robertw

Of course Ismael I must go with Ron's car for obvious reasons and since I've always thought the C7 looked better as a cv then as a coupe it will have to be my second choice.. If I don't talk to you tomorrow have a merry Christmas, my friend.

Leno's collection is amazing. His tastes are eclectic and his standards high. I hope he has set up some kind of foundation to preserve what he has when the inevitable happens sometime in the future, it would be a shame to see this incredible collection of cars be scattered.

Here is a list of the ones I've found: Austin Healy Mk I Bug Eye Sprite TR-3 Lotus S3 Elan '65 XKE cv Mess KR 200 (3 wheel version) BMW Isetta 300 (3wheel version) Citroen 2CV Karman Ghia (with cv & hdt) Fiat 500 (1st Gen) They also did some hi-tech Ferraris and some of the above may also have been issued in that series but they were above my pay grade. I've been quite happy building these basic kits and since I'm not into contest building I'm quite happy having the basic kits sitting on my display shelves.

I built both kits from the double set and while they don't come with the PE from the hi tec kits they are accurate, fit together well and are interesting models for your display shelf. Gunze did a whole set of small English sports cars in that same series and I've managed to hunt down most of them. I'd love to see that whole series out again and would buy and built them again. They are that much fun to build.

Have a fun story about the CV-2. Met a fellow at a car show a few years back who was there with his. Asked him if he drove it much and he answered that he took it to a few car shows in the summer and on Sunday cruises with his local car club, but he added that he always took his regular car on the cruise route first so he could determine if the Citroen could get up all the hills that were on the cruise route.

I believe it was Minicraft that also had a version of this car......now that was basic. Even the basic Gunze kit is Tamiya quality compared to the Minicraft one. You've done a nice job, Gunze had a whole range of English sports cars I wish someone would dust those molds off. Some of those kits were not available from anyone else.

Very nice. I built the original Get Smart verson quite a few years ago and recall that it had some problems so you've done some really nice work on this one.

I retired a decade ago and had wonderful visions of turning a very large stash into finished projects on the display shelves.......ya, right! My output has barely exceeded what I produced during my working years, and my job left little time to build. It seems that just as many things get in the way of building now as they did then work in the house and the yard, family and the list goes on. Another thing that I've found is that when I was working a day off would have me at the workbench for a whole day but now I find I tire and have to take a break after an hour or two so not as much gets done in my free time.I will continue to build as long as my mind, my eyes and my hands allow. To paraphrase a French philosopher, " I model therefore I am (alive.).

Glad to see one of those finally built and yours looks quite good. Had the original Man from UNCLE one decades ago and while I painted it I never finished building it. Picked up a couple of the reissued ones with intensions to build one but still haven't. Your sucess with it just might inspire me to take a good look at it again. Thanks!

They were on most AMT Corvettes starting in the early 90's but I've also seen them on other AMT products such as the prepaint Cruiser, Vickie etc.

Thomas Graham has given us excellent histories of Revell, Monogram @ Aurora but no one has written a history of AMT/SMP/MPC. I hope someone wil before its to late and all those connected to those important modelling companies are gone.

I'm getting quite excited about this Atlantis news. Looking through my Thomas Graham books for bothe Aurora and Revell's history if we are lucky there may be a number of these old kits that may become available over the next few years, the Convair ShuttleCraft kit is listed by Graham as $200+ in the collector market, I built the Atlas/gantry kit as a kid and while my build is long gone I look forward to building it again and as I recall it takes up a fair amount of shelf space. Aurora had a fair number of 48th scale armour kits and they were well done and included such rare beasts as the Swedish S tank. I hope Atlantis sells enough of these old kits that Revell's new owners regret abandoning these molds.

That's an interesting list. I've become a fan of building a lot of these old kits and odd scales ( I blame it on the long number of years that I've been building) so I can see me hunting down a number of these kits. The Aurora armour kits were not as detailed as todays 1/35 kits but are nicely done and are fun to build as a stress reliever between more complex builds.

You've been given some good advice which I can only agree with, foil is still the best for long straight trim, don't go over the same area with more then one stroke of the Molotow pen it can take up to a couple of days to dry completely. It can be particularly useful with logos that are high enough above the paint so that the chrome doesn't escape into the paint layer. It also works nicely just to touch your paint brush up to the tip to transfer one tiny amount of chrome to where it might be needed. It's also very good at touching up sprue marks which is what I use it for mostly. I see it as just another tool in the tool box but not a miracle way to create a chrome finish.

Would this be an example of Chinese Quality Control ?

Switching them both to front wheel drive, are you

Boy, do these photos ever bring back memories of my modelling youth although if I look at the pic too long the vision becomes more like a modelling nightmare. I'm glad you saved so many of them so that we can be reminded of where we came from. It's a good lesson for us when he start complaining about our kits of today.

That's a beaut and an excellent build and paint job and your choice of colour combinations show what a classic car the 56/57 Corvette is.

A nice build and a very clever but believable story line.

Was in the nearest Michaels to me about a week ago and decided to count the number of models on the shelf, only took a minute, 48. Hadn't been in the store for nearly a year but then they had a whole aisle. I expect to find none the next time I'm in there. There problem has always been the high prices.

The Chitty Chitty Bang Bag car and for some company to bring out models of the Shinoda-Williams C4 and the Sting Ray racer.

Hi Ismael, The outfit in the US that carried al this stuff was that Strada Motor Sports but they seem to have gone out of business which is unfortunate because they carried a lot of excellent products. Some of the stuff that you want came from Hobby Design, Crazy Modeler, fmd and I think there were a couple of others. Did a quick on line look and found that hiroboy out of the UK carries some of it and a place in Autralia called BNA Model World .com has some. Good hunting. I am pleased to announce that when I go out to the garage I now have something to look at beside the Equinox, that's why I haven't been in touch been working to get the garage ready and the car here. On the other hand I'm sad to announce that we're probably due for snow any day now. Take care. rob

Many of those mpc kits fight you right up till you give up or they are finally on the shelf. Yours is certainly in the latter group it looks very nice.

It's nice to know that many of these Fisher cars have managed to survive this long and some of theses ones are in excellent shape. Does the Salt Lake City museum have some of these in their collection?

An interesting paint scheme and just what was needed to take this build out of the ordinary. Your masking technique is simple but I know that I would never have thought of it. Well done!