to get more and more souped and scooped up ("further developing the product", wink, wink), until, as everybody knows, they hit their performance peak, and no doubt, re-attracted the attention of the Chevy division, who probably at that point said: "enough is enough"! Just imagine if they hung in there long enough to get the Grand National engine!

Well...the original Cuda's and Challengers had fake scoops in their twin scoop hoods, too... I had a '74 Cuda with one of those hoods. The previous owners made those scoops real (meaning: they cut them out). The only "real" benefits those "real" scoops had were: 1) they let copious amounts of water into the engine bay. 2) once, we were having a tuning session, and briefly ran the car without an air cleaner. We had a backfire out of the carb, which, hand to heart- shot flames out of the scoops. That was one of maybe the 3 coolest things I have ever seen in my entire life!!!

How has the early 60's Chrysler "Toilet Seat" trunk lid not yet come up in this discussion??? My Dad used to tell me he actually added one to a '59 Fury that he had, while it seems that most people were ditching them (or wanting to) at the time.

Or what he said!

As I put the notion of an absolute beginner modeler in my head, I'm thinking it couldn't hurt to have your friend work on a few other things before he tackles this one. This kit is well engineered, but a beginner might have a little difficulty joining the body/chassis/interior, as it's all engineered to fit pretty precisely. Practice on a few simpler subjects might help. If it were my friend, I'd have them try out a few snap kits to lean the basics of painting and assembly first, then maybe a few simpler glue kits (maybe the Revell '70 Chevelle, or '70 Challenger T/A or '70 Road Runner kits), where they're engineered fairly well, but not to go together as precisely as newer tools. Those kits were engineered originally in the early 80's. They benefit from having a good level of detail, while still being relatively simple.

The easiest solution is to replace the whole engine with the one from Revell’s ‘68 and ‘69 Dodge Darts. It’s a 383 but could stand in for a 400 or 440, and it comes with a really nice Torqueflite auto trans. The exhaust manifolds on the Dart engine are A-body only, but if they bug you, you could use the ones from the Monaco kit, or from the AMT ‘71 Charger. If one would go to that trouble, though, they would probably want to do the whole chassis and engine swap with the Charger kit anyway. I think that engine, when painted the proper blue, would be a great improvement over the MPC kit engine as-is.

The problem is: I have something like 7 of these Monacos already. Can I really justify getting another one??? Hmmm... ... ...yes. Yes, I can.

The caps... ...my guess is that they'll throw in the new ones from the Dodge Pickup. They're a little better than the ones in the Monaco kit, not fantastic...but... ...the box seems to show the Cop Car (ventilated) caps. I wonder if we're getting those, or if we'll be getting decals for the caps representing the vents...

Aww man! I'm too late- I was going to get all cryptic!...

Yes, with some additions. I read on another board that they have retooled the better/ square lightbar for it (I think the one from the old "Force 440" kit), and new wheels (stock depth, I would guess they're the same ones that were in the recent 1978 Dodge Pickup) presumably with skinnier tires. All previous issues of this kit had super-wide steel wheels with MPC's NASCAR tires. I'd like to see if they replaced/ redid the steering wheel (as these always came with the 'Tuff" wheel)- incorrect for probably any Cop Car, a holdover from the days that these were the 2-door Dodge Monaco Sport. It would have been nice if they added a new, improved (more stock) Air Cleaner and Thermoquad carb. That would have been a total Baller move...

No problem, and thank you! I figured it couldn't hurt to ask. All I really need is the back end to one...

Me too!!!

I'm revisiting your earlier post, Tony- I was noodling around with some old parts I have stashed away. I don't have much from the '68 and '69 Coronet kits, but I do have a large stash of extra parts from the MPC '68 and '69 Chargers. I do have one or two of those trailer hitches, a set of mag wheels and some of the jack stands, but that's about it from the Coronet kits that I have. I always hated when I would find built '69 and '70 Coronets and they had those custom side scoops glued on!!! PASS!!! I think the MPC '68-'70 annual Charger kits gave a similar building experience to what you describe - a massive amount of extra parts, enough to do 4 building versions out of the box (stock, NASCAR, Drag, custom). Notable are the custom grilles, which had rotating headlight sections- giving the builder the option for projector style round lamps, square lamps, or grille sections. I have never seen that set up built, but it must have been cool when done right. They usually came with open steel wheels, custom wheels (early Pontiac "2 piece drum brake" wheels in the '69 and '70 kits! ), clear custom hoods, single carb, dual carb and injected intake options, roll cages, custom tail pieces with '66-style full width taillights, seat belts, molded license plates, NASCAR dual shock set ups, and more. Those old annuals were a little after my time. I grew up on the "Dukes of Hazzard" and MPC/ERTL "500" and Daytona Chargers, which were descended from the original tooling (with problems). The body had been revised back and forth over the years, perhaps it's the most revised model tool in existence. Some of the body details are a little muddier than they were in the annual days. None of those old optional parts remain in the newer issues, save for the racing gauge panel, oil cooler box, some of the roll cage, and racing headers (which became the stock exhaust manifolds at some point). The newer issues did gain some nice American Racing wheels (before they got really popular), a good blower set up, and 80's style drag hood scoop. Anyway, I was thinking that it would be great if I built all 4 versions of the '69 Charger kit, using just the optional parts from the original annual kit. This could be done pretty easily and inexpensively, as I could use later issues of the '69 Charger kit for the builds, rather than the originals. This would show what a builder could do with that kit right out of the box. I really love these kits for no good reason, so I have a ton of them and I don't think I would even need to buy any to do what I propose. I think that will be a lot of fun, especially the full custom with window louvers, quarter window fillers, clear custom hood, and custom grilles & taillights. I would be interested in seeing how the "NASCAR" version will turn out- it's by no means accurate as a NASCAR racer from that era, but it might end up looking like some kind of club racer. The '69 drag version used Dick Landy graphics, and the equipment won't match his 1:1 Super Stock car, but it would still make a nice "What If?" phantom match racer. I just have to round up a bunch of those stock whitewall Goodyear tires, which might be a slight challenge.

Agree!

Beautiful build!

I have some damaged bodies. Maybe we could make a trade- either you could take my damaged bodies as needed, or I could use that one?