Dave Van

You're making me want to do something I said I'd not do again.....build a AM McLaren!!!! Nice work!

Looks great so far!!! Nice paint job too! Glad you saw Last American Hero....a great film.

You are building about the best AM McLaren I've seen! I know how tough a build it is. I built 4 of them for the original Accurate Minatures company....two of which went to McLaren itself! The vinyl lines are cool and tough! I got all of them to work but never did get injector lines on.....If I did you had to leave the engine cover off. Great woork....... My last build for AM...... PS....when AM closed shop they tossed a bunch of kits as they couldn't sell them any longer.

I know they are hard to see....but I made all of mine from the oven bake clay from craft stores. Bought off white clay and painted them after baking. Easy to do.....

Well....I geuss living in Charlotte and working in NASCAR my view is different than most. The movie was filled with so much junk it made it laughable. So many things they talked about were just goofy. Made it hard for me to watch. Then in the movie they would be racing at 'Atlanta' but the film footage would be Charlotte.....Then when in the film they are racing at Charlotte....it would be Michigan. WHY??? If you go to all these tracks use the right track. Also the manufacture of a car will change in the middle of a lap. Watch and see the BUD T-Bird change into a Monte Carlo in the race!! Come on....cars are wrecked then show up fixed a lap later.....It was a slap in the face to fans who could read the walls at the tracks. No respect for the sport in my book. Want to see a REAL NASCAR movie??? Get Last American Hero......THAT'S a racing movie. Tom Cruise haters??? Well my daughter is a child development specialist. 6 years of hard schooling. She has seen and helped treat 1000's for kids with development disabilites. So how can Tom get on national TV (Today show) and say all kids with 'development issues' are just soft parents that don't raise their kids right. If he was talking about a race he would have been hung....but kids with metal issues....it's OK to slander. Look it up! Anyway....model cars.....the only thing I don't like about the MC kit is the headers are wrong. Find a set from a 1/24 scale Monogram 57 Chevy if you car. Much more correct for this car.

A Very Very Bad movie....... Anyway.....the Revell Monogram Monte Carlo kit is a pretty decent kit. The chassis is just a little dated for the car but it's very close.....and it builds easily so a plus. Watch the decals in that kit. One run had bad decals. IIRC the white backing was omitted on one run so the decals bleed so bad they are not usable. BUT there are good aftermarket decals available if you got a bad set.

All my builds for the last ten years are spray can. 99.999% Tamiya TS. Start here........ http://public.fotki.com/DaveVan51/2008-model-builds/

The GLue Batmobile has a bunch more stuff. Two complete motors and chassis and a huge photo etch. This size pfoto etch for planes or ship kits sell alone for $25+....so....no I don't like high prices....but the value in the glue kit is great....or settle for the snap kit.

I bought a few Neon promos just for projects like that......go for it!

First off all the builds look fantastic. Thanks so much for sharing your work. I'd like to add one name to your list. Dave Burket. Dave is working hand in hand with Frank and Dave M. in making these shorter run kits viable. I will not or can go into the details but there is a good chance some of this may not ahppen with out the entire team.....Dave Burket too. And when everyone gets to see what Moebius and Model King have coming it will blow you away!!! And I want to give thanks to Dave, Dave and Frank for allowing me to help out with these kits. It's a very small part...but to me it means the world. Add to it the things I get to do because of my relanoship with Model King and Moebius...... I am Blessed. All in all these are the 'good old days' like the good old days never were. Thanks Dave

This kit will be well worth a $20 street price....Hope the molds don't get made into a Hundyai !!!

Very cool!

Adjustments were made to some engine parts and the major revisions were to front sespension locationors. I don't think I could tell by looking at one kit....but know there is a difference from building. All mods were 'twiking' and not like a new part.

One note on these AM Vette kits. There are two versions available. If you have one with the Charlotte address you have a first gen kit more than likely. A Concord address is a second gen kit....much improved. I built a number of the kits and gave feedback on the second gen kit. Once the mods were made the kit went together well.

You know I'll be watching this build!!!! My 1/1 73

It may be a combo of both. I had family at AM and in fact worked there a day or two packing kits myself! Last time I was in the warehouse there were a good number of Vette kits on hand....along with a lot of other kits. MRC got the aircraft kits, someone that posted on here they had the XSTuning wheels and the Vettes went to RM. I grabbed a bunch of McLaren kits they still had but could not sell and even got a few of the NASCAR Taurus kits that were never issued. While still in biz the AM tooling was in Korea and is more than likely still in the hands of the molder. IF RM needs to run them again they will have to go to them.....but they are more than likely available to anyone with cash.

In all the contests I helped run Box Stock was what comes in the box, glue, paint, foil and decals. Anything else and it's not Box Stock. Build the Revell Snake rear engine rail....it includes fuel likens so it would be box stock if you use the included lines!

Robbie Gordon and Brad's Brother when he runs.

Gannasi has been Chevy for years...RCR motors.

Finished just in time....Penske goes to FORD in 2013.......

Just FYI here is the engine bay in my 1/1 66 2+2 under restoration.......might help some.

In my mind and understanding of the cars today it makes perfect sense. Juan gets a vibration because a hunk of gear breaks off a cluster....the 6000 rpm of the shaft will vibrate like crazy. Chunk of gear gets sucked up into the cluster locking it up along with the rear axle. Watch the video both rear wheels are locked tight. The rear end locked forces down the the front of the car causing the headers to rub pavement....sparks. All in all I don't think they will ever prove what happened. Juan was following the rules that allow him to 'catch the field' and staying down low as possible. If anything NASCAR needs to look at equipment on the track during green or yellow flags. No jet dryer on the track and Juan's intact but broken car is towed from the track worse case.

Supply and demand....simple as that. As a kid growing up in So Cal in the 60's all the guys in our group built models. But so many of them ended up being blown up, set afire and played with outside never to be seen again......didn't leave many for those of us wanting them again 40 years later. I know for a fact we destroyed a bunch of high dollar (today) promos with firecrackers and gasoline!

Why is that not possible??? I,ve worked on those Ford Top Loader 4 sp trans......the NASCAR guys run straight cut gears and super tight tolerances. The smallest chunk of gear breaks off, not hard when they don't use the clutch to shift, and it gets sucked up into the gear cluster it WILL lock up on you. I think 99% of the folks missed on this one. This could have been a true mega tragedy with 2 or more folks killed live on TV. No one hurt, nothing loss than can't be replaced....at the end of the day (night?) all is good. I am not a big Juan fan....but I respect what he has done. When Johnson, Gordon, Kahne, Biffel etc etc win the Indy 500 and the Monaco F1 race and NASCAR races.....let me know

That's a resin kit I produced and mastered. If you want info contact me off board.