tim boyd

Well, I'm glad you guys jumped in on the discussion about the rear axle layout on this kit. A couple of additional factoids on this - first, the kit was originally conceptualized, from what I've learned, with a lot of input from Roger Harney, Revell's late Vice President of Engineering. Roger was a car guy through and through and knew his hot rods. Second, the actual kit itself was designed by a highly experienced engineer who worked at AMT during the glory days there, and built and drives his own 1/1 scale hot rod - a very sharp '34 Five Window Coupe. Third, another person from the outside who did much of the research for Revell on the body dimensions and who provided a detailed, part by part kit proposal to Revell, had pushed for a transverse leaf rear spring/Halbrand QC setup, so I am presuming that the choice was discussed at Revell when the kit was conceptualized. So the content of the kit and tool was closely considered by several people who fully understand the 1/1 scale hot rod world. When you actually buy and build this kit - along with the derivatives that will hopefully come along sooner than later, I think this will become even more evident. Second, while the transverse leaf rear and quick change is almost considered a "must" for a full-on "traditional" hot rod, it is not the defacto choice of many building actual street rods/hot rods these days. I no longer live ten miles from Roy Brizio's shop, but if I did, I suspect that when I visited his shop I'd still see cars being built there running coil overs instead of transverse leaf rear suspensions, simply because coil overs are a more adjustable and modern solution for chassis design. If you are running your hot rod cross country on a regular basis, or if you are used to the handling capabilities of today's sports cars, you are going to want to have this more modern rear suspension. Personally, if I ever decide to have a 1/1 scale rod built, it will probably be built by Roy, and I am sure mine will be running coil overs in back - although perhaps with a modern QC rear axle (like the Washington Blue, Tennessee-plated "Deuuuce" photo Greg posted on the prior page). Bottom line here - it might be jumping to conclusions to assume that Revell made a "mistake" by choosing the rear end configuration that they did, or that they were "out of touch" with the latest in hot rod design when they tooled up the kit. From what I can tell (acknowledging that you all will form your own opinions after you get the kit in hand and build it yourselves), every single bit of the design was well thought out. No one is going to agree 100% with the content of any model kit - that's one of the reasons we do kitbashing - but I think you will find out that this kit (and the follow-ups I hope materialize sooner than later) will be batting at a very high average - at least as high as Revell's '32 Street Rod series when it first appeared in 1996, and perhaps even a little higher. TIM

Thanks Bill....in this case, the engine block and tranny case are tooled together. Excellent point about the potential for another round of models (and kti sales) for the '32 Ford series....Cheers...TIM

I would be extremely surprised if we don't eventually see a full detail model of the '15 Mustang GT or GT350. No insider knowledge about this, just a clear pattern of past kit sales success for current model Mustang kits. I expect we'll also eventually see a full detail kit of the Z06 or some other C7 Corvette derivative. I would think that the companies might wait for the next generation Challenger (whatever that may be) before tooling up a new kit of that subject. time will tell.... Finally, as Gerry has mentioned any number of times on this Board and in the magazine, I can also say that Revell's plate is very full with new kit topics in various stages of development, that have yet to be announced. The amount of 2015 Q2 releases should not be taken as a sign that there will be less new kits in the future from Revell. Likewise, Round 2 has some highly interesting reissues in the works, and Mobius as additional versions of kits in the works,, that have not been announced. TB

Ludwig, just to repeat what everyone else is saying here, you did a superb job of building this kit. Congrats...TIM

Harry...can't wait to see what you do with that Entex '37 Packard. I've always been intrigued by that kit. But after building the Entex Mustang II fastback back in '75 or so (this build commissioned by AMT for me to build, for use at their upcoming sales reps meeting where they were going to introduce their own lineup of 1/16th scalemodel kits) , it was such a horrible kit that I never wanted to buy the Packard. Based on what you've done with your other large scale classic builds...I am sure you'll turn out a spectacular model. Like I said, can't wait to see what you do for it). TIM (PS - yes I am among those that mourn the fact that JoHan's announced plans to do a 1930's Package in their Gold Cup kit series around 1968 or so, never materialized. And yes, I do have the Monogram Classics Packard Roadster kit set aside in my "might build" kit stack....TB

For those who are interested, there is an extensive feature article on the '57/'58 Eldorado Brougham i(with lotsa pictures) in the new issue of Hemming's Classic Car magazine (April, 2015), it just showed up in my mailbox on Thursday so it may not be on the newstand yet. TIM

Scott...thanks for the feedback, Maybe I missed it myself when I built the model. TIM

A couple of factorids to help answer some of the questions above.... 1. The rear crossmember on both frames (the '32 Highboy and the Z'ed Model A Frame, are molded with the frame rails (for rigidity) and they are modern, So-Cal style crossmembers in design. Someone wanting to run a Halibrand quick change can do so without alteration to the crossmembers, but if you want to run a stock transverse-style leaf spring as well, you'll need to kitbash the matching Model A crossmember into the frame. Probably a five minute operation for a moderately experienced model car builder. 2. The center crossmembers are separate and the layout is clearly configured to allow other engines to be used in future kit derivatives . 3. The rear suspension is coil over shock as detailed in my original post on the subject near the beginning of this thread (see Post #8 on page 1 of this thread for a detailed description of the kit contents). The entire rear suspension is designed to emulate the style of "over the road/long distance driving" hot rods popularized by Roy Brizio and the So-Cal shops. 4. Steve Payne...those are great ideas and I suspect you'll see several of them in future version or derivative of this tool. A good deal of whether there are future kit derivatives will depend, of course, on how well this one sells, not only at intro, but as an ongoing contributor to Revell's kit sales. 5. The kit already includes an underbody exhaust system which connects to the Limefire-style headers. This requires two separate exhaust configurations to accommodate both the Highboy and Channeled Roadster frames. 6. Thanks Bill for pointing out that V8-60 engines have been and are used in Hot Rods. I agree that this is pretty rare (in part due to the relatively low power output, even after typical hot rodding enhancements, and probably as well the small visual appearance of the engine in a Model A engine compartment, as Dell pointed out), but it DOES happen. 7. The channeled /Z'ed configuration of the second frame in the kit should lend itself to the possibility of a '26/'27 T turtledeck kitbash using one of the aftermarket bodies, with a visual result trending towards that Brizio GNRS winner pictured above (which is easily in my list of all- time favorite 1.1 scale rods); this is one of the first things I plan to try when the kit hits the market. 8. Martin and Joe: Norm is already working on additions to his catalog that will work with this kit (Revell sent him partial test shots about six weeks ago or so), IIRC Norm specifically said that he is working on additional induction options for the Nailhead, including a tri-power intake. Norm did mention that he is extremely busy right now with a backlog of customer orders (including, not too coincidentally, a number of his products that allow modelers to build Model A hot rods), so it's very challenging for him to find the time to develop new kit offerings. But he's working on it... 9. For those interested in kitbashing a '28/'29 Model A body for this kit, I photographed several 1/1 scale hot rods with this bodystyle at last fall's NSRA Street Rod Nationals North. They are posted at my Fotki site www.fotki.com/funman1712 under the "Correcting or Kitbashing Model Car Bodies" folder (at the top of the page at this link). (Sorry I can't post the exact link as I can't get the copy function to work on this board with this laptop computer). Hope this helps....TIM

Gabe...that's a good question. Let me have a think on that one....TB

Scott...that's interesting because my instructions only showed cutting the back end - not the triangular pieces. Wonder if they did a quick update during the production run? If so, that's good news...TIM

Dennis...that's an awesome Model A collection. I really like the radically channeled roadster and the Tudor Phaeton conversion. Thanks for posting those! TIM Andy...thanks for posting! Any of the rest of you want to add to this thread with your Model A hot rods? TB

The body stretches over the completed chassis. It's pretty secure when finished. But you have to trim the rear of the chassis as shown in the instructions, PLUS additionally trim triangular sections of the outboard rear corners of the floor board (not shown in the instruction), for it to fit the Corvair body. I only had to trim the rear wheels wells ever so slightly from the inside (no radiusing of the wheel opening from the outside is required.) The front axle also should be moved forward slightly (as is the case with virtually all of the AMT A/FX style funny car kits). And, the instrument panel leaves a slight gap between its forward edges and the windshield/cowl of the body. Not too unsightly, particularly if you finish the IP in black. All in all, it's a fairly cool look when finished. TB

Lee, I can't speak directly for Revell here, but my take is that with the original 1960's era Revell '29A Roadster/Closed Cab Pickup, the '31 Tudor Sedan kit, and the '30 Woody kit (which between them can be built close to stock) and the 100% stock AMT '29 A Roadster, Revell has determined that the stock Model A builder is fairly well covered and a newly tooled kit of those subjects would not have the sales potential of a pure hot rod Model A kit. But the true hot rod builder of Model A's has never had a purpose-built kit of a Model A Roadster on '32 Ford rails, much less a channeled version to boot. The way the new Revell kit is designed, it could not also contain a stock version and deliver the pure hot rod version in the form that they have achieved. (Not a single part of the new kit, other than perhaps the door handles, is 100% stock). The success of the purpose-designed '32 Ford Street Rod series over the past nearly 20 years has, I suspect, has convinced Revell that the business potential of a pure hot rod Model A kit is far larger than a compromised kit that tries to serve both types of builders. Stated another way, it's not that they don't care or aren't aware, it's that they see the dedicated hot rod approach as a better long term business proposition. That's my best guess....and yes, I do understand your disappointment. On the other hand, if the ITC Model T kit sells well, it's not too hard to surmise that they might give a serious look at a Model A as a follow-up kit subject. TIM

...or the V8-60 from the Edelbrock Midget Racer kit...! Or even the Offy from the old AMT Watson Roadster Indy kit (one of Rodder's Journal Publisher Steve Coonan's friends when he lived in Huntington Beach, CA, built an Offy powered '29 A Roadster Pickup that is still going great to this day (Red, Highboy, steelies, wood rails above the shortened pickup bed...you have probably seen pictres of it if you read the rod magazines...) TB

Dennis is spot on, this kit is the only source I've found for Guide headlamps. Here's what these lamps from the latest issue of the Revell (originally Monogram) '30 Ford Phaeton/Touring kit (#85-4242) look like installed on a kitbashed Model A Chopped Five Window Coupe Hot Rod: I agree with Joe above, someone in the aftermarket should consider casting these lamps, because as Dennis says, these ARE the quintessential headlamps on many traditional hot rod builds these days....TIM UPDATE - so Norm has added these to his catalog (see posts below) - thanks for the update guys....TIM

Primo, Harry....TB

Thanks guys for all the positive feedback....Best Regards...TIM

I see your point on this (I had the same thought as well), but the kit's designer was ntent on replicating more of a "traditional look but with some modern gubbins underneath" type of rod you'd get from Roy Brizio or the SoCal shops. (In fact, the rear radius rods and coil overs are dupes of the 1/1 scale SoCal components). One that is designed to drive cross-country more than the local Rat Rod show. As I posted elswhere, I'd wager a bet or two that one of the aftermarket suppliers will be on the scene with a traditional/historically correct transverse leaf/Halibrand Quick Change rear end setup sooner than later. TIM

In celebration of Revell's new Model A Roadster kit, and in response to several spontaneous threads of builders posting their own kitbashed Model A Hot Rods, I finally got busy yesterday and did some high-quality salon photography of my own fenderless Model A Hot Rod models. When I was done, there were 15 models and about 170 pictures. I've posted the album here. http://public.fotki.com/funman1712/from-the-pages-of-y/all-my-fenderless-m/ There's a quick portfolio overview of each model. Then follows a detailed photo set on each model. Overall, front/rear, engine, interior, and chassis shots of each. The first photo in each of the detailed sets tells a little about the model, including where and when (approximately) in appeared in print. It's easiest to look at these large size photos and the captions if you use the "Roll" feature (tab in upper left of screen). Here are a few teasers of the models posted there. I encourage any of you who want to, to add photos of your Model A Hot Rod builds to date to this thread. All I can say is that with the new Revell kit, I'm sure I'll be adding to my collection of Model A Hot Rods, and I bet many of you will be too. And this time, it's gonna be a WHOLE lot easier and quicker to get great results! Here's a few teaser shots, and thanks for looking...TIM Much more at the link...TB

Ahh....I see your modeling buddy is helping you out, Luc. Mine is sitting about 15" away from the keyboard, purring and sleeping while I type this. I do expect to see a later round of test shots at some point, but not sure if I will be using it for an advance online build or something else. Time will tell...but thanks for the encouragement! TIM

From what I've heard from Revell and those in the Trade, the 'cuda kit did sell very well, many (but not all - as you point out) distribution sources did run out of the kit, and there was a second production run of kits scheduled pretty quickly after the initial intro. With a kit like this '29A Roadster, it would be a really helpful sign if it not only sold well initially, but then remained a steady selling staple for years to come. That's what the Revell '32 Ford series has been - it seems to me that in almost every year since this series was first introduced in late 1996, at least one, and often, several of the kits were in Revell's yearly kit catalog. As many of you have pointed out, this new Revell l'29 A Roadster kit has great kitbashing potential. And the basic kit design lends itself to a number of follow-up kits (just as the '32 Ford series evolved over the years). Both of these would point to a long life for this kit, and, one hopes, its eventual derivatives. Having said all that, I'm not taking any chances, I've got several pre-orders in for this new kit. Like you, I can't wait! TIM

John...yeah...this one in particular was hard to keep under my breath due to the subject matter and how well it is executed. But the model companies expect that people they bring "under the fold" on future projects have to respect their secrecy. (This personal policy also comes from my 35 year career at Ford and having to keep future product news secret in the 1/1 scale car business too). Actually, I know what is a pretty small slice of firm future product plans from the big 3 domestics (Revell, Round 2, and Moebius). What little I do know makes my head spin. Really innovative stuff on the horizon, though that horizon can take up to five years or more as ideas are weighed against each other, prioritized for development vs. other future kits and hobby categories, then designed, tooled, and refined with several rounds of test shots. So I don't know when any of these will hit the market... I also hear a fairly steady stream of info from outsiders, that is, people who have contact with the model companies, but do not work for them. This info often comes years in advance of a kit actually hitting the market. I have learned over the years the "outsiders" who seem to have a good track record of separating future fact from future fiction. Thus...I had first heard rumors about the Revell '29A Roadster at least three, maybe four years ago, though Revell never said a word to me about it until they contracted me to an in-depth, structured review the first round test shots just about a year ago. Occasionally I have proposed my own ideas for new kits and on those, and I generally have at least a little idea of how they are coming about. But not always. Right now, I think the market is ripe for a new tool '70 GTO, with a 400 RA-IV (which would be the first time that's been done in 1/25th), in both regular and Judge forms, followed by one or more of the Stock/Super Stock racers that ran that body style. But on that one, I haven't heard even a faint whisper that anyone is working on that topic right now. Finally, I have been known to plant a rumor or two myself, either in the press or trade, or directly with the model companies themselves. I haven't done this in recent years, but I did so several times in the 1980's and 1990's. Just one example - I told the Domestics that I had heard a viable rumor that one of the Japanese kitmakers was going to do a series of early C3 Corvettes if the domestics didn't jump in that market soon. This was totally fabricated, but geared to get them to realize that there was a big gap in the Corvette kit lineup that was begging to be filled with some modern-era kits. Within 18 months, Revell's 1969 and 1969 new-tooled C3's appeared, and a little later, AMT/Ertl's 1970 1//2 and 1972 LT-1's came out. But honestly, I have not no idea if my "plant" had anything to do with that eventual result. Cheers...TIM

Chris..the tool has both '39 Ford teardrops and '48 Chev rectangular tailamps. I presume both will be available in this kit, but we'll have to see the final release to be sure. The tailamps are on one of the chrome trees (which, btw, is just packed with parts), and it is left up to the customer to add the red lense effect with Testors Stoplamp Red enamel or lacquer. (Personally, I actually prefer this with small lamps like these, because if you do separate clear red lamps, the parts thickness buildup leaves an unrealistic appearance on the finished model - though I realize you and others may see this differently.) Thanks for the question....Cheers....TIM AMEN buddy! Triple AMEN!!! TB

Dennis...I'm not an expert on GM transmissions, but I can tell you it's an automatic, and it does not appear to be a 1950's Hydramatic. So therefore I presume it is probably a 1960's Turbo 400, or maybe a more recent GM AOD. It looks to be a cinch to swap in some other trannys, although original Hydros, which are really large, might need a bit of tweaking to surrounding surfaces. One other thing to note - the tranny has a separate and very nicely engraved pan on the bottom. TIM

Greg...interesting....I can't even begin to determine how many projects this Nailhead will show up in...but an Ivo T conversion sure became a whole lot easier, and I'd use just the approach you suggest. TIM '