Bernard Kron

Tasty!

A superb First Look, Tim. Well worth the time to peruse all 71(!) pages. A brilliant kit, detail objections not withstanding. Your comment at the start of your review that the kit is virtually 2 kits should be taken very seriously. I for one have amassed quite a little collection of AMT '29 A Roadsters and, based on your review, the AMT body shell looks quite compatible with either frame. Hopefully that will be the case and I can enjoy the best of what was one of AMT's finest kits combined with what promises to be Revell's newest and finest. For sure this kit will figure in my kit-bashing arsenal whether this is the case or not... Thanx again, B.

I'm so glad to see this thread revived. So many cool builds, cool stories and cool memories... Has it really been 6 years since I posted on this thread (and 7 since I started building car models again...)? A lot has happened since and I thought I'd update my favorite photos. Along with my skills in modeling, my photography skills have gone through some improvements, so here are 2 pics which I'm most proud of, both for the models in them and because the photos capture the "vibe" of the model as I see it. The first is from a model completed in 2013, but the picture was taken more than a year later as my photo skills got a major upgrade. I went back and re-shot the model because I considered it one of my best efforts up to then. I especially like the sharp focus and the lighting. The other is from a few months ago and its a sense of drama and realism that it evokes for me that ranks it among my faves. I hope you dig 'em. B.

Everything about this is wonderful. Good on ya Curt, indeed!

$$$$$ for a "team" to take care of things... That's how its done.

Limitless funds to buy any car, impractical or not = one of a kind, irreplaceable classic. Mine would be this one, 1957 Maserati 450S Costin Zagato Le Mans Coupe: But what would be my streetable, money no object contemporary equivalent? Perhaps to have the Raeli Ferrari F80 Concept built and developed...: Otherwise, if I had to write the check and take delivery of a production car then the current leaders are most likely the LaFerrari or the Lamborghini Veneno shown above.

Welcome from Seattle!

A subtly ambitious build with a superb outcome. Love the small-block and the ;late 20th century big 'n' littles. Besides the top which you covered nicely in your build thread, the important other detail is the crisp, well defined louvering job, not just on the rear deck (which would appear to be from the Revell 5-window kit) but the matching hood and (most impressively) fuel tank sets. Lemme tell ya, this is definitely non-trivial! Having attempted this sort of thing repeatedly and lobbied endlessly for aftermarket pieces of this sort, I'm dying to know more about how they were done. Regardless, this is top notch stuff. Big Thumbzupz Phil!

Thanks for all of this. I have a couple of the old kits, the Hydro Hemi and the AMT Rayson Craft and have plans to build them. I've been experimenting with Metalflake paint effects and large scale decals to duplicate period typical panel paint schemes and these would be perfect candidates for those sorts of things. Great inspiration as always!

I never left, but for some reason I keep missing your new completions. So it occurred to me to go to your profile and check your topics...and viola! Now I'm getting caught up. Cool stuff!

Cool rendition of this iconic car, Curt!

Yikes!!! Quite a "first shot". Looks great.

Nifty Keen!!!!!

Thanx everyone. As always your comments are much appreciated! This is my 3rd build based on the Ramchargers kit and I'm finally getting to know its strengths and limitations. This era of dragsters are perhaps some of the most beautiful race cars of any sort ever created (IMHO), especially this mid-length wheelbase period - the later 220+" machines don't look half as nice. I was pleased to capture some of the grace and aggression of these cars. The rear bodywork from Altered States went a long way toward capturing that look. I was surprised that I didn't have more trouble with the decal technique and with the p/e wire wheels. Those RepMin wire wheels offer a very good solution if you aren't going to go whole hog and lace your own rims. And I'm looking forward to experimenting some more with the decal technique now that I know that the theory works. As shown earlier the spokes come on a single sheet and they are attached to each other. That's what I meant by cutting them apart. Once you detach them from the sheet the individual spoke segments on each disc are separate from each other, ready to be bent to shape. The set comes with excellent instructions and a jig which make the process much simpler than it might appear. I checked my 2013 RepMin price list and Norm offers only a 1/24th-1/25th scale set as far as I can tell. They are offered with 3 different tire selections (Dunlop, Goodyear and Bridgestone), however. But always check with Norm. You never know...

All Done. Below are the final Beauty Shots. Thanx to all who followed along.

I'll PM you with a bunch of Photobucket and Fotki links with pictures of some of Norm's offerings.

Thanks everyone! All the major assemblies are now done. As I write this I’m in the middle of final assembly. Below are some pictures showing the Replicas & Miniatures Co. of Maryland photo-etch wire wheels I used with a breakdown of the various parts in the system and final result. Beautifully detailed with some incredibly finely detailed parts (check out the hubs…), they are a tremendous improvement over the kit wheels. The motor is finished and fitted to the chassis. Not shown in the pictures are the injector stacks and the zoomy headers. Much of the rest of the build is straight out of the kit. The one change I have made is to run the steering tie rod outside the body, again not shown because it’s a one-shot deal during final assembly and doesn’t lend itself to a mockup. I’m shooting for completion this weekend… Hopefully the Gloo Gawdz will cooperate. Thanx for lookin’, B.

A few more TraKable kustom kulture rods:

Nicely done primer rod, Randy!

Do you airbrush? If so a transparent color like Tamiya Smoke over kit chrome will do the trick.

Now that's a niiiice stance! It even makes the modern narrow section tires and large rims look good! Nice and tight and close-coupled looking. I'm sensing you're solving the problem of the well proportioned modern rod, here.

I've only ever done 1, and even then modified it a fair amount. But I have to admit there was plenty of detail to work with and I absolutely did not miss a separate motor and chassis! Seeing what's out there, I will definitely consider more of these kits...

A modern rod! Welcome Chris. I'm curious to see what you do with the injection bits on the motor. I've always liked the detail of that mill but hated the injector setup.

There are certain subjects I keep returning to repeatedly as my skills and techniques evolve. One is the ’32 Ford, in particular the various Revell Deuce kits, and the other is the classic early to mid-sixties front engine dragster, in particular the super-light, super quick Junior Fuelers. In the second case my preferred base kit tends to be the MPC Ramchachargers Dragster kit. I like the ultra-low legs-under rear axle stance and the just-right proportions of its 160” wheelbase chassis. I’m always thinking about my next dragster but these days I only seem to build one every 12 months or so. Now is that time, and this one won’t quite be a Junior Fueler, although I’m using the Ramchargers kit. This time I’m running a Big Block Chevy instead of the small block motor that was de rigeur if you were running a Junior Fueler back in the day (310 c.i. limit). This is because of a really pretty Enderle fuel injector setup I bought from Speed City Resin a while back. It only fits the Chevy Big Block so, BBC it is! With this project I decided to experiment with large area decals to create a fogged panel style paint job. The underlying color is DupliColor Metalcast metallic Ground Coat which is a near perfect 1/25th scale silver metalflake. If you print homemade decals on an inkjet printer you will quickly realize that the colors are very transparent and the base color shows through strongly. So inkjet color decal + silver metallic base coat = kandy color. Using Photoshop I made decals to create the fogged panel paint job I was thinking of. It took some experimenting but the technique works quite well. This one is very simple but now that I’ve figured it out I think I’ll be using it some more. Below are a couple of composite pictures. The first one shows the Western Manufacturing Special body shell from Altered States Models I used, and the Enderle injectors from Speed City Resins. The second shows the decal layout I made and the decals applied to the silver body. All that remains in the bodywork area is applying trade decals and clear coating everything. The chassis is about half done and I’ve begun work on plumbing and detailing the motor. Thanx for lookin’, B.