Junkman

Since there are countless one-offs, which are equally rare as the F-88 show car, the rarest car must not exist. If that thing went for three-and-a-quarter Million, I don't even want to know what the Joe Bortz collection is worth.

'We' certainly don't. At least I like to believe that everyone is still entitled to make up his own mind, but that could have changed lately without me having noticed. I wish they would come up with something new. Something really new. And not just ugly, like they did for the past 15-20 years. Or this retro rubbish.

You want bad car chase scenes now? OK... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Z3j3IIMCYs

Gosh, don't get me started. That Health and Safety Gestapo sure went a tree too far. Isopropyl alcohol is available though, as it was mentioned before, they sell it on Ebay.

Well done. Works a treat.

Diecasts I just boil in water. Takes the paint off within half an hour, no mess, no nothing.

Is that the two-part stuff?

Photovoltaics. Would work a treat in Las Vegas, too. Yes, I know, solar cells have to be manufactured, too. But so do nuclear reactors.

"Bavaria" was for America only. Everywhere else they were called 2500, 2800, 3.0 and 3.3 depending on engine displacement. As for the subject of American cars - it is exactly that stubborn clinging to what is in essence a pseudo history without much human value that requires rethinking, or at least this is what some people in here expressed. Nostalgia or clinging to history one can afford if one -well- can afford it. The American car industry however needs drastic measures if it wants to successfully continue without being bailed out by the taxpayer on a regular basis.

Ralph will have a fit.

Not sure whether you tried it yet, but I have used thick bleach for years and it has served me very well for both - enamels and automotive paints. I buy it at Aldi, 2 litres for 3 quid or so. You must make sure that you use a really air tight plastic container though, like genuine Tupperware. If the container isn't peoperly sealed, the bleach very quickly loses its bite. How do you use IPA?

Interestingly, many of the more successful car makers today don't use model names at all.

Yep, that's the generic excuse of an industry running out of ideas. As if aerodynamic efficiency was of primary importance when cars spend 90% of their life below 50 mph. Furthermore, what looks aerodynamic usually isn't.

Agree 100% When GM, or rather, the entire American car industry, was the envy of the world, it did the opposite of looking at the past. All this retro-nonsense has badly backfired so far, yet the car industry as a whole stubbornly refuses to abandon the concept. Looking at the car in question, it is clearly targeted at an age group that is too young to know what a Chevelle really was or what bell the name rings with their parents. A youthful small coupe with an economical 4 cylinder engine and a low price tag sure has a market, like the original Z-cars or Ford Capris had in the Seventies. Paint it sebring yellow with a matt black bonnet and I could see my daughter in it. Add a turbocharged V6 version for the boys and there you go. But for heaven's sake, don't call it Chevelle or Master Deluxe. Call it something the young people will relate to. Call it Factor X or Cancun.

It doesn't matter what they call it. The car is so woefully nondescript that it won't make any difference if they'd call it Eusebia or Brunhilde. Actually, the latter would add some panache, relatively speaking.

It's a German thing.

But where do you get Isopropyl alcohol in the UK?

Why do they still use these fonts that look like they were lifted from a wedding invitation in North Yorkshire? Totally ridiculous, especially when considering that the scriptplate is the only thing on the car that isn't bland. I honestly believed it can't get worse than what GM did in the 80s. Well, obviously it can. Much worse even.

I rather have them repop those vintage kits than doing this half-baked soulless new tool stuff. Those kits had character.

Yes, despite it is a flat-pack, it's completely new tooling.

The model is actually based on a real car. Well, -ish. It was a yellow Phantom V with woodgrain overlay on the sides. Note that the box art actually resembles a Phantom V more than a Silver Cloud. Quite a cheaky way to milk yet more mileage out of the ancient Hubley tool. This doesn't tell the entire story of the tool though. Hubley was commissioned to make a promo of the Silver Cloud for the North American market and that's where it starts. IIRC the customer was a big car importer and he also commissioned promos for the Triumph TR3, Mercedes 300SL Roadster, Renault Dauphine and Nash Metropolitan, which was - strictly speaking - an import as well. So the tool can be traced back to the late 50s and that explains the simplified detailing. Arguably, this may be the only promo ever made for a Rolls-Royce. I'm not sure whether this is still with us in the Academy/Minicraft issues, but at least until they were issued by Revell AG a decade or so ago, they still had the approval by Rolls-Royce Ltd. moulded into the baseplate. The tool obviously had numerous owners: Hubley, Entex, Revell AG, Academy and Minicraft. Obviously also still with us are the tools for the Triumph TR3 and 300SL. One wonders what became of the other Hubley tools? On a different note: Other model kits suitable for a London street scene apart from the ones already mentioned, would be the Tamiya Jag MKII (would make a fine Metropolitan Police car!), and the Gunze Sangyo Triumphs, Lotus Elan, Jag XKE, and Austin Healey Sprite. Sorry, no Cortina, Landcrab, ADO16, Rover P4/5/6 or Jag XJ6/12, which I find strange. Very strange actually.

No. It's about driving a Segway while someone does donuts with a beaten up old Ford Fiesta hot hatch or something.

Don't forget they also fished in Hasegawa's waters for the Samba Bus, which they themselves even distributed in their own packaging, before they decided to tool it up new all over again. I too am not impressed by this practice. None of these kits needed new iterations. What a waste of tooling effort that could well have been spent on different subjects.

A Black Shadow. IXO did a diecast. Also a Brough Superior, various Nortons and other English bikes.

You can use the Emhar Bedfords, the Aoshima MGB and the various Minis from Tamiya, Fujimi and now soon Revell. Add a Monogram XK120, MG TC and the ex-Hubley Roller you mentioned and you'd have a nice 60s London Road Scene. You can even spice it up with the Bedford CA van and S-Type from the Parts Box.