OldNYJim

My wife has her own cutter - I’ll probably use hers ?‍♂️?

Just won this on EBay yesterday - just under $4! I’m building an Impala for NNL East’s Impala theme this year...and I realised when I was nearly done that all I’d really used from the kit was the body and 2 of the wheels ?. Figured if I got another body I can do a second one and probably STILL have extra parts left over ? This is the first one in progress, for anyone curious: I think I’m going to see if I can make a second one that can park under this one ??

I found (accidentally) a while back that blasting too-thickly-applied Tamiya acrylic with a hair drier will make subtle splits and cracks as the paint shrinks and blisters a little when it dries too fast. Just used the same trick, intentionally this time, on a coffin that I painted for one of my projects: Im doing to go back in and brush some black pastel dust into the cracks to exaggerate the effect, but that might be a trick you can use?

A little more progress on this one - got it polished out - wanted to make sure those sides were nice and straight and as perfect as I could get them: And whilst I wait for some more epoxy to arrive so I can get it assembled I messed with an idea I had for a display stand for it: Ive since tidied up the light rope and got it secured all neatly - but I like the effect! IMG_8257.MOV

I’ve been messing with it for a while - I quite like it! I’ve been careful to test it on a spare piece of whatever I’ve been using it on before committing to painting anything important, and regardless of whether a paint says you need primer or not I prime just about everything anyway...works out well for me! I like their silver for a kind of polished aluminum finish - it has a real fine flake to it that I like:

A tiny bit more progress on this one...got the headliner painted: Made some brake disks on my cutter: And soon as those are painted I can assemble this thing! I carelessly ran out of the epoxy that I like for assembly, but there’s more coming next week so more soon-ish!

Thank you everyone! Won an award for this build from the Red River Modellers club this week: Love the challenge coins they gave out as trophies! ?

A little more progress - couldn’t decide between a patina’d look for the coffin in the back, a kind of old wood look, or something shiny and candy-coated...so I went for a little of both! Shot the whole thing with silver, then a green candy then wiped that off and left a little in the recesses, then some red and orange candies which I hit with some seat to make them blister and split a little from drying too fast: Ill add some pastels and to add some more depth to the cracks and crevices in the paint and then call that done - it’s kinda hard to see in the back there anyway but I wanted to do a little airbrush work on it anyway. With that done, did a little work on the interior...again, it’s pretty hard to see in there anyway and there’s already enough crazy nonsense on this thing so I left it pretty plain aside from the pearl purple colorscheme to tie it in with the engine color: Next up, I needed to make a headliner - I cut a cobweb design out of some styrene sheet and soon as the primer dries I’ll shoot that a candy lime green to match the roof: And then this afternoon I did a little detail painting on the bumpers. The attachment points on these couldn’t be in any worse of a spot - you can’t snip them off without really ruining the chrome, but I wanted a more subtle look anyway so they got cleaned up and shot with a chrome silver paint followed by a black wash, some orange for the turn signals and a little pearl white to try and improve those moulded-in lights a little: More soon!

Huh, I never saw that translucent stuff before!

Great advice, thank you Steve! Going to do some more experimenting with my lacquer technique here!

It did not - I’d like to pick up the version with the figures though...although I have 4 more of these in stock right now so I don’t NEED one ? Got all the parts for this thing in clear and they’re setting up before I polish them, and I picked up some Citadel figure painting paint for the interior color I wanted: And did a little brush painting on the wooden benches to add a little grain to them: And used a little Rub n Buff on the seat brackets and wheel to give them a kind of vintage aged metal look: Almost ready to start doing some assembly on this thing - I’m running out of parts to paint ? More soon!

Looks great!!! Very impressive! You’re absolutely right on all counts Steve. I did try adapting my process with lacquer to simply laying more coats down but still haven’t perfected it - I know you’re a proponent of using lots of lighter coats and your results speak for themselves. How many coats of clear do you like before you feed comfortable? I really want to get perfect lacquer paint jobs down, because as you say enamels aren’t perfect over every color...and I can’t keep painting everything dark colors forever ??

That looks great! What kind of printer did you use? I’m having a polishing day...I used to find polishing really nerve-wracking when I was polishing mostly lacquer clear - always a decent chance of burning through an edge or ruining it somehow. Since I’ve started using an enamel clear though I’m enjoying it much more - seems like the enamel is tougher and it’s easier to get a perfect finish more often than not:

I’d buy it!

Ohh yeah, that’s cool!

Thank you fellas! Forgot to post the nearly-ready-to-paint coffin...gotta figure out a 70s paint trick that I haven’t tried yet for this thing! ?

A little more on this thing - had to paint a bunch of parts, including these suspension linkages so that I could get this thing closer to being a roller: Modified the kit interior so it has a bed in the back to fit that coffin that I was want to put in there: And shot all the interior parts with a base color ready for more detailing later: And a quick mock-up to see how it’s going to look - it’s starting to look like a thing! More soon!

Incredible stuff! Love projects like this, and love seeing them come together!

I’ll be following! This looks cool already! ???

Yes! This is exactly my least favorite part! I try and have a couple of projects staggered usually so I’m not waiting for paint to dry forever before I can work on something, but this is definitely my least favorite part of the process Guess I need a dehydrator ?‍♂️?

First finished build of the year - this one is for NNL East’s “Known Survivor” category this year. Used an AMT 50 Ford kit, did a bunch of bodywork and modified or detailed-up about every part I think. Build thread here, for anyone curious: Thanks for looking! And some pics of it on it’s display stand for the show:

And that’s about a wrap on this one - thanks for following guys! Finished pics under glass!

Tried Citadel paint through the airbrush for the first time today - was trying to find a nice oxblood red color for some interior parts and spotted this stuff in a store near where I was working...worked great! Didn’t even need to thin it!

A couple of little touch ups and details to add but this one’s nearing completion... Today I BMF’d the supports in the roof to add a little visual interest in case anyone looked at this thing from a low enough angle to actually see that stuff: Then laid out a design on my vinyl cutter.... ...to add a little signwriting to this little base to display it on: Got one more little project to work on over the weekend and then I can snap some nice finished photos of this thing and call it about done! More soon!

No way would I trust my thousand-hour build to a record player crossed with a slingshot ? I’d be curious to build one and get it working nice...but I’d be nervous to put anything on it ?