gami8630

Toyota has been competing in the NASCAR Cup Series since 2007 with the Camry, but the kit I have built this time is a NASCAR version of the Toyota Crown, built under the fictional assumption that Toyota was competing in the Winston Cup Series 51 years ago in 1972. The fourth-generation Toyota Crown, unveiled in 1971, was an ill-fated model that was changed to the fifth generation in just three and a half years, as its overly innovative body design was unpopular with the conservative buying public of the time. I was still in junior high school in 1971 when this Crown was unveiled, and I found the two-door hardtop design very attractive, showing similarities with the body designs of the Ford Torino, Mercury Cyclone, and Dodge Charger of the time. So, based on the following fictitious background, I decided to refurbish a production car kit of the 4th generation Crown to NASCAR specifications. ..When the fourth generation (S6#/7#) Crown was first exported to the U.S. in 1971, it was decided to enter the NASCAR Winston Cup Series in order to increase its name recognition and appeal its performance in the U.S. 　The decision to enter the series was made with the main sponsor, Crown Cola, which had the third largest market share but was still far behind Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola, and wanted to expand its market share, aiming for a synergistic effect of raising awareness of the "Crown" car name and sponsor name. The basic plan was to combine the body of the "1971 TOYOTA CROWN HT SL" released by Doyusha in Japan with JO-HAN's "Ford Torino OVAL TRACK RACER" and modify it to NASCAR specifications, but detailed fitting adjustments were necessary. The following is a brief description of the project. 1. Body In order to fit the wheelbase of the JO-HAN Ford TORINO, the body was cut at the rear end of the front wheel arches and the first half of the body was extended by 8mm by inserting a plastic plate. 　The front wheel arches are slightly extended outward to accommodate racing tires. 　In addition, various moldings and emblems of the production version have been shaved off, the race-spec fuel inlet, gas cap, and overflow pipe have been reproduced, the taillights have been removed and a rear panel added, catch pins have been added to the engine hood and trunk lid, front and rear spoilers have been added, and the doorknobs have been removed. 2. Front Grille 　The Japanese domestic version is equipped with two rectangular headlamps, which were changed to four round headlamps that existed in the overseas version, and headlamp covers were installed. The leftmost lamp has a mesh finish for cooling the oil cooler. 3. cockpit, roll cage, and chassis 　Basically, the cockpit, roll cage, and chassis of JO-HAN Ford TORINO were used, but the upper part of the roll bar was modified to fit the Crown body. The instrument panel is from a Monogram early 80's NASCAR kit, and the 70's American Powerslide instrument decals were applied. 4. Engine 　The V8 engine of the first generation Toyota Century, Toyota's top-of-the-line car at the time, was a cross-flow OHV system with a center-plug hemispherical combustion chamber, the so-called 'HEMI' engine. I have tried to create the engine as it should be by combining engine parts from JO-HAN, monogram, and Revell under the assumption that this V8 engine was modified to be a NASCAR engine. 5. tires and wheels 　Tires and wheels are from the Ford Torino Talladega released by Polar Lights. 6.Paint and Markings 　The paint scheme is that of the Ford Torino that Buddy Baker drove in 1972, sponsored by Royal Crown Cola, and the decals are from Powerslide. As mentioned above, it took a long time to complete the project, but when it was finished, I felt that the Crown hardtop, which was unpopular in Japan at the time, was transformed into a powerful racing car that is very NASCAR stock car-like, and I personally enjoyed the project very much.

The body of Dale Earnhardt's Monte Carlo was painted and decaled more than 10 years ago, but the chassis has now been built and is finally complete. This Monte Carlo has a 2000 body, and the correct color for the interior is light gray, but my image of Earnhardt's car is a black body color with a red interior, so I decided to make the interior red this time as well. The #43 Grand Prix is one of the cars that were painted to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the sponsorship agreement with STP, and the nostalgic petite blue hoddy is very attractive. It was more than 10 years ago when I built this car, and I refinished the dusty and dull body and window shield, and now they look alright. The headlight decal should not be applied to the car, but I decided to apply it for my own preference. Still, I find it fascinating that in the GEN-4 era, there is a clear difference in the body style of each brand.

Thank you all very much. It is quite a challenge to recreate an old stock car, but it is very satisfying when it is completed. The car I am working on now is Dale Earnhardt's Monte Carlo. This kit was in storage with only the body completed about 10 years ago, and I have just resumed work on the chassis.

Thanks, everyone. Your replies are very encouraging.

Thanks, Helmut.

You will need to mask the paint many times to paint it white, red, and metallic blue, but try your best.

When I was in elementary school, I saw a beautiful Dodge Charger with a fastback style that was completely different from other cars when I watched a Japanese TV race program broadcast the NASCAR Grand National race. Since then, the Dodge Charger has become one of my favorite NASCAR stock cars. The only NASCAR version kits for the Dodge Charger are probably the old MPC ones, but I built mine from a combination of the production version of Revell's 1967 Dodge Charger and Lindbergh's 1964 Plymouth Belvedere stock car race version. Since both cars are based on the Chrysler "B-body" platform of the day, I combined parts of the Dodge Charger body and interior with the Plymouth underbody and engine. It took quite a bit of time to match the wheelbase, ride height, engine compartment, and interior parts, but it was a fun project. For example, the NASCAR race-spec roll cage did not fit well into the body of the car with the Plymouth kit, and since the shape was different between 1964 and 1966, I made my own with plastic round bars that conformed to the 1966 NASCAR rules. The dashboard was modified to race specifications by cutting off the instrument panel of the production version and using plastic plates and decals of various meters from the 1960s. For the body, I removed various moldings and emblems from the production car, putty-filled the fuel lid sculpture to recreate a race-spec fueling port, installed catch pins on the hood and trunk lid, removed the taillight area, and added a spoiler to the rear end of the trunk lid. Decals were purchased from "Mike's Decals" which I frequent, as they are from the car run by the leading team at the time, COG (Cotton Owens Garage), and driven by David Pearson.

This is a 1957 Chevrolet Black Widow and Ford CUSTOM. Both are Revell kits, but they are relatively recent products, and while the interior, exterior, suspension, engine, etc. are precisely reproduced, they are easy to build. Both kits were assembled as-is, with only the plug cords added, but the tires and wheels on the Chevy are from PPP. Both drivers, Buck Baker, the 1957 NASCAR Grand National Champion in the Chevy, and "Fireball" Robarts in the Ford, were selected as "NASCAR's 50 Greatest Drivers". By the way, 1957 is the year I was born.

Hello, everyone. Thanks for the compliments. I like stock cars of all ages, but the Gen-1 cars have a nice old American car feel to them. This kit, for me, is one where the paint job on the body is fairly well done. After applying the decals, I sprayed several times with clear spray, then sanded with #2000 sandpaper to eliminate the bumps on the decals. Finally, I finished with compound and modeling wax.

Here is the first introduction to a kit I built. This is a 1964 BILL STROPPE Mercury Marauder made with AMT's 3-in-1 kit and Powerslide decals. The body has had various production-spec moldings and emblems shaved off, race-spec fuel filler and fail caps reproduced, and catch pins installed on the engine hood and trunk lid. Inside, rear seat removal, incorporation of roll cage made by myself with plastic round bars according to the regulations of the time, and refurbishment of instruments, seats, steering wheel, etc. The engine is almost as it was in the kit. Tires and wheels are old JO-HAN ones. White, red, and metallic blue body colors were spray painted by Tamiya. The reference material is "Classic Stock Cars", a collection of various images and photos on the Internet.

Thanks for the welcome, Pete. Japanese plastic model manufacturers have also released many kits for racing and rally cars, but unfortunately few kits for American cars have been released. The Toyota Camry is currently competing in NASCAR, and if Tamiya were to commercialize it, it would make a great model kit, though. Indeed, you and I share exactly the same mirror image problem. I understand that you order your kits from HobbyLink in Japan, but I order many of my NASCAR kits, decals and customization parts from Mike's Decals in the US.

Thanks for the welcome, Dennis.

Thanks for the welcome, John. When building a NASCAR kit, I used to have a hard time because of the limited materials available. Nowadays, we can get a lot of information through the Internet, which is really convenient.

Thanks, Joe. I too enjoy seeing all of your wonderful models.

Thanks, Jim. I'm glad I polished it up before posting.

Well, I'll end my introduction by showing you another kit I built. This JO-HAN "Superbird" is the oldest kit I have in my collection of completed kits, built probably about 35 years ago. I made some modifications to the roll cage and instrument panel, and cut the wheel arches to fit racing tires. I waxed and polished it for this photo, but it is not so beautiful. The next kit to be built is either Camaro (#9 Chase Elliott) by Salvinos, OLDS (#33 Harry Gant) by MONOGRAM, or BUICK REGAL (#11 DW).

Thanks for the welcome, Trevor, Mario, Jim, Noel Smith. Having discovered this site, my desire to build NASCAR model kits has grown even greater.

Thanks for the welcome, everyone. I'm glad I visited this site, even though my English is not very good. First, here are some of the kits I have made. They are all just assembled straight from the kits.

I am Japanese and live in Tokyo, Japan. I built my first plastic model more than 50 years ago, and since then, plastic modeling has been one of my most important hobbies, almost uninterrupted. I have built models of many genres, including airplanes, ships, science fiction characters, and automobiles, but I am especially fond of racing cars, especially NASCAR stock cars. I was first drawn to stock cars as a child when I watched the "Daytona 500" on Japanese television, where large American cars raced around an oval track in a scene that was indescribably cool. In the past, and still today, NASCAR fans are in the minority in Japan. In the past, it was not easy to obtain AMT, MPC, or JO-HAN stock car kits, and there were few books to serve as documentation. Later, when I purchased a NASCAR kit released by MONOGRAM in 1983, I was impressed by the greatly improved reproduction of the body, chassis, and interior all, and since then, I think I have purchased more than 100 kits including those from manufacturers other than MONOGRAM. And now, with the spread of the Internet environment, it has become easier to obtain not only NASCAR kits but also numerous decals and afterparts, and to view many wonderful examples, videos, and images of actual cars, making it possible for me, a Japanese citizen, to enjoy NASCAR in Japan in a much more fulfilling environment. I am very happy to be able to enjoy NASCAR in Japan. I will do my best to introduce my kit in the Model Cars Magazine Forum here. In addition, I am running a web site about my hobby, which has contents summarizing NASCAR kits. If you are interested, please take a look. However, since it is written in Japanese, I would appreciate it if you could translate it using your web browser's translate function, etc. summarizing NASCAR kits of My Web Site Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)