W Humble

Hoping this isn't inappropriate on this forum, I'd like to announce my 'A Place On Mars' Series of three novels and three 'novelettes' on Kindle Direct Publishing to the car modeling community: these are original young-adult tales about growing up in a remote westen small town in the early-boomer era, and are not sci-fi! They are loaded with cars, trucks and even crawler tractors, garage band rock n' roll, family values, plus danger and adventure! All reflect, of course, some experiences I had c. 1959-64, though vastly dramatized. Street racing, wildfire supression, college life, police matters (ahem!), demolition derby, deer hunting, boys n' girls... Kindle eBooks are very cheap ($2.99) and the paperbacks not expensive (about double that, right now) available through Amazon. Friends, I never expected to make bank from these stories, but I do need some reviews, or just ratings -- otherwise, Kindle lets my titles get buried under newer ones, and thus don't get read. Financially, I'm still trying to earn enough to offset the cost of donating sets of six to our local middle schools, etc.! The characters are very diverse, just as I encountered in real life high school (and in my teaching career) and have teen issues that progressively get more complex and stressful, but good friendship and 'The Golden Rule' are enough glue for the five friends, four boys and a girl -- who is also daughter of the local sheriff! THE FLOOD, THE WILDFIRE, and THE EXPLOSION are full novels, and THE HAZARDOUS HUNT, THE HIT & RUN, and THE DEADLY DERBY are shorter novelettes. All are barely "PG-13 rated." If you don't recall how hard it was for a garage band to afford decent equipment, or how a kid might leverage himself from one clunker to a better one, or how it was to attend a rural high school of 300 kids -- give my stories a read. Or, if you DO! In the first story, Ray debates the financial wisdom of taking a girl to the Sophomore Hop: "A dollar, drag? I could get an AMT 3-in-1 kit for that!" Thanks, Wick Humble (Modeling since 1953, age 79.)

Faint hope: I need tailights from an AMT '61 Bonne kit for a '60 Chevy Kustom I'm building. Even one would probably do, as I have one unused since '61! I converted mine into a Catalina back 63 years ago, and not very well! Got old stuff to swap! Wick age 79

You didn't specify what year, or era. Oddly, I got a 1/25 printed sheet of 1961 era state licenses as a premium from Auto World, the big models-by-mail store in NJ. I might have a color photocopy of that somewhere. Very old skool, oc. I laminated one sheet, and cut them out -- carefully -- for my old kits. Karma: I got '61 Massachusetts plates for my '61 Lincoln "Hyannisport Hot Rod" done for Pres JFK, no less! Annual Styline kit, begun in '61! Wick

Hemmings Classic Cars (last year, I think) featured a Stroppe-built Merc police special that has been restored. Retired CHP? I think it was once a 'kiddie-cop" patrol car for Chico (CA) State College in 1959-60. Big ole' 430, etc. It was around Chico for years with the door star removed, and flat-black rat-can primer on the white door. Interesting cars; some had to contribute their running gear to the big Edsels, even. The '57's came with a single headlight, I think, but a very awkward dual-light adaptation was available from the factory to be 'up to date' with the new cars with quad lights. Stude/Packard did this trick too, and it looked very J.C. Whitney, indeed!! Wick

Sorry to be askin' again, but I still need a hardtop roof for my 1963 Pontiac Tempest/LeMans ragtop body, to make it a coupe. Even a roof lifted from a big GM coupe of the 1962-64 era would help, if I narrowed it down to fit the Y-body. Funny, that roof appeared first in GM on the '61 'senior' compacts, and funnier; though Pontiac released a convertible body with Buick/Olds in '62, they never added in the true pillarless hardtop body -- until the Chevelle-based A-body cars debuted in '64, of course! I have a Tempest 'Monte Carlo' dream car rep model, a '63 421 Super Duty racer (both built in those years, or at least started!), and a '62 ragtop done like our 1/1 LeMans from a few years ago. I want to build my last '63 as a coupe, and paint it like our '61 Tempest 1/1 coupe, ivory white top with dawn firemist body. I still have trading material, especially from annual kits c. 1960-65. I'm a member of the 'Little Indians' chapter of POCI, and wrote the complete Tempest history for Special Interest Autos Magazine back in 1978 -- when Mickey Thompson, Mac MacKellar, Bill Collins, and all those guys were still around to be interviewed! Those were the days... ! Wick

Alan, I'm afraid I need to sell this car; my dear wife of 52 years can't comfortably ride in it, so what's the point, anymore! Out four times this year. It's never been driven through standing water, during about 500 miles of sparse use since 2019. It has lots of features that enhance the experience, believe me! Pettersen Motorworks (specialist) custom 280 engine (overbored, new pistons, etc.), aforesaid 5-speed, and just about NEW everything. Had one tiny bit of rust just just ahead of rear wheel-well, but cut-out and replaced with new metal. 280Z louvered hood, new bumpers, billet rear air vents (only ones in the world on a car!) It isn't quite finished; I started another project before I installed the A/C and 'sound system', and the oil cooler isn't hooked up yet. The grille is a copy of the Fairlady Z mesh that I made to accommodate the driving lights, but wasn't stainless as was sold to me, so I have to R&R and paint it graphite gray. I had a gennie Japanese market grille but didn't want to modify it. It has a Hobrecht roll-bar (braced), four-point belts, '20th Anniversary' leather Z seats with all the features. Lightened flywheel, RevLoc clutch, 'ram air' intake, Mallory distributor with Pertronix conversion, LED bulbs, custom console, ZX rear discs and Sumitomo 4-puck front calipers; all the stuff I really wanted. This car also has the 'home-market' exhaust manifold, without emissions fittings. I am asking $50K firm, as is. It looks really good at shows, and drives superbly, quietest Z in my experience! Comes with loud Magnaflow muffler, as an option! If you know of anyone... ? My first Z I bought in 1970, while still a GI at Ft Sam Houston, later restored and sold back to NISSAN USA fot a display car. The poor baby just sits around, and will go into winter storage soon. Sad. And, I wrote the book! Sorry for the 'advert'! I'm going through the stages of grief... Wick

John, I believe in guide coating, and I know that the color sanding process is very effective, tho I don't belabor it on my kits. A great restoration shop shooter once told me: Hell, some of those sanding grits; you might as well just use the back side of the paper!" I'm sensitive to the problem with the 2K process paints; super wetlook shine, but the clear builds so deep it gets all out of scale. Strike a balance, I guess. I always used PPG 660 Hi Perf clear, but I know that many good body shops use the better rat-can clears for spot repairs -- must be okay, exposed to UV and IR rays, etc. -- so I've been using UPOL brand aerosol clear, and it seems pretty equal. With our cars not being 'parked in the weather' it isn't a t much risk, huh?! Just always and lightly on the hig spots, ribs, etc. Makes the hobby interesting, anyway. Wick, and gettin' old!

When I don't, I often regret it! Simple as using two colors of primer, but make the second a light once-over. For a gazillion years, body shops used this method (often with just dusting the surface with cheap silver rat-can paint), but now there is a more sophisticated system using black powder and a puff-like sponge. 3M, I think. Overkill for a 1/25 kit. A great step toward a better underlayer, which makes or breaks a paint job! Wick, once PPG guy.

Trivial, but what is the best source for old-timey hood pins PE, or ?? Thanks, ole' Wick

Bill, as always I value your comments (who wouldn't?) very highly! I used to 'decorate' every car ad in MT, HRM, etc with flames and scallops; lots of practice, even if it didn't make perfect. The '61 Furd wasn't the prettiest car in the barn -- esp compared to the '60 & '63, but I did driver training in one; 4 doors, six, and stick. All black too, just like the towns new police Interceptor except it had all the HD goodies. After I posted those two, I noticed that they'd gotten the same grille treatment! I did a number of scallop and flame-jobs later, but never mastered pin-striping. There were three guys in the Class of '63 at Modoc Union High School (N CA) who were artists, and I was probably third in rank. Tom second, and a kid named Danny the best; a cartoonist and natural caricaturist. Tom went on to be a Maintenace guy at our local State U., and Dan animal control boss of Pasadena! I got an MA in art, and then taught Kindergarten, mostly. I spent 1969-70 as an 81E20 Graphic Arts/Illustrator in the Army, which was an education in itself! I'll post a few more, since I dug out those. All too many are just plain embarrassing! The Henry J may not look better as a hardtop. The IH tractor was from the summer of '62 when I was sent to KS to work on my uncle's ranch, mostly bucking bales. If it weren't for KOMA radio R'nR (OK City) in that beyond rural existence, I'd probably have croaked at 16! The Bug is more study hall quickies! Wick, just turned 79

This moving pics is a challenge for me! Sorry if my attachments are screwed up to some degree. You can see where I finally got an elipseemplatee! The Camaro is from much later, obviously. Wickcrewed up to some

Having some probs with my laptop today; bear with me! These are 'study hall' or 'watching American Bandstand' drawings; pencil was about all I had in those old days; better media I learned much later in college and as an Army illustrator! I'll include two from my HS pal, Tommy Johnson; we were the two hot-rod/kustom 'artists' in a class of 60 kids. The twin Allison (inspired perhaps by 'Big Al' Ford sedan?) was influenced by the short fad for enclosed, streamlined diggers, and perhaps a bit of Big Daddy Roth? Typical of classroom 'qucky' scribbles; often when a friend suggested an over-the-top idea. These were done in '62 (Where were you...?) because Tom was forced into the Army by the local probation officer before our class of '63 graduated. Lots of potential here!

That, of course, should have been WWII, not WWI. Bad typist! W.

The panel lines thing is hard; even scary! You can ruin a good model -- or cause yourself LOTS of extra work -- with some bad engraving on plastic, I know! I'm trying to build a WWI diorama of two aircraft, a subject I haven't tackled since I was in eighth grade (when Ike was Pres!) and re-scribing the kind of panel lines that two 1/64 a.c. require is a toughie! Converting a Kyushu Shinden and Curtiss Ascender to 'what if the war lasted longer' jet canard fighters forced me to sand off all the surface detail from both kits (Japanese and Ukrainian plastic) and recreate them, plus a bunch of 'imagineered' panels from -- forgive the pun -- scratch! They don't look bad now, but that's not going to get it done for a show where most of the best entrants are aircraft. Wish me luck! BTW, for lines parallel to an edge, I use a tool from my old mechanical drawing set, a 'calipers inker pen' with adjustable jaws (sorry, no pic) which will do various widths (if you're vewy, vewy careful!) and least provide a guide for a more agressive scriber. A 'ready-made' tool, tho there might be better ones. Thx! Wick Boy, this font is little! And, how cum it isn't spelled 'scarey'?

Pete, Yeah, I built mostly aircraft (Aurora Famous Fighters series, when b-day or Xmas came), ships, and military (Renwal, Hawk, Revell, etc.) because there were so few car kits, really. My first modifyable were Revell '56 Ford, '56 Buick, of which I still have some parts -- and decals! Then AMT came to the rescue, and in '59 my bros and I bought a number of 3-in-1 kits, half of we still have -- or, I have 'em! Gave away (or blew up) all the others by 1960; my course was set! You're right on strippers, oc. Wick

Peteski, Well, I guess I'm just an old modeler -- first car kits I built were Revell Highway Pioneers (def not custom/comp 3-in-1 products!) in about 1955. I'm going to try the stripper product advertised in the magazine next, tho I don't have much left that needs stripping, at 79. I seldom add a 'new' kit to my pile, because I'm still trying to complete all the projects I began in 1960! And their all stripped now, and I sure hope to finish them before my expiration date. Since I do 1/1 restorations, I mostly rely on PPG OEM-type finishes, to virtually 100% good result. As a PPG employee (my retirement job, from teaching, etc.) I have a lot of goodies to draw upon; and I'll share! Thx! Wick

This is me a few years ago with my restomod '71 Datsun Z. Also have '51 Ford Crestliner and '61 Pontiac Tempest coupe with stock Buick 215 aluminum V-8. I don't care for aero doo-dads, and at 79 don't drive with the SR-71's anymore -- nohow. L28, 5-speed, 280ZX discs, roll-bar, Tokiko suspension kit with Suspension Technique anti-sway bars, and.... I wrote the book 'How to Restore Your Datsun Z-Car' in 1990, still in print, now with CarTech Books. Wick

I like the drawings, esp the engineering ideas! I had a '55 Nomad back in the 'eighties, fixed all the rust and tried to waterproof the liftgate with another weatherstrip, etc. We made the mistake of trying to make a family car of it, and at 30 years old, it wasn't in the cards. Gypsy red, w/w radials and stock B-A wheelcovers, plus a special P-Pak 265 with B-W overdrive (had a 350 and PG when acquired for $3K!) That car got an honest 25-mpg on the road using the OD as much as possible, on regular gas. Being a trucker (not long before) I made the kickdown discretionary, and could split shifts in second and third = five speeds! I like our T-5 trans (from S-10 pickups) so much better. The '51 Chevy has a five-speed, the '51 Ford a B-W OD, and the Poncho just a PG -- out back! My restomod 240Z has the L28 engine and five-speed from a 280, of course. Plus discs, leather seats, etc. I found drawings (not so hot) of my first and third cars that I may post; and photos of the models I made of them. The '51 Ford had to be converted from the AMT /49, and the tail-lites, to my surprise, were not available in resin, so don't look very real. I dropped almost $40 on PPG custom-mixed paint for the kit, supposed to be Hondouras Maroon, but now called Garnet Red -- or something. The '55 was 'Refrigerator White' with blue striping; interior was striped in white. As I might have mentioned, I earned my BA class of '68, and got a CAS Civilian-Acquired Skill MOS in the Green Machine: 81E20 or Graphic Arts Illustrator, and was posted for 21 mos at Ft Sam Houston TX attached to Brooke Army Medical Center/Medical Field-Service School, and did all kinds of art jobs; even learned something too! Made SP5 E-5, and then got out for grad school in 1970. I hitched up with a local gal, Benita, Latina of course, who should have known better, but I hung our with her brothers and cousins, so was acceptable. She was cheerleader and class valedictorian, and I was hot rodder, first trombone, and 23 from the bottom of my class of '63. She was '67, too young to date in HS! We've been hitched since '72, and have two kids and four grandkids; all pretty artistic, I must say. Youngest wants to make a career of it; hope she also gets her teaching credential, as a back-up plan. She and I have our health issues, including the BIG C, but are getting along for now. We have been sweating out the Park Fire, about 2-3 miles away, but at the heel and mostly burnt out/cold now. We have too much valuable junk; the model cars prob would have been left behind, darnit. I'm too ancient for this BLAH_BLAH_BLAH_BLAH! I mostly work on kits in the colder months; finishing up my son's '51 Chevy and the '61 Tempest currently. I have a '53 Stude sedan I'd like to slice & dice into a custom roadster next. Wish me luck! Wick

KIndle Direct Publishing doesn't allow much creativity or control over these Kindle Vella 'covers', as they'e only ebooks. Not the format I'd have chosen, but niether were the other ones; makes them look so amateurish! Wick

Thanks, but... I was lucky through most of high school to have a 'bestie' who also loved to draw customs/rods, and was very adroit -- neither of us had lessons 'cause of living in a small, isolated town in NW CA, but we'd often draw part of a car then let the other finish it, for fun. We also flamed and scalloped every car in magazine adverts, and cut some out to 'lower' or 'section' them. It was fun. Then he got in hot water and the probation officer offered him the famous 'join the Army' option to stiffer penalties, and he left town; Tommy Johnson. There was another guy in our class who was a masterful cartoonist/caricaturist, Dan Sheflin. I used to say that our HS knew the value of art, as it offered NO art classes -- mechanical drawing only. Later, 'cause I think everyone called me an 'artist' because they didn't think I was any good at anything else, I got an MA in Art/Education -- so I should be a lot better than I am, now!! GI Bill helped! The novel covers were intended to be done by high-schoolers, but my grand-daughter did one and a classmate another (digitally) but I didn't include those as I didn't do them. I paid almost $100 each for the two girl's work, but they said they weren't interested in doing more! As a former fine arts teacher, I found that hard to imagine; earning money for artworks at age 16; were they in my class, I would have allowed it as a class assignment, and graded appropriately! The time we live in!? So... I literally backed into those cover jobs, and they weren't ideal. Kindle didn't mind, however... ! I've only sold about sixty copies of the six stories, and some I boght myself to give away. I also have a very long novel about the life of a (fictional) pioneer aviator, Bird of Ill Omen, coming out on Kindle Vella, a serialization outlet for ebooks. I did the 'cover' for it also, as a -- get this -- tee-shirt. Came out okay; acrylic craft-paint rendition of a Brewster Buffalo in combat in Malaya; just part of the action! Well, I have some more ancient art cleaned up; if my scanner works, I'll send some more cars, c.1962-65, to this topic asap. BTW, the A Place On Mars stories are only about $3 for ebook, and $5 (cheap, as MAD Magazine used to say) for the paperbacks. Trying to get some ratings/reviews on Kindle!! Thanks for being my pen-pal! Wick, age 79

Gary, thanks; it's been a long time! My favorite car (from my lifetime, anyhow) is the 1953-54 Studebaker coupe -- always has been! Others are the 1961 Pontiac 'bubble-top' coupe, the 1955 Chevy (in such great taste, plus my first car, the one you never forget!), the Avanti, Datsun 240Z, 1951 Ford club coupe &/or Victoria, and... well, you get it! I've been doing a little drawing lately; four book covers for my Kindle 'historical fiction' novels -- just about my teen-hood, fictionalized a LOT! All have lots of cars, r&r, and teen angst -- and bad guys! Covers are supposed to suggest comic-book art. Keep on doing art! And making models, oc. Wick

Marcus, I was shocked to pay over ten bucks (ten years ago) for ELO -- I just supposed it had a lot of advantages over DOT 3. I do 1/1 restoration too, and once had saved about a quart of used DOT 3, so I (feeling poor) put it through a couple of strainings to get the obvious chunks out and tried a couple of old styrene bodies in the Tupperware tray using the used stuff. It worked; a bit slower and messier, but cheep! If I get into any more stripping, tho, I'm going to try some of the MCM advertisers' products. Wick

I'd swear that Testor's ELO is just Dot 3 brake fluid! Don't leave styrene in it too long soaking; embrittles the plastic!

FYI: I worked of-and-on as a lot-bot in our local Pontiac-Buick-GMC (and Rambler!) dealership, because the partners had houses across the street from ours, and one of thier kids was my of-and-on best friend in high school, c. 1959-63, PMD was riding high at NASCAR, as well as NHRA in those days, and the dealer received a large faux-oil-painting of Fireball Roberts winning the '62 Daytona 500 race in his '62 Cataline, Smokey Yunick's #22 car. Ken, my pal, somehow acquired it when we were roomies in J.C., and though I plied him with every inducement, the more I wanted the thing, the more he had to hang onto it! It showed a '61 coming around the banking right behind him, so some of them were still competitive after the 421 SD debuted. Such hardware was readily available until '64, when GM Corporate suddenly withdrew from racing/autosports, period. They were being investigated by Congress 9in their infinite partisan wisdom) at the time for their dominance of the domestic market -- Chevy was riding high, one division outselling all of FoMoCo put together! -- and the threat was a forced sale of Chevrolet as contributing to a monopoly in restraint of trade. No kidding! This was well before the Nader/Corvair scandals, etc. The sad thing for GM marque partisans was that not only did they end factory support of racing teams, they shut off the supply of competition parts and technology to everyone (except for a few leaks like the new Chevy big block ("Mystery Mark IV V-8", 'Porcupine-head', 'rat motor' or BBC), and later the Pontiac GTO, etc. But, when MoPar and Ford got seriously in the act, there was no GM challenge at all, whch left us GM guys bereft. Yes, the hemi and various big Fords were potent, but without the biggest engineering staff in the world in the mix -- their victories were easily earned, after all. Pontiac, Chevy, and even Oldsmobile had monstrous racing engines under test (32-valves, DOHC and SOHC, and sized upwards of 500 inches! THAT would have been a race! The big 455 Olds W-43 was on the cover of Hemmings Muscle Machines this month, and another mag (HRM?) had a Repco SOHC V-8 Pontiac commissioned for Trans-Am series last year, to show a few. 'What might have been...!" Well, as a PMD buff, I would like to get my licks in! So, I'd better get started on my #22 car, even if it's wrong! Q: did those Robert's decals come back on the market? Last time I checked, they were sold out. I think I'll make my inaccurate modification a streetable racer, with Tri-Power and 8-lug Kelsey-Hayes wheels, etc. I have 'my version' of a '63 SuperDuty 421 Tempest (or 'Powershift', as PMD Engineering called them) from '63, and a '61 Tempest "Monte Carlo' two-seat roadster show car with M/T GMC blown 195-in. slant four, and am building a '62 replica of my own LeMans ragtop. Probably another '63, as coupe, also. The 1961-63 Tempests never built a pillarless-hardtop body, though Buick and Olds did so on the shared Y-body. I need a '62-64 GM coupe roof to convert to do this, if anyone can find me such. Well, good luck! Thx! Ole' Wick