Brian Austin

This firehouse is on the same street as the Ferrari...

OK, thanks Rob. The history was an interesting read.

I saw this thing last month. What is it?

As if the Franklin Mint Airstream diecasts are easy to find cheap. :-)

I think the problem was the use of unmodified doors for the front. To flow better new door skins would have to be fabricated that don't flare out. And then new side glass would have to be formed if the roof had been redesigned to flow in a graceful line.

There are lots of R/C conversions of HO vehicles, including construction equipment on YouTube. Also a German fellow made an R/C VW bus in 1:160 as well.

Yes, and I never would have thought of "turning" the model's tire into a wheel rim to fit a rubber O ring.

Some 20 odd years ago I experimented with making some dished truck wheel centers in 1:35 scale using those wiggly eye lenses. Results were so-so, but it's something to consider and could be adapted to 1:25.

I've been impressed with how well my phone camera can do closeups. These were taken at last year's Classic Plastic show. Knox fire truck is 1:160 scale.

Great step by step video showing the clever engineering...

Don't be so gauche... :-P Remember smudging Eraser Mate pens and the crummy Safety Left-Handed scissors in school? I had trouble in Boy Scouts shooting a rifle Lefty, likewise power machinery can be awkward. I play guitar in the standard manner, while I have a friend who has a Lefty (mirrored) guitar. He always stood out in the open mike song circle.

I didn't think much of these two kits when they came out, but they might be fun for kitbashing. Have any of you built these? I was reminded of them by my last visit to my local hobby shop a few weeks ago. They have the '60s version, unbuilt but reportedly missing one windshield. 1950's comic book version. Note the chassis appears to have been copied off the Revell-Monogram 1959 Cadillac! https://scale-icons.weebly.com/batmobile-of-the-1950s.html 1960's comic book version. What do you suppose this chassis is from? https://scale-icons.weebly.com/batmobile-of-the-1960s.html And then I was just reminded of the Polar Lights all-plastic 1960s Batmobile in1:25 scale.

Thanks for your kind words, folks.

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I didn't want to potentially derail the thread, but here are a couple of pictures, taken around a decade ago. The Blackforce window frames were cut out and replaced with sheet styrene. The trunklid was extended a bit, as the Blackforce's rear was a bit short in proportion to the body. I've been wondering when we'd be seeing the "Slammer" series again. People seemed to have fun kitbashing them 20 odd years ago.

I customized a Monogram '40 Lincoln Continental with the roof/trunk from a Blackforce. With a bit of fiddling you might be able to fit the body of the Blackforce with the interior, chassis and rear bustle from the Continental. The cowl is a bit narrower on the Blackforce, however.

Chassis would be different between Chevy and Pontiac.

You probably use sprue cutters to remove grapes from their stems. :-P

Interestingly, along with HO came 00, and later even 000 (close to the present N Scale) which followed the precedent of paint brush cataloguing: smaller sizes got progressively more zeros. Neater from the standpoint of promoting the hobby as a whole, but manufacturers introduced new scales at random moments in time, inventing their own designation for them in their marketing. Surely messy for a beginner, but I recall some good books on the subject from the '70s and '80s that explained all this pretty well. Perhaps we should refer to "0" as Naught Scale. Or Null, or, Zilch or Nada or...

For years there have been discussions of the fairly nice WELLY 1:24 diecast VW but I don't think I've seen one in any shop or model show. I'd like a T2 for a kitbash. I'm looking forward to the Revell release. I can wait a little bit longer. :-)

Has there been discussion regarding this kit? This would be a "Bay Window" bus, not the "Split Window" models they've done already. This subject has been something hobbyists have been requesting for some time, but I don't recall reading much about it in the forums I frequent. https://www.spotmodel.com/product_info.php?products_id=53548&language=en

Correct, British O Scale is 1:43, or "7mm Scale". HO is directly half of that. Note though that at least one line of vintage British diecast vehicles (Spot-On) was said to be scaled at 1:42 for whatever reason. Many other brands such as Corgi were "box scaled" with some cars being scaled at 1:48 or 1:50 instead of 1:43. American O was standardized at 1:48 scale for convenience to those using rulers, but in the mid 20th Century there was some model railroad equipment manufactured in the slightly unwieldy scale of 17/64" to the foot to be a bit more accurate in relation to the 1.25" track gauge. Continental European O Scale is scaled at around 1:45. Finally, note that the "O" should in fact be a zero instead of a letter. The next-largest track size in the toy train catalog is #1, and if you double European O Scale you get 1:22.5, garden railway size.

Thanks for the kind words, guys. The front wheel openings are supposed to echo the rear ones, and tie in with the front styling as well. The driver's side front wheel opening needs some adjustment.