Chuck Most

Droptop new tool '57! Another no-brainer if you ask this apathetic-to-Tri-Five-Chevy guy. I'd love to see Revell do a closed cab pickup street rod from their existing Deuce tooling... pattern it after the Brookville street rod body and the fuel tank location becomes a moot point. And like I've said- from where I sit there's never been a better time than now to look forward to such kits.

That's what made me chuckle. "Wow. These guys must love having a stack of spare bodies laying around." I do like the AMT Model A Woody/Pickup, though- seems I always have enough spare Model A parts on hand to make a complete model with the spare body. Ditto the Revell Model A pickup that comes with a closed and roadster cab. But that's just me.

The diecast people largely overlook modern pickups as well(though they are a bit better than plastic kits, selection wise), but I've spent quite a bit of money I could have spent on a theoretical modern pickup kit or two on some high end diecast- The trucks pictured here actually belong to my father, but I have all four of these (and more), just haven't taken them out of the shipping containers in a while.

Well, you do have the Shelby versions and such, but I do see what you're getting at! And where are these guys saying a '57 Nomad would be a bad idea. Again, not a fan of Tri-Fives or '57s in particular, but such a kit seems like a no-brainer even coming from my viewpoint.

I do see your point on the Chevelle, but really- the 150/Black Widow? Can't imagine that one being a big seller for Walmart, '57 or no. And I can imagine quite a bit. Here's a bit more to chew on- can you see the big box store people wanting to stock a Hudson Hornet? Or a '50 Olds? A cheapo die cast, maybe, but a full-detail kit? Doubt it. I can guarantee no big box retailer would have carried Model King or Dirt Track Racecars dual-branded kits (among others). Sheesh, Dave Burket pretty much makes a living by catering specifically to the 'enthusiast market'. No, those mostly terrible 'Fast And Furious', 'Rides Magazine', and 'American Hot Rod' releases are what the big retailers wanted to have on hand.

Cool seeing another rig rod go together- I've been working on one myself.

You mention utilizing existing tooling, and I'm a big proponent of that. While I confess that I'm not a huge fan of Tri-Five Chevys, Revell/Monogram has gotten a lot of mileage out of that original Monogram '55 tool. Odds are better now more than ever that modelers will finally get that GOOD '57 Nomad kit they've always wanted. Or what about a '57 Bonneville? The 1:1 automakers used common parts among several different lines and years, and I think it's well past the time that the kit manufacurers followed suit. And if, say, the hardtop version of Kit X includes a different set of custom wheels and engine hop up parts than the Kit X sedan variant, so much the better. The days are over when merely refreshing the box art and throwing in a new set of decals is enough to tart up an existing kit, and I'm glad to see that. I remember when Revell started bringing out variants on the Deuce kit, and a small but very vocal group kept asking why they didn't just include the new bodies in with an existing kit. I did get a chuckle out of that. For one thing, could you go into a Ford dealer in 1932 and buy a Tudor sedan, and a spare Roadster body to go with it? Of course not. And there's that bottom line everyone keeps refering back to- if you want the Tudor kit, Revell wants you to buy the Tudor kit. To me those kits are a great example of expanding on a base kit- from the initial Roadster, Three-Window, and Speedwagon (what ever happened to that one?) the line has grown to include a five window and Tudor, and not only new bodies- that Tudor has some very nice wire wheels and a full-dress Flattie, and the Hemi and those hairpin radius rods from the Five Window are tasty indeed. Some might see that as trying to 'pull one over' on the customers, I see it as a great thing.

The Blues Brothers might be why there are some very vocal souls requesting a Monaco. I'd be happy whith any Town Car or Crown Vic besides the '97 Lindberg kit (not knocking that one, just saying). I wouldn't mind any of the above, simply being a fan of good old American land barges.

Wasn't going to post my 'OLD old' pickups, but a lot of guys are, so why not... Again, this is all we have to WORK WITH, people!

We can post what we have to work with, though. See that diecast F-250 of mine? I'd have 20 of those things if they were full-detail styrene, or heck, even decent curbside (gasp) snap kits! Pfffffffffffft.... car washes are immensely overrated.

You and me both. Wait, do you mean that in a good or bad way? But on a serious note, the fact that a '50 Olds was even considered to be kitted is uplifting to me, not even considering the fact it is actually going into production at some point.

Uh... okay... Explain to me the sucess of the 150/Black Widow kit. Or the '65 Z-11 Chevelle? These aren't the kinds of vehicles that big-box-store department managers want in their inventory.These were kits that were wanted by the real, finely-threaded car nuts. The core of the scale modeling business in other words. Oh, sure, there were always a slew of '57 Chevy kits, but you'd have never seen one that could be built out of box as the Utility Sedan or a 'close enough to get the message across' Black Widow replica? (Imagine how 'Mr. Disappointed this Impala is stock-only would feel once he cracked open that '57 and saw it had no back seat...)And something obscure like a Z-11 Chevelle? A Chevelle SS would be a no-branier, but only the diehards would have wanted a Z-11. I think every SAE 'most wanted' list had a Z-11 Chevelle on it until Revell came out with theirs. And there's proof everywhere that the model companies are listening- for years we've wanted better accuracy and detail, and for the most part, the manufacturers are delivering on that. Moebius? I defy anyone to say those guys aren't listening to us loud and clear! The Hornet and Chrysler were both on many hardcore modeler's wants lists speaks to that. And be honest, who here ever thought they'd see a kit of those two, much less the International Lonestar? I'm crossing my fingers for them to bring out a bulletnose Stude one of these days, and I don't care what anybody says! I'd hazard a guess and say if the model companies were NOT listening to us, the quailty of kits never would have progressed much past the mid 1980's or so.

I'd buy more Olds kits if it had the inline six, but....

Dave Metzner told me in an e-mail that the cut lines will be corrected on later runs of the kit.

I'm using IE- I can navigate the page just fine.

Judging from the photo, the wheelbase IS off, but not by as much as was thought. I think it has to do with the rear overhang- look at it- on my monitor, the body aft of the rear tire looks about 1/16 or so short compared to the pic of the 1:1.

I'll be watching this one for sure. Hope it turns out as killer as the Coupe you did before!

That one's got a late-model Hemi powering it though, just for a modern twist.

On the other hand... there was seemingly pent-up demand for the Beverly Hillbillies Olds kit, and look at how that reissue tanked. Really, who knows what could happen?

You left 'into the ground' on that last sentence. RC2 actually killed off model kit production before Round 2 took over- could market oversaturation have had anything to do with that? I'd have to think it played a role. Why would a store buy more, say, '67 GTO kits when they already had a shelf full of the last run that weren't sold? Though in the case of the IMC stuff, it might work, simply because they've been out of production for so long (for the most part) there's pent up demand from modelers who don't want to pay collector bucks to land one. That and I'm sure that quite a few guys (and gals) are being introduced to them for the first time- I showed the '59 Rambler thread to a local modeler who didn't even know the kit existed until then- he's up for a couple of them now.

I have more, but you get the point.

And the 'putting my money where my mouth is' side-