Dave Darby

Hi Tulio, actually, Terry Jessee did the red and black 57 Ford, along with the purple custom on the side panel. I did the box top car (mint green and white) that was also used on the three car set with a 63 Galaxie and a 57 T Bird. You do beautiful work.

The 32 Grille shell was in every release from the original, up through the Street Rods issue. The Street Rods issue lost the Ala Kart nose,deck and chrome reversed wheels, along with modifications I'll mention later. The bulk of the remaining Ala Kart stuff (cab, fenders, frame, interior tub, etc) was removed from the 1976-77 A-Venger issue, except for the Red Ram Hemi, and some rear suspension parts. When AMT/Ertl was toying with re-issuing the Ala Kart back around 1999-2000 or so) they opened up many of the gates on the tool, only to discover that the fender and cab units had been much modified. Instead of restoring the tool, (which I would love to see Round2 do), they elected to create the new tool Ala Kart, which is good for two things. Under carriage parts, and for driving the prices of the originals down (they were going for 2 Benjamins prior to this release.) Look a little left of dead center, underneath the Ala Kart frame, and left of the windshield frame, and you will see that 32 grille shell. Up to this point, in 1970, there had been zero modifications to the tool. You could have built that yellow car on the box art even way back in 1962. I've owned every issue of 1929 Model A kit, and wrote an Ala Kart (real car and model) history that appeared on the now defunct Bonediggers Styrene page, and in Model Cars Magazine when the new tool Kart came out. http://public.fotki.com/DWDarby/ala_kart/?show=all http://public.fotki.com/DWDarby/model_cars/vintage_model_kits/amt_ala_kart_instru/

Seeing Tulio's gorgeous 56 Vicky made me want to post mine. This is actually the build that got me started doing bx art models, as the box this came out of had the hideous red and white build up on the box with the front 12 spoke Halibrands on one side and the chrome reverse rear wheels on the other. Gaaaack! Anyway, this is painted with plain ol' Testors enamels out of a rattle can, and is my very first ever Bare Metal Foil job. Underneath that foil is some pretty nice silver painted trim, but.... There are some added details on this kit, including plug wires, (at one time it also had heater hoses, too. I also made rear window trim and visors from Evergreen plastic. The fender skirts are cut down from the AMT 49 Merc. Enough Yak. here it is... Not too bad for a 26 year old survivor?

Looks pretty good to me, and I'm a Ford guy.

The only thing I would change is the zip code of the shelf it's sitting on. It would look pretty good at 52722. Where I live. Nice job!

Here are the contents of the most recent iteration of the 1929 Model A Kit, circa 2002. As compared to... (Boy I wish I had this one back! This was my first Ala Kart model. My first Model A kit was the Street Rods issue back in 1973, when I was in 6th grade.

Hi Tim, actually, I did a little research on the cowl thing. That portion that Revell has molded to body isn't really molded one piece with the body. So Revell isn't totally accurate either. That windshield and cowl section is actually several pieces. If your windshield posts are the same color as the car, the AMT kit is perfect as is. If you want a chrome windshield, then you might want to do some masking of the center section. BTW, you're my friend, too, Tim. I've met John in person several times over the years. I hope day our paths will cross as well. The roadster cowl below will break down into about 7 pieces. The cowl top doubles as the gas tank. (One piece). I actually dragged one of those home from an abandoned farm when I was a teen. And it further breaks down like this... So I wouldn't go molding that center part to the gas tank/cowl top. AMT and Revell are both generally correct. They are just broken down differently.

Bill, I'm loving this (what looks like) old build you posted. Did you build it, or is it an acquisition? We have Facebook page called Scale Survivors, where we share new and vintage photos of old builds. I'd like to share it there. Anyone else here who is interested, feel free to check it out. https://www.facebook.com/groups/scalesurvivors/

Besides the other points mentioned, and I hope my good friends Tim Boyd and John Mueller will forgive me for this, but I think the AMT 29 A body has it all over the Revell version. It is closer to stock, much more graceful, and doesn't have that clunky made in China look about it. It has finesse. Look at the post above mine for an example. Don't get me wrong, there is a lot to like about the new Revell kit (I have one), but If I'm building a 29 A, that body will be coming from the AMT kit. I'm looking forward to seeing what's in that new issue. For anyone wanting somewhat of a preview, the 2002 and later issues of the Model A have many of the Ala Kart parts back in, minus plating, front axle, and wheels. The original AMT A kit also came with a bunch of vintage 4 cylinder speed parts. Gonna be another good year.

Someone on a another board said, "Nice Save". The model you started with was pretty nice in its own right. What I would say is that you performed a pretty magnificent upgrade. The only thing I would change on that build is the zip code it resides at. Nice work!

Caution: Above comment is not necessarily the opinion of most posters on this forum. I, for one am ecstatic at what Round 2 has been doing with AMT/MPC's long neglected assets. While some new stuff might be neat, if they keep restoring the old Trophy Series kits back to their original splendor, that will keep me plenty happy til I'm horizontal. I am a big proponent of constructive criticism, but the above comment is just so much tactless and ignorant bashing.

I think it depends on which Revell kit. I LOVE the old 1960 (really a 59) Multi-Piece body kit. Other than engine detail and optional parts, I think body and interior wise it beats the MPC kit in every way.

Sounds like rather than fixing the spindles, they just put the solid plastic springs of the later issues back in. I don't have one in my hot little hands to tell for sure tho.

Weeelllll.... Not quite. The 63's had different A pillar trim, covering the entire pillar,including the door, sort of like a convertible windshield with a hardtop added on the back. 64-67 had thinner trim that left much of the A pillar body color. You can see it in your photo. That said, a little BareMetal Foil applied the right way will cover that detail. I think you are off to a very cool project! Love that car!

It was turned into the Scorpion, a mid engined dragster

Looks great. You did your friend proud.

Like I said in my earlier post, the current 2015 (actually came out in 2014) kit is the one to get. Nice white plastic, miss-shapen front fender issues corrected, both engines, and nice decals. Only way to do better (shy of a bunch of kit bashing) is to spend the bucks for an annual.

First off, very nice build. It looks pretty sharp. All in all, I think that old MPC body is pretty accurate, Better than the newer Duster kit in that regard. If you were to kit-bash the two you'd have an excellent representation of the real thing. Anyway, I just had to chuckle at the above quote about rusting out in a couple of years. In the background of the photo below (that's a young me in the pic) you can see my brother's then TWO year old 72 Demon 340 with some pretty good rust issue developing at the bottom of the rear quarters. The similar vintage "Brand X" in the foreground looks pretty solid.... That said, I also had a 72 Demon (318) and I loved that car. Wish I had it back.

No photos right now, but this is one of the better re-issues of this kit. It appears that Round2 did some clean-up on the body mold as well. All of the previous Ertl issues I own have oddly distorted fender tops, sort of like sink marks and low spots on the front fender peaks. You can also see an odd seam on the insides of the front fenders (not a real issue), The new kit has none of these problems. I may have to pick up another one. The custom panel painted decals are pretty cool too.

My AMT/Ertl re-ssues have the skirts. I had the Street Rods series issue when I was a teen, but I don't remember whether or not it had the skirts. Might have to watch eBay and look at the photos next time someone lists one showing the box contents.

Yeah, it's waaaay out of proportion;

This one...

I think the issue that set folks off (and I'm sorry, I realize this is an old thread). is when you started accusing Round2 of trying to rip people off. The model car industry is not the big corporations with large budgets it was 55 years ago. You may be surprised to learn that most of them have well fewer than 50 employees, In fact I believe Round2 has fewer than 10. It costs northerly of 200,000 dollars to cut a new tool, plus create box art, and new instructions. And you know what? Chances are, if someone did do a new Cougar, the body probably wouldn't be as nice as the kit you were complaining so loudly about. Round2 puts an awful lot of effort into its re-issues, Nobody there is getting rich, but they are making a lot of historic model kits available to us, at the lowest price point they can afford to sell them for. If all of the big box stores were still buying cases of model kits, the prices would be lower, but they aren't. That is why kits cost as much as they do today. It's not gouging. It's survival. So before you come in with guns blazing about the latest rip-off old tool model kit being "foisted on us" take a deep breath, and do a little research. Remember, tone is everything. BTW, I built a copy of that Cougar for AMT about 22 years ago, and I thought it was a really nice looking kit. (You can see it below.)

Other than aforementioned and the decals, the rest of the kit is essentially unchanged.