Chuck Most

Some beautiful bus builds from this one, guys! Larry does bring up another strength of the Revell kit- the great inner panel detail (though it is marred a bit in places by ejector pin divots). I really like David's solution, sounds like even I could pull that off, but it does seem a bit strange Hasegawa did not provide any interior panels. I might cut this one up into a double-cab pickup, so the lack of inner panel detail may not be much of a hindrance! Speaking of which... hey, Hasegawa? How about bringing back that '67 Type II pickup kit????

I like where you're going with that second part... As for the first? That's the beauty of modeling. You can build a car that you could never,ever afford in real life and/or one that would easily get you killed (either by design or by angered fans of whatever car you 'ruined') in 1:1.

AND IT HAS AN ENGINE!!!! May sound weird coming from a hot rod fanatic like me, but I really dig this car. Must pick up a couple of these... one to build, and one to pirate the engine for another project...

Okay, so this one's been out a while. When it first came out, retail was right about eighty freakin' bucks. This one had a price of $77 at a local hobby shop, another one put it on clearance for $30, so I snapped it up then! I've seen this kit and similar versions of it going for about that much,too, so if you've had your eye on this one for a while, but didn't want to pony up the bucks, now would appear to be the time. Anyone who's built the Hasegawa '67 Type 2 pickup kit should be in familiar territory- this kit is similar to that one. It's a tradtional Japanese curbside kit- having no engine besides the lower half molded to the transaxle unit. Front suspension is steerable, and attaches via nylon donuts, as with most Hasegawa and Tamiya kits I've encountered in the past. The tires are no-name soft rubber, and the wheels are very nicely done, although there is no hub/lugnut detail, so the VW-branded baby moon caps are mandatory unless you'd like to perform a little plastic surgery to the wheel hubs. The side and rear doors are molded partly open, and only joined at the hinges. The instructions mention that they can be cut open and reattached in the open position, but Hasegawa points out that this kit does not include the inner door panels, which is correct. This seems to imply there is a version of this kit which does have those parts, and I have to wonder why Hasegawa did not include them. Hasegawa did include two HUGE resin surfboards (I guess they'd be long boards? ) with kit, each with a separately molded fin, and also two resin roof rack bars, as well as graphics on the decal sheet for the boards. Let's face it, any 'non-hippie' mircobus is probably a surf wagon, right? About those decals- Hasegawa's are some of the best I've ever used- they lay down well, and are pretty forgiving as far as positioning them on the model. Like most kits of this type, the body and interior are pretty well done, and that compensates somewhat for the lack of any engine detail. Detail freaks will pass this kit up in favor of the Revell Samba bus, due to its engine and opening,hinged doors. The Revell kit is fairly easy to build for how complex it is, but is still a bit off-putting to many modelers, the Hasegawa is a cakewalk to build. The Revell kit sells for about what I bought my Hasegawa example for, so if you can find the Hasegawa kit for a bargain basement price, I'd still reccomend it. The time spent not fiddling with the Revell's hinged doors and engine parts could be time spent customizing the van, or focusing on interior detail, as the interior is in plain sight with all those windows. I wanted this kit when it was almost eighty bucks, now that some places are selling it for much, much less, I'd say it's a must-have for any Vee Dub fanatic!

Dude... you did it way better than I would have. That's one of the tiny little things keeping me from tearing into the several Monogram 'Cudas I have stashed away...

Okay... THAT one I like.

I hope somebody kits the DMAX concept hot rod. Make it stock or show truck, and watch the light commercial and street rod guys snap 'em up!

Uhhhh... to quote Eric Cartman... "It's wrong. It's WRONG!!!!"

D-D-R-R-O-O-O-O-L-L.... Love it. Just absolutely love it. Forget the '64 Marauder, '66 Park Lane, and '64 Comet kits... they need to reissue THIS!!!!

Very sweet as usual Lyle. I can hear that Stovebolt idling in my mind...

Gives me something to shoot for with my 1:1 '67 Fury 4-door!

One of the many reasons I love old dragsters (cue choir of angels, please...) THE PIPES!!!!

That poor, poor woman!!!!

The tub on it almost kinda/sorta looks like the Ala Kart, so it's (again) kinda/sorta half A/half T. So it's a former 1928 Model A that is now a Model T. Yeah, that works...

Ford did the Unibody from '61-'63, and I think the old AMT kit is repopped in resin. The heavier and four wheel drive Ford trucks continued to run the '57 style bed for a few years (through '63, I think) on the '61 body style. I'd love to bash one of Jeff's '66 kits with a Modelhaus '57 bed to make a '61 F-100 4x4 I once saw at a local car show!

Call me a total chump, but I'd have been happy paying a LOT more for that kit... even though I'd just chop it up into a Bobcat Woody!

This is a terrific kit for a beginner, despite its age the tooling seems to have held up fairly well. It was issued not too long ago under the Revell nomenclature, which no doubt caused a bit of confusion with this and the mid 1990's era '32 Roadster street rod kit (and all its spin offs) we've come to know and love. Man, I wish Revell, Monogram, and or Revell-Monogram would just pick a brand name and STICK WITH IT!!!! (And yes, I know the company is just Revell now. )

Sounds like a screamin' deal!

Ah, okay. Guess I had a 50/50 shot!

Sweet! This must be the AMT kit?

Uh.... I think he has a point there, actually...

LOVE IT!!!!

Yeah, can't tell you how many articles I've read by that infamous "G" guy.

Glad I don't use Photobucket anymore!

The Coca-Cola branded '34 Ford pickup is the same way, listed as 1:24 when it is in fact 1:25. But that's not the worst... the San Fran Cable Car kit is listed as 1:24 but is actually 1:48!