styromaniac

At the Smithsonian......

I was on my lunchbreak today at the Barnes and Noble near Springfield Mall, perusing the car magazines when I realized the white haired gent standing next to me was none other than "The Bill Stillwagon". So I turn and say "Bill"? He turned and thankfully recognized me from the MAMA meetings of days gone by. Of course I had to extend my hand and commence with the "what have you been up to...what are you building ?" conversation. After a lengthy chat I can tell you he is just as enthusiastic and helpfully informative about the hobby as ever.

Granted many a nameless wrench turner pulled off the feat first...but are we talking iconic here? Ideal proportions, wheelbase, etc

LOL....I knew it would be only a matter of time before you rang in with precise info....Thanks Bill!

https://goo.gl/images/LJQq5i. T Bucket Plans website.....

The first Hot Rod T Bucket? Did Tommy Ivo's Buick powered T arrive about the same time as Gabowski's T...or did it show up later? Then there was Ed Iskendarians T....which may have predated them all.

I remember Agnes well! My brother and I were home for the summer our freshman year at Va Tech...we spent a whole night down in the basement at our home in McLean bailing water out of a storm drain in a stairwell trying to keep the flood water from running into the downstairs storage area...fortunately we were able to minimize the damage.That storm spawned tornadoes all up and down the Ohio valley and caused so much flood damage along the Susquehanna river valley in Pennsylvania the upper Chesapeake Bay had peoples lawn furniture floating around for months. The agricultural run off was blamed for polluting the Susquehanna Flats grass beds and nearly killing off the striped bass.Those fish didn't come back to decent numbers again for almost 20 years.

Agreed...Ive been shopping online for years and almost never seen this kit built or unbuilt...quite rare.

I think a well executed model doesn't necessarily have to be super detailed...to me it's all about balance. For example...it makes little sense to me if a scale model car has a detailed engine compartment with all the wiring etc if the remainder of the model lacks a similar level of detail...its imbalanced. An out of the box rendition lacking all the fine details can still be a great model as long as the stance is good, the paint is nicely finished and the execution is clean. But that's just me...

Nicely done! I've always liked that box art.

Thanks Gary. Thats what ten or twelve years of ebay will do to you.Maybe when I retire in 5 or 6 years I will actually build/restore some of those kits.

LoL....good one there Jim!

Not surprised you have those books Dave....I'm sure your work/hobby space is a veritable museum of kits and memorabilia.By the way...I've enjoyed your Fotki photo space for a number of years now....

98i9x98

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Great thread. Years ago when I discovered the internet I began searching for kits from my youth, mainly for the cool box art ( due to shortage of funds I couldnt ante up for mint in box ) Eventually managed to acquire a few built or partially built kits. Can't speak to the AMT annuals or foreign sports cars....but based on years of searching for niche kits of the 60s...it became clear which ones appeared to have "holy grail" status. Kudos to anyone who has managed to obtain the following..... Any of the Revell "Double Car Kits" Monogram "Uncertain T" ( not my cup of T ) Monogram Daryll Starbird "Futurista" AMT "Wild Dream" and "Tognotti T" Revell Roth "Brother Rat Fink" After years of perusing the internet these five stand out as really hard to come by.

Nice work Dave! And those old Revell/Pactra/Testors trophies make excellent book ends for your work bench/modelling library....I've picked up 5 of them through the years.

LoL.... "Go Back Buggy".....think something was amiss in the translation....or maybe they drive it in reverse.

Thanks for the compliment Michael. And yes...that is Mullholland Drive on the L.P. cover...overlooking the L.A. Basin.( Wonder if Deadmans Curve is anywhere near there ). The car was actually owned by Fred Steele from Massachusetts, he and Doug Spinney built it and Fred had moved west and become a member of the LA Roadsters car club when a photographer was looking for a suitable vehicle for the Ventures nightime cover shot and the ice box "appliance white" paint job on the T was perfect....bet it irked a lot of Californian hot rodders that an easterner was chosen! The build was deceptively more difficult than you can imagine, despite the availability of useful parts...real challenging to get all the work crammed and aligned into a 90 inch scale wheelbase...some short cuts were needed. Lots of info on the real car on the "T Bucket Plans" website....just Google Fred Steele T Bucket. P.S. Neat dune buggy kit...never seen it before. Would like to do my own version of a Meyers Manx from one of the kit variations out there. Steve McQueen's Manx from "The Thomas Crown Affair comes to mind...he did his own driving on the beach in that movie and no doubt scared Faye Dunaway blasting around those dunes.

That album cover motivated me

I just spent 10 days hiking and camping up in Banf and Jasper....stunning country up there. Hello to all up north. Waiting for some of that cool Canadian air down here in hot and humid Virginia.

"Surf Hearse". Not that far fetched. Found an interesting article online once about how the 60s surfers would buy up used hearses from huge lots and live in them at the beach. Apparently the funeral trades in California were always upgrading their fleets with newer fancier models and a decent relatively low mileage hearse could be had for minimal bucks...plenty of room for boards, blankets, bunnies.

Got the '29...but missed out on the '30. Fortunately I have squirreled away a couple of original issues of that Monogram stock '30...think one of them is molded in an olive green.