Junkman

They had some whacky cars in Seibu Keisatsu. Apart from the Machine RSes, there was the Super Z Machine X: A Nissan Gazelle convertible: and their mobile command unit: All of them were available as 1/24 scale kits from Aoshima. Thanks guys! I really appreciate your well wishes! Unfortunately I can't sit at a desk. Gosh, I don't know how to tell my boss on Monday. We are only two people in the team covering the time zone of this part of the world and the other guy broke his leg yesterday!

Unfortunately the joy about my parcel from Japan was slightly interrupted this afternoon. While playing with my daughter, suddenly my knee just buckled and I fell over. It hurts like hell and swell within minutes to about twice it's regular size. My wife took me to the hospital, but apart from an x-ray, they couldn't even do any further examination, because of the swelling and the pain. So they issued me with two brushed aluminium sidepipes, a blower safety blanket around my knee, and an assortment of drugs: Gosh, I look like a shmock. The bad bit is that I have a manureload of work to be done, which I can now nail at my knee. But there is worse news: Those drugs don't mix with whiskey.

The unthinkable? I was at Reno once and since then I'm only surprised that this hasn't happened earlier and isn't happening more often. All I can say is that a car race held under such safety conditions, or rather the total absence of them, would be nixed within minutes. And exactly like in Ramstein 1988, everybody who attended the event knew exactly what he attended and what the danger is. The thrill is a main motivating factor for many people to attend air shows, me included.

That's a rare Seibu Keisatsu "Machine RS"! Seibu Keisatsu is a science-fiction/police TV series in Japan. There are several different Machine RSes, all Skylines. Each carries different special 'future' crime fighting equipment.

Today arrived what must be the crowning piece of my 1:20 scale collection. It is a Mitsubishi Fuso "Dekotora". This is what the Japanese call their highly decoreated lorries. This one is modelled after a truck used in a Japanese TV series. Box open: Flat panels of the body and the huge decal sheets removed: The two red carton covers removed: The rest of the parts:

I should also mention my father, who, albeit only doing railways, is a very good modeller. He got me going in the first place, when my aunt gave me the Revell Robert E. Lee Mississippi steamer as a Christmas gift. I must have been eight or nine.

The real issue is that the Jo-Han and Lindberg kits depict two different cars. The Jo-Han is a Polara, whereas the Lindberg is a Dart 330. They have completely different roofs. So you need to first find out which model 64 Dodge you need to replicate in order to determine from which kit to work. And if it turns out to be the Jo-Han, you will need both, it's as simple as that. The Jo-Han for the body, chrome, and glass, the Lindberg for everything else.

Not a chance in hell.

Since it seems to be Corvette show off time, here is mine: Admittedly, I only drive it on Sundays, which makes me a typical Sunday driver. The car was built in 1986 on a 1969 Corvette chassis. It won the STT (Special Touring Car Trophy) in 1987, 1988 and 1989. Two time Le Mans participant. Three time 24h Nürburgring participant. Best lap: 7:08:37, that's half a second shy of the Formula One lap times achieved there. Six time 24h Spa Francorchamps participant. The car is still competitive in the Supercar League. It's powered by a de-stroked 454 (to A. meet the seven litre limit and B. achieve higher revs) with Crower injection from a power boat, Doug Nash 3-disc clutch and a Muncie M22 rock crusher, backed by a BMW diff. Steering is courtesy of an Alfa-Romeo 2000 Berlina rack-and-pinion and it has Brembo brakes at all four corners. All we had to do for that is knock on the Brembo guys' shoulders and they did the brakes for us. The entire setup weighs in at less than 2425 lbs. And if you didn't get it by now, it's a noisy thing.

One of my Gurus is actually Dennis Doty. The other is Peter Ziegenthaler. Albeit the latter only ever built curbsides, he has a superb 'feel' for colours. He is only intrested in shape and colour, not the oily bits. So Dennis is the one who wanted me to become a better builder and Peter is the one who opened my eyes to the world of colours.

Interesting. They remind me of Richard Petty.

Something for my ever growing 1:20 scale collection: If you have/know of any whacky Japanese 1:20 kits for sale, please let me know.

I only ever exhibited at one show and that was in 1987 in the factory canteen of BMW in Munich. I had a 1:24 Heller Citroen 15/6 with me. It was black, a notoriously tough colour to get right, at least for me. It was painted with a special PU paint for motorcycle helmets, then clear-coated with PU clear. It gleamed like a grand piano. I had also replaced the kit 'glass' with acetate (which is not too difficult because the windows of a 15/6 are completely plane) but the effect was so good that it got noticed by quite a few people at the show. I had also glued tiny yellow beads into the headlamp pods to simulate the typical French yellow headlight bulbs. The entire interior was covered in grey velvet. I was very, very proud of it. It was knocked off the table accidently and landed on the floor. It completely disintegrated. On these, the front wings are glued to the body before painting the entire assembly as a unit. Needless to say that the wings broke off and left severe paint and glue marks where they were attached. Same with the spare wheel cover on the boot-lid. I wasn't too upset, since those kits were still plentiful and cheap back then. I was actually less upset than the chap knocking it off the table by accident, who was downright devastated. He wanted to pay for the damage somehow, so we both had a schnapps and a cigar at the bar (smoking was still allowed and alcoholic beverages were still available in the BMW canteen back then) based on my suggestion how to compensate for it. I built quite a few of those 15/6es since then, I think six or seven. But I still have this wreck and maybe, yes, maybe, there will be the day when I strip the paint off and start it all over.

I'm really enjoying this build. My baker-boy-cap-wearing art teacher had one in exactly this colour, how's that for matching stereotypes? Can't for my life remember what it looked like inside, probably never checked. How does the ordering from Paints4U work? Especially for small amounts of paint? I visited their website and the smallest I see is 1/2 litre for 20 quid. Or a scratch repair kit which comes in as little as 30ml bottles, but they toss in a plethora of unnecessary stuff so they can charge 14 quid.

Very nice! Who makes those chains?

Wasn't it just a matter of time? I expected it to be Dodge Daytona, but oh well...

Mine was blue.

You can always drop Don a line and ask him whether he can do you one. He is very generous in that respect.

That must be the lowest thing I ever heard about in the context of a competition. I always thought it can't get any lower than fighting in the paddock area, but this beats it by not a narrow margin. No idea how I would have reacted. Man, is this low.

All these airplanes do is take you to countries where the beer is worse. No bloody thanks.

Where I can't travel with my car, I don't want to be.

A wotzitt?

Yes, there are. And yes, there are quite a lot of them. But for classics? Not sure. Most of them do Borranis and stuff for Ferraris. And make no mistake, even a PE wire wheel will never be as nice as a laced real wire wheel. For which car do you need them?

I was quite surprised myself, when I found out. It wasn't exactly cheap to begin with, I think also around 60 Dollars or thereabouts. I bought two, one for a friend, one for myself. That must have been around 2005. When another friend saw them, he wanted one too, that was last year. So I tried to get one for him, but faced being outbid on three occasions, all ending in the 300$ neighborhood. If you check now, there isn't one on Ebay, and a quick search on the interweb didn't yield any for sale either. Those hardcore movie memorabilia collectors must be in a different income group than us poor car modellers.