Junkman

A true barn find! At least in my imagination, in reality it's an attic find. Yesterday I was invited to a 50th b'day party. For some odd reason, the conversation drifted to car modelling at some stage, i.e. the wife mentioned the old boxes with unfinished modelling projects in the attic. Long story short, I went home with them. gosh, do I love b'day parties. You always get nice gifts, isnay? All of them are started to a bad standard, but imo very salvageable. The haul in my dungeon, less cobwebs and dust: A Bandai C-cab which begs to be rodded: Everything painted is brush painted Humbrol. So no problem soaking the paint off the parts: A very politically incorrect Gakken/Entex A-Bone: Gives the term 'they don't make them like they used to' quite a new twist, dunnitt? What is painted is brushed on Humbrol. No body parts are painted: Then we got this beauty: Imagine my surprise, when I found out that there are TWO in the box: The model can be built two ways, both of which have been attempted. The brown one is the version without sidemounts and the spare wheels on the back. It has never been completed, but the body is sprayed with what looks like automotive paint without primer underneath. This will be tough to remove. The yellow one was ready built, and it is the "Maharaja" version, i.e it has sidemounts and the uninterrupted fin on the bootlid. It was crudely brush painted brown and I had this one disassembled and soaked this afternoon! Unfortunately, it has terminal front axle damage. A build of this model was in the cards for me anyway, hence my question for the correct engine colour elsewhere on this forum. This find enables me to leave my mint boxed original Gakken mint boxed! This is the pearl of the haul: Again, the box contains two examples: I might build one oob and the other one into an art carved hearse?

The ride height oob is only correct for the rubber bumper version. Here is mine: The suspension would need to be considerably lowered and in addition, the track narrowed for a chrome bumper car, which imo is not an easy task considering how it is designed in this kit. The real car was raised two inches in order for the bumper height to meet federal standards. Whether lowering the model two scale inches is enough has to be seen. One often has to exaggerate a bit on models to achieve an authentic look.

Yeah, sweet thing, isn't it?

I'm certainly not the only one. These are pics from the NNL East:

Btw, I'm more than willing to trade my doublets for stuff I don't have.

It is a blooming nuisance for me and I can well relate to the problem. Always had the eyesight of an eagle, when it suddenly started to deteriorate after I turned 40. Two years ago, I finally got reading glasses (read "modelling glasses" here). I can only use them for reading, or modelling, or something right in front of me. For everything further away, I have to take them off. This includes watching the telly. As a result, I can't do anything while watching the telly anymore. I used to do bare metal foil, or similar stuff while sitting in front of the tube. No more doh. As a result, I haven't watched a lot on telly for well over a year now. Entirely btw, it is amazing how quickly the human brain can recover from the damage caused by watching TV, since every time I try and watch telly now, I can't take it for longer than maybe 30 seconds. It's just an insult for every intelligent form of life. But this constantly juggling spectacles when I do something right in front of me and look up from it sucks big time. I tried bi-focals and they drive me straight in to the asylum, straight jacket and all.

Tell me 'bout it. They are out there somewhere, I'm sure.

Since plastic cement is an essential cornerstone of our hobby, I find it deserves a well earned place in model kit history. Hence I started my Vintage Glue Museum a while ago. It is in a vintage German cigar box: Over three decades of plastic welding history: Mint, boxed: The Far Eastern habit of supplying cement with the kits produced some nice collectables: The world of plastic cement peacefully united: Older modellers, like me, may well remember the obligatory question 'do you need some glue for those?' when piling a stack of kits onto the check out counter of a model shop. Plastic cement has been with us for the better part of our life. We went through the biggest disasters, devastating divorces and even more severe fates, but plastic cement was always with us. May we never run out of it.

I strongly disagree. Even a new issue will be comfortably over 100$, especially when you factor postage into the equation. There is now one, and there were recently several of the old Monogram issues out there, where the model is pictured in black on the box and is also molded in black plastic. They go for 150-180 usually. A mint orignal early issue will normally command 200+ no matter how you look at it. That one sold for 57 bucks is pure luck, which occasionally still happens on Ebay. I recently managed to grab several 1/16 scale early Gakken kits off Ebay UK for less than a tenner each. But these lucky strikes are certainly not an indicator for the going rate for these kits.

Worst thing was that for me everything turned into a brown theme, which was really difficult on my old eyes. Took me some time to figure out how to change the theme back to something more agreeable.

With my absolute favourite being this:

Yeah, wow allright. I'm convinced there are forums out there where one can hone his coping skills, or learn anger management, or gets treated for obsessive compulsive disorder, or borderline syndrome, or any other bloody syndrome, even those which haven't even been invented yet. But this is a model car forum. Its main purpose is to go to the workbench, put in some modelling, then photograph the results and post those pictures here. Or am I mistaken? Please correct me if I'm wrong. I mean, for clarification, you know.

Workbench -> model -> build -> result -> picture -> post Problem?

I wonder, I really, really do wonder, what is so difficult about getting back to the workbench, putting in a few hours of modelling and posting pictures of the result to this forum? What is it? What on earth makes it so difficult? I mean, it can't be such a strenuous endeavour to go to the workbench, do some modelling and post photos of the results here, I would think. Maybe I am missing something? Am I missing something? I mean, just going to the workbench and do some modelling, for crying out loud. And then post pictures of the results. Is it really this difficult? What makes it this difficult? Is there anything you need help with? Is there anything I fail to see? Do you need a tutorial on how to get to the workbench (I think not)? Some modelling tutorial? Problems posting pictures? If it is any of this, please just let me know and I will be more than happy to help. I'm really thinking hard, but I am unable to come up with any reason which would make it hard to go back to the workbench, do some modelling and post pictures of the result here. It doesn't sound very difficult to me. It just doesn't. So can someone out there please explain to me what is so difficult about it, in order for me to see what I am currently having a problem with to comprehend? I mean, we are here to learn, aren't we? Just going back to the workbench, putting in some modelling and posting pictures of the results here. I just can't see it. No, I can't see it. I can't see what is so difficult about it. Gott im Himmel.

I could not agree more. If there are no pics, it hasn't happened.

Hey, nothing wrong with it. Make another one.

Wow, we have Round 2 pplz in this forum? I'm impressed! Feel a bit like Moses must have when God spoke to him.

Tyres can pop, you know. The only really serious thing about it is that you can get seriously killed. But such is life.

There are no dumb models, but there are dumb people building models. As for you and your rig, I find it anything but dumb. In a never ending sea of yet another rat rod, it is a more than welcome relief. Very original and very tastefully executed. Bravo!

Whatever wasn't bombed out was raided by the occupying troops. As I said before little or nothing survived and if it did, it was taken out of the country if it was deemed of even the slightest value. Documents in a car factory certainly fell under this.

Hey thanks for the info. A factory fire or something is good. I would call it a World War which had the effect that Germany was literally pulverized. There is not much stuff which survived, practically everything pre-war German which exists today has been outside the country during this period.

To call 'Maschinengrün' "just plain bilious" is nicely put, but imo still an understatement. It makes split pea soup look good in comparison. Btw, the term translates to 'machine-green' and has nothing to do with machine guns, which were hardly ever painted. In fact, Maschinengrün is widely used on - well - machines to this day: The tip to ask the AACA or the CCCA is a good one! Thanks for that.

Sorry for the typo, but I also clearly stated M 24 II engine. I somehow doubt that a customer would have bothered to specify which colour his engine is being painted, or actually had the option. And if, only very few would have done so and why would they all agree on black? Most customers would have specified the body style, equipment and paint, and 70 of them bought only the chassis and had it delivered to their favorite coachbuilder. That most surviving engines are black nowadays may well have to do with the fact, that Reseda Green is not exactly an appealing colour, but doesn't clarify anything.