Tcoat

Wish I had had the presence of mind to take some pictures but I was just so taken by surprise I just started carving. The rear fenders had thick flash sticking up so far it looked like it was a '59 Cadillac, the mold lines were all huge, the wheel wells almost completely flashed over and the inside of the body had excess material so thick I had to break out the Dremel or I would never have got the interior or the chassis in. Took a couple of hours of clean up just to get the basic shape right. One parts sprue was fine but the others looked like somebody's first attempt at casting resin.

I recently built the latest release of the AMT (Round 2) Corvair. It was one of the worst things I have ever laid eyes on with a vaguely car shaped lump of plastic body and part's sprues that were almost unusable. Next I built an AMT '64 Galaxie that was probably the crispest body and most pristine parts I have ever seen. The "overall quality" (as said) is not consistent since it comes from the molds they use. Old worn out and unrepaired molds will give trash where new or fully restored ones have perfection. I would guess that the ones in your list will all be fine since they probably haven't made millions of them like that poor old tired Covair mold has.

This ^^^ just this. There are good and bad kits from any manufacturer and blanket statements just can't cover the topic.

I use Citadel washes Nuln oil for black (in that example) or Agrax Earthshade for a dark brown. Just slap it on over a gloss coat and let it dry. It will fill in the lines of the detail but leave very little colour on the raised parts. Just experiment a bit. I think pretty much any commercially made shade or panel line wash will do the same. I also use tinted Future Floor Wax as a wash but you can't get it anymore. The brown on Wolfman and black on Drac's face and the Creature would really make them pop.

These monster kits are so cool and nostalgic! Have you ever considered giving them a quick dark wash? It makes these large scale figures come alive (well not literally thank goodness)

And you thought there were a lot of tiny parts on the 1/32 Mustang!

????? And

Frank approves!

Well it certainly would grab my attention if rolling down the street! Love the folding fabric top.

Next up is how to paint the thing. In the first movie they are just sort of a steel color. But by T2 it appears that Skynet found a good detailing shop and they are bright shiny chrome. They don't show up in the later movies but all the equipment that does runs between the two finishes so I don't think there is a "right" or "wrong" answer really.

Sub assemblies all done. And for just how big this thing is let's throw in a 1/35 Sherman

When I was a kid there were the remains of one of these out in the bush by our house although not sure it was a Model T. All that was left was just a frame (shortened like this) engine block and welded to the front a PTO housing very close to what you are making. Figured the only reason these parts were still there were that they were just to heavy to pull out so remained after everything else had been stripped. Such a cool subject!

Update! After 2 years I finished this one last week.

Looks good!

I have never built a Heller kit but so far everything looks quite impressive. Those wheels look like little gems.

Sweet! Are those the kit wheels?

For anybody not familiar with Pegasus Hobbies kits the first thing that needs to be mentioned i that they are not styrene. The plastic they use is a heavy ABS. This means that some glues just won't work and they recommend Tamiya Extra Thin or Modelmaster liquid only. Of course you can also use super glues. I use the Tamiya and it works great. Of course this subject is modeled after a movie prop and some of the parts seem a bit simplistic when you first look at the. For example the return wheels for the tracks have no sort of suspension to them but are simply little wheels on a stick. The wheels themselves have nice detail but that is about it. This of course is fie with me since once the tracks and side panels are on you won't notice anyway but anybody that really like to go to town could easily do more with these. The track assemblies are huge of course but they fly together since there actually very few pieces. The pieces there are you get to do 4 times. Pegasus uses a lot of slots and bevels in their design instead of locating pins. This does a good job of hiding most seams and is very strong but some of the bigger sections don't fit perfectly so there will be some filling and sanding. I understand that this can be hit and miss with the molds and was a lesser issue with the first release than this one (this is the 2021 rerelease) The smaller assemblies though fit really nice.

Ran into decal issues with my latest plane build so. This is the 1/32 Hunter Killer tank from the Terminator 2 movie. As the "real" thing is described as 3 stories tall then even in 1/32 it is MASSIVE.

Yep. Boils down to whatever you want to throw down. My old home made paint booth just got the inside painted with whatever was inside the airbrush after every project. Looked like the underside of an inner city overpass!

It is very nice kit for it's age. Nice OOB detail without being at all fiddley. The plastic is a bit weird in that it can tear easily instead of cutting cleanly. Even using my nice sharp sprue cutters and trimming with a new blade I ended up with some torn spots where the sprue attached. The seams closed almost completely up with just some extra thin Tamiya cement. There was a very faint line in some spots that If I had squeezed just a but harder or longer probably would have went away. The wing roots however were a perfect fit with no filling required at all.

Engine base coated and detail painted Pilot, cockpit and engine dark brown washed, flat coated, and ready to get closed up and hardly seen again!

Oh this is why I am asking for opinions and want all the 2 cents I can get! I have struggled with this. I am not against doing a diorama base but am afraid it will take away from the model itself that is why I went plain. I can see what you mean though as the wood is TOO nice for the subject. I would like to keep the pictures in the foreground as they give context that it isn't just some smashed up plane. The canvas may work nicely. I think I have an old grey army poncho around here. Need to avoid green at all costs.