papajohn97

Fujimi Enthusiast Porsche 356 1/24 (any of the various versions). An amazing model kit (especially the wheels) and a true test of one’s scale modeling skills to assemble with all four tires touching the ground! ?

Thank you Dennis for all the effort you are putting into this detailed WIP, so far a real master class in kit bashing! Your replacement of the molded-in wiring harness with real wires is motivating me to try this on a future build. Painting molded-in wires is usually a hit & miss for me at best and can detract from the actual wire detailing on the engine.

A beautiful build worth refreshening. Can’t wait for that new Moebius ‘65 Dodge(s) to be released (late ‘24?).

I really like this one! A 6 cyl “run what ‘ya brung” (gasser?), total embodiment of drag racing good old days. I always felt that the body/ windows on this AMT looked “off” to my eyes but the body on this build appears much more accurate, did you make corrections to the front window frame/ corners? Beautiful clean build!

Fabulous job Dennis that you’re doing on this body morphing so far. What’s your end goal on this build? A stock ‘63 with a max wedge? Looking forward to see where you go with this.

Loving what you’re doing here with these altereds Mike. I also agree with your comment about the “golden age of scale drag racing models”, I’ve been stock piling many of these same kits but have only built the Fiat from the AMT double dragster kit so far (I’m still trying to finish all my super stocker kits !). Looking forward to seeing this “crackle-fest” line-up come together! Thanks for posting this WIP!

Loving this Mopar SS/ AWB production line. Grafting the Moebius ‘65 sedan roof onto the bottom of a Moebius AWB HT lower body is a brilliant solution to making a non-resin AWB sedan. Looking forward to seeing some finished model(s) coming out of this assembly line.

Also saw it yesterday, finally an historically accurate racing movie for grown-ups. Loved ever bit of it. Good script, casting, acting, art direction, non-CGI action scenes, incredible 12 cylinder Ferrari sounds, touching human story (my wife probably would have enjoyed it). Loved Adam Driver’s understated conflicted portrayal of Enzo and Penelope Cruz’s portrayal of Enzo’s wife Laura stole the show. Never been a Patrick Dempsey fan but his performance was fantastic as an aging Taruffi, also the dudes playing Peter Collins and de Portago were convincing. The tragic Mille Miglia crash scene was graphic and made it understandable why the Italian gov’t discontinued any future road racing on public roads. One of my favorite scenes was when Enzo discusses intake manifold design features with his young son while reviewing blueprints at the kitchen table as well as the touching final scene. Brock Yates, author of the book they based it on, would be pleased with the result. A “no Hollywood BS” racing movie, go see it!

Cool collection of one of my all-time favorite F1 cars. Form following function and oh what a beautiful race car! Beautiful clean builds all 3!

Nice job Mike on this BTC kit-bash. I’ve read that the Trumpeter car kits are pretty mediocre but the body on this ‘64 Falcon looks pretty accurate to me. Did you use the Thunderbolt chassis on this build or is this the Trumpeter chassis with Thunderbolt driveline and rear suspension parts? Congrat’s on that two-page write-up in this month’s Model Cars Mag. Love that Hemi-Under-Glass!

Fabulous recreation of Grump’s first Camaro. The detailing and realism of the engine bay is an A+. I have the Slixx decal set for this one and am hoping that Revell re-pops this kit before I get too old to build and paint model cars, the ones on eBay are crazy $$$ ($80 - $100 with tax & shipping).

Wow Zip! You completed a ton of kits this last year and all beautiful top grade builds! My favorites are the El Camino, the orange ‘37 gasser and that ‘50 Chevy truck with the swamp cooler. Can’t wait to see what you post next year!

Very nice builds! Particularly love the lowered bird & ‘stang!

Now that’s the car I want to borrow when I burn up all the firewood this winter and need to make a quick run out for more! Beautiful job Pat on this cool outlaw 356. These Fujimi kits are not easy ones to assemble and it looks like you got all four tires in contact with the road and the ride height adjusted just right. Bravo!

‘23 was a pretty fun year for me for building car models. Despite being away from the man cave for a few months due to travel and recovery from surgery, I managed to complete the eight kits below (along with two aircraft, one tank and one ship). The bad news: I probably added three times as many unbuilt kits to my stash! ?‍? Need to crank up the production numbers in ‘24! Much thanks to everyone for all the input and encouragement I’ve received on this forum. Happy holidays guys and keep the glue & paint flowing in ‘24! Cheers, John

What a cool idea and clean well-executed result. That Moebius cammer is one of my favorite 1/25 engines, looks like it was meant to fit into that super large Starliner engine bay. Love it!

Hey Mike, fellow post-prostatectomy car model friend! I had my robotic surgery in April as well and also celebrated my 6 month “non-detectable PSA” blood test in Oct, what a relief! We are both lucky to be alive in these days of robotic-assisted laparoscopic nerve-sparing surgery! Congratulations to us both! Cheers, John

Wow! Fantastic job Thomas on this hammerhead Tyrrell. The additional fasteners, wiring, springs, switches that you added really brings this build up to an MFH kit level. What paint/ technique did you use on the Cosworth block to make it look so realistic as a casting?

Great job Mario on one of my most favorite cars. Your street diorama photography is amazing!

I really enjoyed and learned a lot from your recent Bonneville convertible WIP and am so happy to see you’re doing another one with this Lemans. It’s incredible to me to see the results you get from starting with such old basic kits, simply amazing skill and artistry! This comment made me laugh. When I go to show a family member or friend some old social or travel related photo taken on my phone, they laugh at all the scale model related pics I have. If it weren’t for my cell phone, I would totally loose track of what I built and when! I’ve also started putting reference photos of each project I do (or intend to do) into digital albums which helps me find pics quicker. Thank goodness I have a 2T cloud capacity!

Enjoying your progress so far John on this classic. Very neat tidy paint & assembly results so far on the chassis. I built the Italeri Mercedes 540K a few years ago and remember the challenging of painting and assembling the body in pieces, hoping you’re able to bring it all together without damaging the red paint. Love these 1/24 Testors / Italeri/ Monogram classic kits, they are a nice change from the AMT/ Revell auto kits and are a good base to add extra detailing.

Amazing job that you’re doing so far Andy on this “Rubic’s Cube” kit. I noticed there are very few builds posted of this kit and now I understand why! I don’t ever recall seeing what one of these EB’s looked like with both doors open. After consulting a listing for one that was auctioned on bringatrailer.com, I learned that they included a weird angled vertical strut extending off the chassis on either side of the front seat: It looks like both doors engaged/ locked against this side strut. I’m not suggesting that you need to incorporate these struts in your build (you have enough to do with all the other mods!) but I just thought it was interesting how the designers/ engineers handled suicide doors on a four-door hardtop. I look forward to seeing how you conquer this beast!

Incredible result from this Lindberg kit, particularly the metalizing (Alclad?) paint work on the engine, front grill/ lights/ horn and wheels. I’ve recently gotten inspired to build the 1/24 classic auto kits and have been shopping for most of the old Monogram kits - I may have to add this Bugatti to my wish list.

Nice job Phil, love a 300 in red (I posted the green one last week) and the detail painting in the engine bay is particularly nice. The silver (stainless steel) paint at the rear of the roof is reminiscent of Chrysler Imperials of the late 50’s. Love this AMT kit and yours makes me want to build another one in red.

Absolutely! I can see Don Draper (Mad Men) cruising through Manhattan in this beast (although I think he drove a blue Caddie coupe IIRC). Thanks Tim. Painting the inner areas of these chrome headlight inserts actually wasn’t that hard to do. I punch out round tape masks for each of the headlight bezels using hypo tube punches (made years ago, I use these a lot for rounds/ fillets in masking) and then just applied liquid masks around the parimeter of each insert. I then airbrushed the green base paint and then removed the masking and did a few Molotow touch-ups where the chrome plating was damaged. Thank you all for all the other observations and nice comments above, it’s always very helpful and encouraging for me to share builds on this forum! John