W Humble

Likewise, and I still have some of the decal set! Wick

Jason, thx! Ordered one! Wick

I'm rebuilding my YOM '61 Pontiac (B'ville converted to Catalina, sorta') and I'd like to dedicate it to Glenn 'Fireball' Roberts who campaigned the cars so valiantly, but need a decal sheet; apparently these went out of production some time ago, but I wondered if anything was available nowadays... ? A shot in the dark! Wick

Colored plastics; reminds me of another very trivial thing about JoHan kits -- usually if you stripped the chrome parts, they were molded of a marbleized-like mix of various colored styrenes. Never noticed any other kit maker recycling plastic scraps that way -- and not a bad idea, either! When I toss a big handful of sprue, I often wish there was somewhere to recycle it in a practical way. Oh well... Wick

I have a fair percentage of JoHan models (in a small collection) and all are MoPars, c. 1960-61. Revell did Plymouth-Dodge in '62, also. They were brittle, and the 'kustom' stuff was a bit behind the curve, but nice kits overall for sure. None of mine had engines, but all had the funny pseudo-torsion bars up front, and very thick metal axles. The most notalbe thing was that our local '88-cent store" carried only Johan kits, and at that price they were much cheaper than AMT-SMP 3 in 1 kits (usually marked on the box at 1.39, which helped my budget. MoPars of the Exner era! Wick

I had the Revell Buick and '56 Ford; and still have a few bits and decals from 'em! But in concentrating on the question, it was probably the Revell 'Old Timers' Model T kit, one we ostensibly bought as a Father's Day present for my late Dad about 1955. We also bought him a R-R and a few others, which I graciously glued together for him, good helpful son that I was! I still remember trying to secure the wheels on the plastic axles by the kit-recommended method of heating a screw-driver blade with his Ronson, then pressing it against the excess axle stub -- and half the time getting it so hot it fused solid! Aaugh. Dad passed in 1958; coronary. The Buick and Ford were hard to build for a ten-year-old, but I LOVED the idea of customizing them, and began to wean myself away from aircraft, ships, and tanks. My first AMT 3-in-1 was the '60 Edsel ragtop, but I (again!) built a '59 Ford for my lil' brother. When open hoods with engines began to appear, that was the best!! I had all the Spotlite model books; wish I had some now! I had the Mono duece kit, and some others, plus some decals for 'em yet. A lot went by the wayside when I packed them away in 1969 upon being inducted into the Army; wa''nt sure I was coming back. The big carton got crushed, and half the cars broken pretty severely, tho all the good ones are repaired now. Still a few from 60 years ago unfinished, but... ! Wick

Did you mention what you wanted for the whole lot of 1/25 stuff? Wick

Thanks! Wick

Jeff, don't think so on tires, but I'll go thru my box. No use for Firebird clear hood, at all? Wick

Hey, N CA is the center of the universe! (Well, I'M here!) Ole' Wick

Sweet! Only on MCM forums?! I was converting an OLD Aurora Avanti kit into a NV Hwy Patrol car -- to save it -- and thought it might be cool to have it 'sponsored' by STP/Stude! Oh, it has a BBC. like a Lark (Canadian) I saw drag race in '65 that claimed to be a true F/X car! Wick 3191 Coronado Rd., Chico, CA 95973

Thanks, I bought the decals as the 2024 IPMS show in Yuba City CA. I built an RAF Brewster Buffalo kit, and another one as the air-racer that was planned for the thing, but never built (I just faked a Wright R-2600 from the SB3A dive-bomber that they built onto it, and lowered the canopy, etc. The XP-55"B" and Shinden are almost done, and I'm glad! Nice projects, as a diorama (photos soon!) but I'm going back to automobiles; aircraft are too fiddly for my old eyes/hands! Wick

Les, still seems awkward, huh? Think I'll stick with my Flintstone method! I still prefer 1/1 auto finishes, and teensy spray guns, too! Wick

"Two girls for every boy" at Chico State College, formerly Chico Normal School as they called teacher's colleges. The claim was made for that ratio, and since I was only looking for ONE, I found her in '67 -- together ever since. Ironic: she was from my little tiny home town, Alturas, and we'd never met because I was graduated before she was a freshman -- tho I'd seen her, as a HS cheerleader! OC, we used to go visit our MUHS pals at Sac State and Davis to party! CSC was also supposedly in the top ten party schools nationwide; could have been! The now defunct 'Pioneer Week' was pretty out of hand, or got that way in the '70s, and was banned. Prob good you missed that, John! Anyhow, our Cox slots were pretty hard to beat in the Alturas slot racing world; just putting on better tires put you among the top dogs, in a town of 3K -- and still is! A cheap plug: I've written six novels about growing up in a small, rural Western town on Kindle; the A Place On Mars series, and they're full of adventure, music, cars, and slang -- though could be only rated PG. Cheap. Just search by my name on Amazon. Also, the non-fiction book "How to Restore Your Datsun Z-Car', c. 1990 also on Amazon. Shameless self-promotion, huh? Wick Humble

Always wondered how those booths worked when you need 360-deg coverage, or even 'in the round' coverage: for aircraft for instance? You still have to handle the model, etc.? Old Philistine that I am (in rural area) I still spray 'al fresco' and mount my car bodies on a thingie that holds the body from the underside so I can pick it up and spray from my best angle. Aircraft -- doing some for the first time in 65 years -- are trickier; some kind of clamp-mount like a pylon, and then clamp that in a vice or something to let it cure/dry. Looks neat. Wick

All I can find is a Firebird hood, clear plastic, unused -- not much. Also have one late GP body only. No pickup parts. Sorry, Wick

Bill, thanks I tried that source last year after my MCM plea, but no longer available even then. Guess we'll have to search ebay and forums. Wick PS: how do you post those quotes in blue that you and many others have? Forums baffle me; I'm 78, and think a good conrtol is a light switch.

Wouldn't you imagine that the 'glass' from the Revell '60 Impala repop kit would fit? If someone lopped off the roof to make a ragtop...? I had the YOM AMT hardtop kit, back in the day, but it's long gone, darnit. Building the Revell version now as a 'kustom'. Far from my fave car, but they were rakish!! Wick

Les, I'll dig through my stuff, but I just used a set on a kit-bashed '40 ragtop (Lumpy's car, from Leave It To Beaver; the day Wally and Eddie Haskell chained the rear-end to a tree...!) and that might be all of 'em. The kit was marked 'Lindberg', a surprise to me, but AMT parts fit. Don't call me, I'll call you, etc....! I have a nice set of '49s. Wick

I want one too! BTW, by the grille teeth, that's a '54 Stude. I loved that Bourke/Lowey body, and would have bought a 1/1 Conestoga if one had ever come up for sale in restorable condition where I could see it. Not as cool as my old '55 Nomad (long gone!) but almost, if modded to run fast! The real cars are a bit fragile, lightly built vs. Chevy/Ford (have a '54 sedan body to put on a S-10 frame with IROC-Z V-8/T-5, etc. That strange hood fit was actually on many 1/1 Studes! The real '54 grille floated, teeth weren't attached to frame. One of the few kits I'd still be in the market for, if buildable. I have an extra AMT frame/suspension new/unused for it. Wick

I need the pair of 'Studebaker' decals with the circle-S trademark from an AMT '53 Starlight coupe 1/25 kit, if anyone can spare them. My kit is the original issue, so natch the decals are cracked; if a set were available from a repop version, I'd appreciate having them. Or something similar? Have lots of misc decals to trade, most very old however! Tjx! Wick

Jurgen, hot solvents will melt surface of most plastics, esp. our styren! Much like common lacquer thinner, they attack everything. If I do more stripping, I'm going to break down and buy one of the recommended purpose-formulated gunks mentioned above! Wick; not too happy with DOT 3 brake fluid!

Not quite as funny, but I knew a guy who built A.) A '39 Chevy with a c. 1956 MoPar A-series (273, I think) V-8, and 2.) a Datsun 240Z with a Chevy 235-six. Something out of synch, here; maybe he got them mixed up in the darK? Not bad builds, and he doted on 'em, claimed the '39 was real fast. However, putting a stove-bolt iron six in a Z was not good strategy; more cubes sure, but more weight than a SBC, even. I once considered putting a '75 280Z L-28 six in our '51 Chevy two door, however; had the engine almosf free from a total that had been running good (too good!) and... well, I didn't! Wick

The Srombecker Scrab racer kit (it was buildable into some kind of battery-powered slot car, I know) that I bought in '59 has a nice set of Hali 'bean hole' rims, but one is broken. I tried to make surface resin castings, but none came out good enough. Also, the kit had real rubber tires, like Firestone Super-Sports. Love to find supplier for those in big 1/25 or 1/24 for a Bonneville racer I'm scratching up with two Cad V-16s! Wick