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Dave Ambrose

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Everything posted by Dave Ambrose

  1. Great build! My eyes bulged out so far, they smudged my glasses.
  2. Save the date -- We're obviously subject to any restrictions that might still be in effect, but we're planning on June 5th for the Model Expo.
  3. I just finished an MPC Titan IIIc. Terrible kit. The halve of the rocket bodies do not fit well and require massive amounts of filing and fitting. Given that the center booster is silver, it shows every little defect. Glad to have this one in the done column. the only good thing about that kit was the box. My cat liked to sleep in it.
  4. I'm going to want one of those snap kits to build with my grandson.
  5. Happy new year from the lower left coast!
  6. Thanks. Digital distribution is high on our list of things to implement. It would fix a lot of problems for us. At this point, we haven't identified a platform that protects our copyrights, works well for legitimate users, and offers workable economics. We haven't finished researching it yet, and if we find one, you can be assured that we'll be up on that platform in a hurry.
  7. Rex, Where did you see that? I took a quick look and all I saw were issues of Model Car Builder magazine. I didn't see any for Model Cars magazine.
  8. Sadly, this wasn’t game, per se. This came from a company in New Jersey courtesy of my sister in law. some years ago, my wife shot two deer on a hunting trip. We ate a lot of venison that fall.
  9. She should have called fish and game. I don't know about other states, but California Fish and Game takes those reports very seriously. Sadly, they are also understaffed.
  10. This one also works fine -- http://roadstars.mercedes-benz.com/en_GB/magazine/route/01-2018/on-tour-with-arto-simola-in-the-actros-lowrider.html The certificate they use to verify their identity is out of whack. Not altogether uncommon.
  11. I didn't get a picture, but a model A drove down the main street festooned with antlers and a red nose. It was a great look on that car.
  12. Before you get all wrapped up in the “snap kit” label, remember that Gundam kits snap together and they are very detailed and precise.
  13. My sister-in-law sent us a game box with venison, boar, and a couple of pheasants. We cooked the venison this evening. Forgot to take a picture, but it was deerlicious.
  14. Have them contact Gregg@modelcarsmag.com. We need more Canadian dealers.
  15. Arecibo is both an amazing, and problematic facility. It was designed for an era when our equipment to receive and process the signals was 1000 times less effective than it is now. So, you had to compensate with a lot of collecting area. It certainly has a vast collector. Unfortunately, it isn't steerable, so the effective collecting area falls off significantly when you're not looking directly overhead. The object you want to look at will rarely, if ever, be overhead. Given the sensitivity and low noise of modern head-end electronics, there isn't the great need for so much collecting area. If you need more sensitivity, you can get that, plus better spatial resolution, by combining signals from multiple antennas. We didn't have that kind of signal processing capability when Arecibo was built. Now we've implemented processing capabilities that weren't even theoretically possible when the dish was built. Dr. Bouman's work imaging a black hole would be a good example. Its unique capability was for radar astronomy. That will be hard to replace. Theoretically, you can use a multiple antenna setup as you would for receiving, but you'd need to do something unprecedented with the transmitters. The military-industrial complex tried to do something similar for the "Star Wars" initiative, and failed pretty miserably. So, that capability is gone. The telescope needed its supporting cables refitted. Those cables are under horrendous tension. That's why there are six of them. Two cables had already failed, and the rest were in overload conditions. The ends of the cables were cast into place in the towers with molten zinc. They weren't designed for replacement. We wouldn't do it that way now, but that was the best they could do in 1963. I haven't heard about the condition of the columns, but I can't imagine that they were in great condition either. I can't imagine how you might retrofit them safely without removing a large piece of the reflecting surface. Arecibo got to where it is over time, and mostly behind the scenes. I don't like how it turned out, but given the condition it was in, decommissioning was probably the wisest choice.
  16. I haven't seen one on a race track, but these cars are supposed to be hotter than a $2 pistol. Back when I was in high school, my friend drove an Austin America. That was super fun little car, and I've always liked classic(?) minis. Never owned one though. I prefer that A-Series engine in an MG Midget.
  17. It depends on your viewing platform. Desktop and tablet (I think) will paginate. Mobile phones or anything that looks like one will not. I have seen some very old computers with low resolution displays act like mobile phones.
  18. I like this kit. I know some other people don't like it, but I think it's healthy to have some nice curbside kits of US cars in our hobby shops. They let novice builders further explore the joys and exasperation of paint drama, while relieving them of the perceived complexity of assembling and painting a full chassis. I know you can just build the kit without the engine, but this isn't the way a newcomer thinks. With the separate hood, we can put an engine in there if we want. I might well get one of these kits. Rusting it out, and putting a couple of surfboards in it should make for an interesting build.
  19. These are fantastic, in the best sense of the word. Love the creativity and execution.
  20. If you’re stopping by, please review the revised rules.
  21. If you're referring to the white part on the roof, it's metal. It's like a second roof, but spaced off the cab roof by 5/8" or so. It's intended to keep the cab cooler in hot climates.
  22. I don't get time off for it, if that's what you're asking. It would be nice, but not in the cards.
  23. It's not there yet, but on my list of things to do. Sadly, my employer things I should be doing other things with my time.
  24. Report the post, and include that the trade is complete. We'll take it out of circulation.
  25. Distribution will be an ongoing challenge for us. It's a very niche, perhaps even hyperniche publication, and the distributors want to sell gazillions of whatever they're carrying. Getting them to carry something of limited interest is always an uphill battle. It leads me to wonder if that wasn't part of the reason SA folded shop. But, we will inquire. If you want the magazine on a regular basis and you're in Europe, I recommend subscribing.
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