Chuck Kourouklis

"Facts in the way of a rant", indeed. Let's not forget the pancaked '72 Olds, the taffy-pulled '69 Nova, the square-lipped '62 Impala, the half-baked Rat Roaster, and indeed the new '62 'Vette that withers a bit in the presence of this reissue of 16-year-old tooling. Or maybe we should forget 'em. And Brett, if you don't fancy non-topical stuff, it'd be helpful if you didn't open the door for it by calling names. What was the point of your initial response if not to call Frank a hypocrite? Doesn't matter how clever or indirect you are, in the end, the first ad-hominem in this thread is yours, and it's bleeding-fresh bait for anyone who wants to support Frank's contention. As ever, it's at this point, always THIS EXACT POINT, that the discussion truly starts going off the rails. There's an inevitable and constantly repeated fact that needs to start getting in the way of some rants around here. Anybody wants to see a more grown-up response, I refer you to post #5. THAT one was appropriate and perfectly symmetrical with what prompted it. Too bad that standard couldn't be maintained, but things will always go this way long as a good number of you refuse to realize that your inability to deal with anything less than rosy about kit manufacturers is your problem, and NOT that of ANY online forum.

Doesn't have upholstery seams for the stripes molded in as I remember. Just very fine raised lines to help locate the decals, I think, and while those might help for paint masking, the stitching will be a trick in itself.

WOW, okay. Tricky one to crack there. My single best guess is to find a way to get light gray dots printed on clear decal film, 'cause there'll be hell to pay trying to capture that actual perforated texture to a convincing scale effect, far as I can figure. I'm wondering if playing with periods on a word processing program then changing the color to as light a gray as you can, testing it out on paper, then printing it to the decal stock and sealing it might do the trick. Otherwise, the best cheat may be to paint those perforated sections in a coarse dark metallic shade close to the black of the seat.

Oh, no apologies necessary. As I recall - been a while since I did this one, some 2 1/2 years - I believe there are some very faint raised guide lines to indicate where to place the decals. As for fully embossed detail or a difference in texture, though, pretty sure there's nothing molded to the plastic. Now I'm not certain of the texture differences as they apply to same-color stripes, but a trick I tried to simulate the alcantara/suede-ish patches was to mask off the seats and steering wheel and shoot gray Testors "fabric" lacquer as a base to add some texture in those strategic places. You might experiment a bit with that on some scrap parts, maybe sand it down some, compare it with bare plastic or primers under your color coat of choice to see what subtle effects you might find, and there you might discover an approach for your stripes.

Well. Not all of us - but I thought this was Dave T's thread (least up till now), so "all" - ? One thing to bear in mind is that every so often kit manufacturers mold like-colored elements of the 1:1 together, so it wasn't entirely unreasonable to suppose that the front of the blower might be silver/aluminum, since it's molded to the front engine cover iIrc. As for the decals, the ones on mine were of a delicate sort. They tended to delaminate even under a few coats of clear when you pulled your masking medium off. But what they traded back was very thin and flexible carrier that responded well to setting solution; that took care of most of the silvering even on flat-finished pieces, and then the Mr Color flat overcoat I sprayed on the seats pretty much wiped out any remaining traces.

For my money that '61 Pontiac is the best-looking of any of the '61-'64 B-body GMs. Lookin' forward...

How about before it knew it was a Mustang?

Wow, just about missed this thread! Let's see... Yeah, think I could dig up one or two... This'n was my first new car: This'n I grew up with: and this'n handles my daily chores: Course, you link back to the album, you might see that scat-for-brains little shagwit who took the trouble to stop by and wring his little panties out on what "junk" this and my other car are, in the comment section. 45,000 miles now, wanting absolutely nothing except routine maintenance - the first of four new American cars I've bought that I can say that about. She does have expensive tastes in tires and fancy little German and Japanese snacks, be ye in no doubt. But she's absolutely MY kind of "junk".

Oh yeah! Had mine for a couple weeks now. Think I can carve out the engine cover and copy 5.0 scripts from an '11 Maisto GT, but them Brembo rims is tough. A Welly GT3 gets close, but those wheels ain't entirely on...

See? Goofed again.

That's a good question, and it was helpful to see - however briefly - that another builder had the same problem. I've found Gunze Mr Color gloss benign enough to go on chrome and preserve the shine without attacking it. Maybe Krylon Low-Odor (water-based) clear? S'pose you can clip off sections of sprue to see how your favorite clear helps to seal it...

Last time I actually tried this, I was mistaken. The irony was delicious. 13? Missing vent wings and an A-pillar slant that's off ten degrees are consequential enough to make this comparison a little silly, btw...

The kit has 'em molded to the doors. The builder of that box cover car hacked 'em off for some reason...

Two reasons: 1) You yourself stated the most obvious one. The usual relation between the full-size and the miniature is that the full-size is metal and the miniature is plastic. For that very 1% you mention, the Corvette scenario not only deviates from that relationship, it inverts it, presenting an opposite one might view as ironic. 2) The second is conditional on accepting the premise that - as I stated in post #7 - one of the draws about die cast models is that they're made of materials roughly matching those of the subject (and in the case of the higher-end Mints, CMC and the like, perhaps not so roughly). Not only does a die cast Corvette model break that association, but your typical die cast Corvette body shell on a plastic chassis once again pretty neatly inverts it.

Love 'em or lump 'em, that 1/16's gonna need work. A-pillars is just all kinds of wrong 'n the front fascia's pretty cocked-up too. And yet... poring over shots of builts and thinking back to the last one I had, I'm wondering how hard it'd really be. *sigh* This fool and his money...

Hmm. Coulda sworn the headlight bucket and door were integrated into one piece at some point, but I could find no verification. Did find this... http://www.svs.com/zim/mustang/64body.html

Wasn't there also something about the headlight nacelles changing to a one-piece design later in the '65 m. y.? Always thought that C-scoop chrome side accent was specific to early '65s (64 1/2s) too, while the later '65s were clean there - but I'm not certain about that...

Lol, ABSOLUTELY, Tony! I've always thought the big draw about diecast cars was that they're made from the same (roughly) materials as the 1:1, and a diecast Corvette just blows that out the window. You just gave me my first big laugh of the morning. Always thought it was just me! Oh, well, no, not particularly - it's just that there's now a gap in our plastic where the greatest Corvette since the mid-year C2s should reside.

I was once asked why I didn't just take the highest setting and call it "ten". "'Cause it goes to eleven", I says. Made sense to me. And it was the one time I wasn't being sarcastic.

Not even incorrect, Mike. Just "squarish". And it wasn't even me. And look how pointing that out has just totally ruined your anticipation of the kit… actually, I don't even know if my sarcasm has an off button. Eh, well. Somebody seems to get it. Thank you.

And by the way, any idiot who'd drop a friendship over a discussion like this probably wasn't really your friend in the first place.

See how that works? YOU are actually the first one to mention any specific model. That "horse" is far from the only body shell I could have been describing. A "bad name." To whom exactly? And WHERE is this "blown proportion" on the seats, exactly? The only proportion I see starting to distend is at the reaction to one reference. You don't want the discussion to go this direction, don't start overreacting to one bland mention of squarish seats. And don't even TRY TO PRETEND that it's not THAT OVERREACTION where the discussion starts going off course.

Time for another reality check here, I see. 'Cause once again, we got the agitatin' for a problem before a problem even really exists. Talk about squarish seats, and this thread will go down in flames, and Meng will just cut the production run and never explore this line of subjects again 'cause we had the NERRRVE to point it out, right? Yeeaaah, NO. Slightly squarish seats that'll take about 15 minutes to sand rounder in the middle of an otherwise very nice-looking kit are an entirely different animal than a kit that needs major surgery in its body shell to look acceptable, and that's why, as much as some guys need such fantasies and wildly exaggerated imaginings of "rivet-counting" to justify their own hysterics, there won't be ANYTHING LIKE the controversy we've seen elsewhere on other kits about these seats. And sittin' here like a bunch of online magpies goin' "RA RA!" no matter what's served up is meaningless. The only "encouragement" worth a warm steaming scat to Meng is not to get hung up on idiotic factors like it being one off that holy precious 1/25 scale, or that it costs as much as a pretty unambitious night out with your honey, and just buy the danm thing if you like it. Meng is like any other manufacturer. They wanna shift units, and whatever is said online about their products, if they care at all, will be MIIILES behind in importance relative to sales. And having the attitude, "Funky seats. I'll take two please", will make a far more tangible contribution to the hobby than trying to police the content of some online thread.

I've always wondered about the mirror-reflected gas tank arrangement between this one and the older '69 kit - and which of the two is correct - and I've always thought the '66 would be improved a wee by filing the chromed lower fender areas just ahead of the front wheel openings for a bit more roll-under to the center, and by cobbling up the retracted headlights which are quite visible from certain angles. Otherwise, yes. This is one of the best of that turn-of-the-century "Mueller-era" series of AMT kits, and one of my favorites. The stock version is notable not only for that fine nailhead, but also for a nice set of tires not used on any other AMT kit since, far as I know.

So sorry, Frank! Yes indeed, I will chuck any further mentions.