LennyB

Very cool concept, looks like something that should have been at the NY auto show.

I like it in that color but I think you need the black stripe down the side to finish her off.

I don't know what the deciding factor was, it certainly wasn't year as the Maverick was silver and that's later then the Falcon, Fairlane, etc...

Not all of them, Mustang and Torino were body color.

You'll be amazed. When trying to get replacement taillights for my 39 P8 90% of what you find are aftermarket. Easy to tell as they don't have the Plymouth ship on them and are much flatter then OEM. Now I'm not talking about stuff that's still being made, I'm talking about NOS stuff. There was a lot of aftermarket stuff being made during WWII as people couldn't buy new cars and had to keep the old jalopy going. My car came with door handles that had a pewter sheen to them. They were aftermarket. Polished metal coated with clear lacquer, OEM obviously were chrome. Took a lot of searching to find the right ones. BTW: There is a 4-door parts car in a boneyard 10 miles from my house in case you want to relive those glory days ?

Or some of them were aftermarket knock-offs. A lot of that was going around at the time. One of my favorites is old wheel covers. The knock-offs couldn't use the actual car names so they often simulated the letters with random blocks.

Thanks Donald for coming along on the ride. For what seems like a simple concept there is a lot of scratch building. Stephen, I know what you mean, I have several as well and not only is it too long it's not shaped right. It needs a lot of massaging to get it correct. Good luck with yours.

This week was devoted to the grill. As I have several 1968 Fairlane/Torino projects in the pipe and only one 68 grill in the junk pile I cast some extra grills. The grill is the same for all 68 models, Fairlane and Torino. Only difference is the crest in the center of the grill. Fairlanes had none, the Torino had a tri-colored bar and the GT had a GT emblem, what else.? So after casting the grill I removed the GT emblem from the center. Here I shot one with Revell Chrome. Way too much bling, and it shows every flaw. Toned it down with a black wash but the Revell chrome doesn't take kindly to handling. I eventually intend to separate the bumper and grill as that is the way they are in life. Then I can paint the pieces separately.

Listen, after having to install all the grill "stainless" on a 39 Plymouth piece by piece I understand the importance.?

Be glad you didn't pick a woody and have to woodgrain the whole back of the car?

You didn't say the patient had to live?

As they say it takes one to know one...?

This is a "how to" pick the wrong kit to work on?

You would have to bring that up....?I was only thinking about doing the black in the recesses.? The body color wasn't even on my radar, until now. ? But if you really want to do that you could.....?

Well, I took a stab at painting the grill black and then going over the chrome with Molo. It worked but I didn't feel the bars stood out enough. Then I tried BMF on the grill and then sprayed it after with some flat black. Rubbed off the high spots and these are the results. Aside from a slight wrinkle in the drivers side foil and maybe being a little light on the black, I think I can live with this.

Yes, I removed the molded in detail, still looks thick. Maybe next time I should dig a little deeper.?

I know you all think I'm crazy for not just using the chassis from the AMT 1966 Fairlane or Revell 1970 Torino but what's the fun in that. The point of this rescue is to use just the parts from my junk box. So now it's time to rescue the chassis I started cutting up some 40 or so years ago. Not sure what I used to fill he area once occupied by the mufflers but it looks like cardboard covered with Bondo. Well, that has to go. And replace it with some sheet styrene. The old "Promo" slots for metal axles need to be filled. A little more cleaning and...we are getting closer. One reason for jumping on to the chassis at this point is the very rear of the chassis has two tabs which originally slotted into the body. Needed to see how the chassis now fits with the rear body mods. Tabs have to go and a ridge for the chassis to rest on was secured inside the rear of the body. This chassis is not without it's flaws from the AMT factory. The gas tank is the wrong shape, it should be wider from side to side and it had what appears to be a partial retaining strap molded in. Also, for some reason they have the front of the springs mounted inside the frame rails. They belong outside the rails. And that's just for starters. I'm not going to go nuts on trying to make this correct, just happy at this point to finally make this chassis usable after all these years. Next the grill...?

Moving around to the tail end of business. The 68 and 69 Fairlane/Torino are the same in the rear aside for some trim changes. On the left is AMT's 68 Torino and on the right is the 69 Cobra. The tail panel is concave not flat, but the Cobra is flat and AMT moved the lower section over to the rear bumper. Have to fix both these issues. First by breaking down the rear bumper and then by creating a new tail panel from some .060 flat stock. I put a piece of .040 x .080 stock down the center to represent the rear molding (it will be filed down to shape later). Then filed above and below that strip to get a concave effect. At either end I carved out a depression for the taillight frames to fit into. The frames are a bit thick but recessing them helps to improve their appearance. I can thin them down some but have to see if the kit taillights can still be used. I took it one step further and created the panel that sits behind the bumper. Even thought of possibly putting in a gas cap and hinging the rear license plate. And here is a mock-up of the rear. Still need to remove 69 from the plate. Back to the chassis next....

The Coupe The love/hate relationship with this kit goes on. It's been a week long battle trying to get this interior to follow directions. Full dis-closer however can't blame AMT for it this time. It was more a battle of the paint. I wanted to lay down a satin black to start with the base. Had a can of Rustoleum Satin Black which decided it wanted to go high gloss. Maybe I didn't shake it enough, maybe it was the weather. Anyway, switched over to a can of flat black and then top coated the black with some vintage Testors Dulcote Lacquer. Then some Testors light interior gray to accent the black. Then some red flocking for carpet, which you can't really see and will see even less when the car is put together. But I'll know it's there. Wanted to paint the dash, steering wheel and side window trim (yes, I know it looks like it's the top of the door panel but it's actually the side window surround) body color. On the real car they have wood grain on closed vehicles and convertibles have this painted body color. As this is not a stock build I'm going body color. For this I airbrushed some Createx Wicked Crimson. I never used this before so I test sprayed it on a spare hood and the hood rejected it. Meanwhile it sprayed fine on a plastic spoon. Go figure. Took a chance and sprayed the interior, dash was fine, steering wheel fine, but it fish-eyed on top of the Testors grey. I was able to sand and respray so I didn't have to start from scratch, but then some color bled thru onto the grey. Went back and touched that up but accidentally grabbed Lt Ghost Grey and wondered why it didn't match. Just not my week for painting. At that point I was tired of fighting so I left it. Mixed up some Ivory paint to do the dash and window crank knobs, turned out a bit more yellow then it should but that's just par for the course. Last thing I did is I applied the dash cluster and radio controls I picked up on eBay. I thought I was buying decals, but turned out it was just glossy paper that you have to cut out and white glue in place. Does the job and doesn't look bad, but it is a bit thick in this case. Anyway, I'm done for now. Cheers...?

If I remember correctly Ford sold more cars in 57 then Chevy.

I was actually thinking of painting the grill black and then going over the chrome after with Molo, not sure how that's going to work. I don't think grinding off the backside would work for this grill as the bars are so thin, at least the part that's true chrome, 'er make that stainless steel. The real grill is not chrome.

Thanks guys, appreciate the support. It's also a lot more fun this way.?

No the narrative is it's a period correct paint job. They didn't look as good back in the day as they do restored now. ?

Landed in NY today?

Alan, I agree with Greg, nice job on the dash conversion. Like many cars of the era the cluster and glove box openings were the same size just for this reason. Even VW and the Mustang/Falcon did the same. Made it easy to convert the Falcon Ranchero to a Ute. There is a vendor on eBay that sells decals for the instrument cluster and radio. I bought a couple of set but haven't gotten that far yet. How much horsepower you think you're getting now with that custom exhaust?