crazyjim

Welcome Tom. Jim from florida, USA. I love this forum and have learned many things from it. My problem is being ashamed of the models I build after seeing so many fantastic builds. I just can't do what some of these people can. Oh well. I'll plug along and keep trying my best. One of these when I think something is good enough, I'll post a picture.

I cut the grille out of the Dodge Magnum with the plan to put in a straight bar billet grille. Anybody got any idea how to make a billet grille?

Somewhere in my toolchest I have a tubing bender kit. The kit has several different sized tubes that like like a very tightly wound spring. The idea being you put the tube inside and it's not supposed to kink. The old trick of filling the tube with sand before bending doesn't seem to work for me. Check out Micro Mark #60360.

I think you're thinking about the old Coca Cola - like over 50 years ago when supposedly Coca Cola really had coke in the formula. That's long gone. Back in the day, Coca Cola was great for removing rust from chrome. I use Purple Power for stripping paint.

Please keep me posted about the shows. I haven't been to a model car contest since leaving Chicago.

How did you get those pin stripe lines in there? Please don't tell me their hand painted.

Have you tried plaain old telephone wire. If you rip apart the outer covering you'll find 4 wires inside (red, green, black, blue). You can carefully strip the insulation and use it for the "boots". Scale Dreams and Model Car Garage ignition wires fits inside the "boot" perfectly.

Can you help me out here? You keep mentioning rubbing out the paint and several coats of wax. How and what do you use to rub out the paint? What kind of wax? Do you put on several coats of clear before rubbing out? I've never done the rubbing out to my paint but do use Model Car Wax.

I'm in Citrus Springs and would love to try and get together with other local builders.

I've tried to simulate wood grain by using several different colors of tan, light brown, dark brown, etc. It helps me to put a little paint into a small cup and put a few drops in seperate places in the cup. Then I can mix a little and get the different colors together. For leather I use Testor's Model Master leather paint.

When I've completed a model I throw the box in the garbage. There are 2 boxes in the can right now and the garbage goes out tonight (04/23/09). I can pull them out if you want. I believe the boxes are from a 1960 Ford Starliner and a 1962 Pontiac.

Nice lookin' ride. It's Deuce, right? If you're ever down FLA way, stop by and we can go for a ride together. Ride safe out there brother.

Those "lighted tables" like CSI has are very similar to those we use in making stained/leaded glass and are called light boxes. We use them to layout different colors of glass to check for color and transparency. Check this http://www.glasscrafters.biz/Merchant2/ord...;Category_Code= I made my own light box from 1 x 4 pine with a 24" florescent fixture inside. The cover is a Morton product. http://www.glasscrafters.biz/Merchant2/ord...egory_Code=mort

Your Starliner looks fantastic! I posted the question some time back about rolling the front & rear pans on this model but never got a reply. I have something pretty decent going with Evergreen. The rear end was easier than the front. I like how you opened another grille in the front pan. Thanks for the inspiration.

Wal-Mart, Walgreens, CVS, K-Mart all carry nail sanding boards in a variety of grits. Scale Dreams also sells sanding sticks in a variety of grits. You might aalso want to check Flexifile.

I brush all my small parts. And save the old paint brushes because you can use them to hold the back half of the wheels to paint them. Just stick the handle into the wheel. I've stocked up on several military model flat paints of light, medium, and dark in greys, browns and blues that I use on my interiors.

I got a job today - a census enumerator.

I paint mine with Testor's brass out of the little bottle.

What's a pm? I haven't heard from you.

Here's a pic of what I have. Let me know if it helps. Where it looks like 3 tires are actually a 2 piece tire. Somebody, probably AMT, did those for some time.

I don't do tuner cars so have no tires like that. What's classic style? I'll try to get some pictures to you within the next few days.

I've got tires going back to 1958. I just sorted them out last week. How many of what kind do you need? If you want, take a couple of hours ride over to the gulf side and have a look.

Here's my model area. It's part of a 10' x 20' room inside a 20' x 40' steel building. The other aprt of the hobby room contains 2 benchtops that are 3' x 8' each. One is for cutting and grinding and the other is the assembly area for my stained glass projects. My favorite tool would have to be my Wahl sander.

For a white finish I've used Plasti-Kote white sandable primer applied after wet sanding/washing the car. When dry wet sand again looking for any flaws. Prime again. When body and primer are set, I'll shoot it with either Testor's wet look clear or Tamiya TS65 clear pearl. The TS65 has some metallic in it.

Maybe somebody passed gas during the plating process.