Chuck Most

I had to fill some startlingly wide gaps after installing the bulkhead.

In 1975, Hank Harris swapped a 1967 Camaro 350 and the rest was history. Hank's Speed Shop made a name for itself making V8 swap kits for compact pickups. Hank and the shop are gone now, but Hank's grandson Jace Thum has the LUV. It's on it's third paint job, it now has a 1975 4 bolt 350, and has been swapped to five lug hubs to fit a set of Cragar S/S wheels. But imagine a cleaner version with sparkly paint and it looks almost like it would have back then. This is the Monogram kit, with Edelbrock engine dress up parts from an AMT '55 Chevrolet stepside, and some old MRC Cragars and Mickey Thompson tires. Paint is distressed Rust-Oleum Painter's Touch aqua, with Gofer Racing decals and a Best Model Car Parts 1973 Michigan plate.

New shoes, Monogram '77 GMC 8 bolt alloys, Monogram Ground Hawg tires. And I've reconfigured the original rollers for a dually.

In the sleepy central Michigan town of Sickles, there's a damp, moldy, and poorly lit store on the outskirts called "Rachel's Resale". The shelves were cluttered with... shall we say... "vintage" trinkets, dusty antiques, and what seems like a random assortment of absolute junk. Sounds like a great place to find a bargain, until you see an extremely common (and worn out) AC/DC concert shirt for $55, a non functional "antique" General Electric clock/radio for $200, or a VHS tape of Nukie for $100. And those are some of the more reasonably priced items in the shop. If you dare to leave a negative Google review of Rachel's Resale.. or even a positive review sometimes... Rachel herself will be all over you like musty stink on any piece of merchandise in her store. She will reply with a tirade, and most often end her retort with her famous catchphrase: "You are hereby banned from the premises!" Being "hereby banned" is a part of the local lexicon, with many locals finding Rachel's ire to be an amusing badge of honor. Despite this, Rachel has been in business since 1998, with no ending in sight. People actually drive from all over the state just to buy something or visit, just to leave bad reviews, just to be hereby banned from the premises. To this day, nobody is really sure if Rachel really is as surly and incompetent as she seems, or if she's some bizzaro world marketing queen. Her company car is just as well known, and just as rough. It's a 1965 El Camino with a camper shell that's been modified with shelving inside, for runs to estate sales and the rare trips when Rachel tries her luck at a flea market. She's turned down numerous offers for it over the years, saying that she would not take less than $15,000 for it. Though she does have a reason for that price... pure sentimental value. As for her insane pricing on the stuff in her shop? That remains a mystery... The model is an incomplete, original AMT 1965 El Camino I bought years ago. I figured the kit had sat around for 60 years waiting to be built, so I did this with it. 🤣 It has MPC Dodge pickup wheels, hubcaps from two Revell Stranger Things Blazers, and parts from a couple of '65 El Camino reissues to fill in the blanks.

Wonder if he's the father of the orange kitten... Speaking of the kittens, a couple days ago they figured out how stairs work. So now whenever I forget to shut the door they're free to rampage through the house. 🤣

Also Oliver has a crossed wire🤣 https://youtube.com/shorts/yLxFt7Xnlpk?si=t3Hgk5B6gOVhv0_j

Finally introduced Dinner to one of the kittens, specifically the orange one. Boy howdy, he did not like that. 🤣

If I haven't already introduced him, here's Madhouse Miniatures shop supervisor Oliver.

The trim is bare metal foil with a little semigloss black painted into the recesses. The excess was wiped off with a thin cloth rag stretched tightly over the tip of my thumb.

From 1954 to 1994, Anderson Brothers Pontiac served Sickles, Michigan and the surrounding areas. And for a pretty good chunk of that time, they had a unique shop truck. Built by Steve's Auto Body in late '65 from a rear ended '65 Pontiac Tempest and a '65 El Camino that had been wrapped around a telephone pole, the Tempest pickup was a custom order. Steve Hill built a few different "what if" car-pickups, and elder Anderson brother Joe commissioned the Pontiac pickup for the dealership. The Tempest became a local legend in it's own time, and served the dealership all the way up to 1990, though by 1970 or so it had been joined by a series of Chevrolet and GMC pickups. It then ended up under the ownership of Darren Villarreal, who had started out as a salesman at Anderson Brothers in 1978 and had become general sales manager by 1985. He stayed with the dealership until 1995, a year after the Andersons sold the dealership to Andrew Russo, who eventually ran the operation into the ground. But let's not go there. Darren sold the Tempest to Lyle Abbott, owner of Acme Auto Salvage, in 1997. Lyle has, in his own estimation, completely rebuilt the car at least three times in the 28 years he's had it. Not all at once, but cumulatively. He recently treated the interior to a refresh, including GTO bucket seats and center console. The one thing that's never been touched? The bodywork Steve did back in 1965. And yes, the Tempest still sees regular use, even if it's just advertising Acme Auto Salvage with it's presence. The model is the new AMT Craftsman Series '65 GTO cut and spliced with the '65 Chevrolet El Camino. The door decals and most of the stuff in the bed came from several Moebius F-Series kits. Now if Round 2 ever trots out a '64-'67 Buick Skylark I can do a a trilogy of B-O-P coupe utilities.

Wished Patty a happy mother's Day as one of her brood tried using her head as a step ladder. 🤣 Meanwhile Dinner is enjoying the sun.

On

I remember getting one of the originals and being thoroughly disappointed. Can I get away with saying Xtremely disappointed? No? Okay... I knew it was the show truck, not a production Xtreme, and even though the side of the box proclaimed a 2.2 and a manual transmission. Pre-internet me thought perfect, I could make a neat little fleet truck. Nope,it had the same power train as the other S truck kits. Nice bench seat and floor shifter though. Lowered suspension proved once again that Ertl was blissfully ignorant of what a scrub line is, but the stance looked decent. Updated grille isn't going to move the needle much for me, especially if that's the extent of the updating. We're a long way from the 90s when they'd update things like the steering wheel and intake to depict the changes to the real vehicle for 1995, I accept that. I'm hopeful that if this version meets with a little unexpected success, maybe there will be a more thorough 1998-up S Series update later.

They'd need to throw in the '95 interior as well.

Moebius kit built box stock, painted in Testors Blazing Black and Diamond Dust. The wheels and tires are temporarily installed with water based glue, eventually they'll be popped off and replaced with something a bit more period correct for the late '70's/early '80's. Once that happens I'll whip up a backstory and call it done.

Got my hands on 2 of the 5. I noticed there's no urine or feces in the area. So I got curious and googled it... Yeah, wish I hadn't because exactly what I thought was happening was happening. 🤣

I built one from the Nitto kit (wonder if this kit is based on that one). Those working hinges are making my eyes cross 🤣

A couple times a year, cousin Robby rolls up for a visit from Indiana. You hear him long before you see him, from the rumbling and ratting of his extremely worn out Demon, usually accompanied by some '70's and '80's AOR blasting out of the speakers. He got it when he turned 16 in 1978, and he's never owned another car. Sure, he's moved a few times, and he works at a different gas station now, but the Demon has been a constant. When Robby isn't spouting off his theories about lizard people, hollow Earth, and flying saucers, you'll find him cruising in or working on his Demon. It may look shabby but it's ready for a trip to work or the dispensary at a moment's notice. This is the MPC kit, heavily aged. I used MPC D150 wheels and parts box tires, old photo reduced plates, Gofer Racing bumper sticker, and a Spotlight Hobbies sasquatch silhouette. Aside from those additions it's a box stock build.

If you do end up buying this kit, it does include a spare set of the corrected F100 hubcaps first released in the M100 just so you know.

Got one today, think mine's getting some more period correct wheels and tires. Just personal taste but the wheels are a little too "brodozer" for it. Maybe I'll warm up to them but I have another project I think they'd look better on. Put some Jackmans wrapped in TSL Super Swampers on it and it would resemble pretty much every third or fourth pickup you'd see in a Michigan road in the '80's.

The kit's two biggest flaws are the grille and the rollers. This is a pretty good way of fixing both of those issues. 😁

Now my problem is Dinner 🤣 He's been the only cat in the house for the better part of 10 years, and he doesn't seem to be adjusting well. He seems really tense. I might need to formally introduce him to the kittens once Patty is back outside. She's obviously been a lot less tolerant of him since she moved the litter downstairs.

This looks familiar.... And the kittens are still kittening. As far as I know Dinner has never even seen them.

Dinner seemed sick all night the night before, but he was wound up and hit on the trail of something in the yard this morning. If you were curious, he and Patty get along about as well as kerosene and an open flame. 🤣

Well she wasn't that stealthy, I knew what was going on because for whatever reason she hopped up on my bed in the process and landed on my ankle.