GrandpaMcGurk

Hi gang, I started this project in a community build that had a deadline. It was to be a "budget" build with no more than 50 bucks being spent for the the kit, paint and aftermarket goodies. Well, as usual every day life got in the way and I couldn't get it finished by the predetermined due date. So if you'll bear with me I'll complete it here in this thread. I started with the 1/25th scale R/M '71 Hemi Cuda...yeah, I know I hardly ever build anything this small but I figured I'd give it a try just for giggles. My intent is to build a car that Plymouth never did....a production '71 Cuda muscle car with a Super Bird theme. Nuff' yaking here's some pics of where it's at now...... The chassis is pretty much right out of the box, I added disc brakes to the front as the kit inner wheel halves were simply too toy like. A little texture, rust and road grime make it a bit more believable.....remember, this is a budget build. The tire at the upper left of your PC screen is the only one that has been finished. I'm using a resin Gibson "Super Stock" engine (the Hemi in the kit is a bit lack luster in my mind) with some modifications to make it more like an engine that could have been found in a production car at the time. I'm modifying the kit intake manifold to replace the Gibson super stock unit and scratch built a distributor. (I couldn't drill the resin one without it chipping out).

Due to the things that pop up in every day life, I'm not going to be able to complete this car by the 31st. I'll complete it in the work bench section.

Here's a pic from the TDR catalog.....it's offered as a 1/12th RP body (not cast). Contact Tim directly at TDR Innovations to see if it will print well and pricing in 1/16th. Their E address is at the bottom of this post under my name.

The "lads" heard ya Gregg...... Who knows, I'm sure it came as a surprise to Syd when I asked him to work with us on the Roadster prototype. We feel that selecting one of you builders from time to time to work with us in this fashion provides a field tested product. It allows us to make running changes and provide you guys with a better product.

Eelco, I won't be using the scoop as a "Shaker" air cleaner. I'm lowering the front of the car by channeling the front of the body down on the belly pan and will add Super Bird type bumps on the tops of the fenders for tire clearance. The shaker will be molded into the the hood with the openings facing the windshield. I'll fab up an air cleaner for the carbs under the hood. The nose and rear spoiler are all intended to make the car slippery and provide down force at high speeds....that shaker (as it comes) is just top end wind drag...that's why it's becoming an integral part of the hood and turned around, it'll act more as a vent for under hood trapped air and heat and add a little bling. My intention is to make the Cuda look like an attempt by Plymouth to build a race inspired factory "baby" Superbird for the muscle car crowd of the period.

As you guys that have built this model know, the front end of this car sits way too high.....rather than weaken the kit torsion bar suspension I'll channel the body down a bit in front. You can see in the pic where I'll be trimming the inner fender panels. Probably will have to cut the floor pan from the interior tub and shorten it's height a bit also. Still, all in all it's easier than moving the spindles up. The next two pics show the mocked up nose and "swing set" rear spoiler. Sure it would have been easier to pick up a junk Superbird kit and modify the nose and spoiler for this build but where's the fun in that? Perhaps I'm just a glutton for punishment.

Got a little more done on the "Super Fish". I scratch built a distributor from scrap as the resin one was too difficult for me to drill out individual holes for plug wires. I cut the grille from the valance as I won't be using it with the Super Fish nose. I'm in the process of modifying the kit intake manifold as I don't want to use that big super stock one that came with the Gibson engine. Also added a little more texture to the valve covers after drilling for the plug wires, hopefully a light coat of flat black will give me that "factory" wrinkle paint look. It's also good practice for the vinyl top I'll be adding later. There's a couple of slightly blurry pics coming up as my club fingers inadvertently switched off my macro setting and I didn't want to take the time to re-shoot them....sorry 'bout that. I'm not going to go with the "shaker" hood. I'll be turning it around backwards and molding it into the hood for a little more slippery shape. Started cobbling up the nose...you can never have too many clamps. It's difficult to see in the photo but the added nose extention is peaked in the center and turned upward at the edges.

Getting my first car roadworthy, knowing that one more birthday and I'd have a "legal" drivers license......a '34 Plymouth coupe.

Alight then, being 63 and figuring 30 bucks for the kit and motor, a couple cans of spray paint and few of those small testers paint jars I guess I qualify. Here's a few pics of where I'm at. Sanded and starting assembling the resin Gibson engine. Detailed the kit wheels with a little paint. Assembling the chassis and adding a bit of paint detail.....a little rust and road road grime as this is intended to be a driver not a trailer queen. The addition of the disc brakes was a pain in the butt but sure looks a lot better that the kit "toy" back wheel half.

I haven't built a small scale model in years but this sounds like fun so let me ask a couple of questions to see if I fall within your "rules". I bought a 1/25th "Revell Muscle" '71 Plymouth Hemi Cuda a few years back (as reference) for a 1/8th scale Cuda I'm working on, I was somewhat disappointed as the kit has no shocks , clunky inner wheel halves, wrong interior pattern and to top it all off just doesn't just doesn't look right. I bought it a Hobby Lobby with a 40% off coupon so the kit cost me about 12 bucks. I also have a resin Gibson Super Stock engine. The engine was given to me by a friend but they cost around twenty bucks or so depending on where you buy them. I have plenty of paint on hand from other builds including tubes of acrylics (used to be an artist) that occasionally I dip a brush into for weathering etc. Like I said....I don't normally build small scale so I have no large stash of parts. The only kit bashed parts will be disc brake calipers taken from a broken die cast model. You all are familiar with the Plymouth "Super Bird" I'm sure, what I have in mind is turning the Cuda into "Super Fish" as if Plymouth had built it as a street muscle car in the '70's to complete with the Judge, Boss etc, cars of the era. I have no way of figuring scratch built parts as I generally use scrap plastic, house hold throw aways and I buy fillers, sand paper etc, in bulk for full size stuff. So it's up to you guys... do I qualify?

Here's a couple pics of the "real" engine that Rick is working with.....rather than go with a traditional "old school" engine he's taking a different approach by using a modern power plant in his Woody. That seems to be the trend with today's Hot Rods. Of course if you're feeling lazy you could always cover the whole thing with a piece of plastic like the factory does and call it sound deadening.......LOL.

Here are a few tips from the Madd Fabricator....... When initially doing the body prep sanding, DO NOT use any sandpaper coarser than 280-320 grit as you will either sand completely through the thin gel coat surface or leave deep gouges in the surface which will then require additional primer/surfacer. This only creates additional unnecessary work for yourself. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- During this intial body work DO NOT completely cut out the door and drivers compartment openings !!!!!! The reason for this will be explained in an upcoming post. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I would also suggest that you use only wet/dry type paper, and preferably WET. You will notice that there are some molds lines visible and you may use the 280 grit to initially remove these. Make sure you sand everything with 400 grit or finer prior to applying the primer filler coats and before any color coats of paint. Any spots where you feel that you need to use spot putty, I suggest you make sure the surface is roughed up and hit with a light coat of primer filler before using the putty. Remember any lacquer based putty will shrink over time, so do not try to fill any deep areas with it. If you find an area that needs a significant amount of filler, I suggest you use a two part putty like Euro Glaze or any good polyester type filler. Also use final prep and tack rags faithfully. Doing so will help you create the type of finish you're hoping for.

I just had a chat with Syd regarding how to prep the fiberglass body for his TDR Roadster build, as he mentioned he (like many of you) may have never worked with a glass body before. We've decided to do a mini tutorial at this point and pass along some tips, hopefully to give everyone a "step-up" as far as handling the finishing required to take the "mystery" out of the equation. First of all, glass is not resin.......period. TDR uses fiberglass for it's bodies because they are much lighter, they can be produced thinner than resin castings. They can also be keep much closer to scale. The molds themselves are fiberglass as well...they don't break down the way rubber molds can and from one body to the next the castings remain constant. Another benefit is that the bodies are laid up by hand one at a time...extra reinforcements can be added to corners etc. without the bodies becoming overweight, thick door stops as is often the case with resin. Glass tends to be far more stable than resin in these (large scale) models. The bodies are done with multiple layers of fiberglass cloth (fine, med. mesh) and random mat. Pinholes and hidden voids are all but eliminated...if we happen to fine a flaw it is repaired before shipment or the body is trashed....TDR nor the Madd Fabricator sells seconds as finished castings. One more interesting point is that bodies can be laid up in sections...for instance....if someone really messed up a fender.....it could be laid up as a "partial" without having to replace the entire body. The only draw back to glass as far as TDR is concerned is that being laid up one at a time they require a little more time to produce than pouring resin. Anyway, enough chatter....Syd will post some pics of the prototype body he received, give you his impressions and we'll dig into it from there. Being unfamiliar with glass, Syd will be learning as he goes and sharing his hands on experience with the rest of you members.......so if you've been reluctant to give a glass body a try, follow along as Syd tackles his. He will be able to point out the "beginners" questions that TDR or the Madd Fabricator don't think about. We'll answer them as they pop up. If any of you members have questions about the glass please feel free to ask in this thread....we'll do our best to shed some light on them.....back to Syd.

Syd......the 427 looks great, try to save some of your enthusiasm for the body......you'll be getting your prototype soon. If you could (being the body is fiberglass), perhaps pass a few basic (do's & don'ts) finishing tips on to the MCM members following this thread. I'm sure many haven't worked with a glass body before.

As Dave mentioned the 392 & 426 Hemi engines are two totally different critters. An easy way to tell the difference at a glance it that the distributor & and oil filter are on the rear of the 392 - they are on the front of the 426. The really old (baby) hemis 331 etc. have the bell-housing cast as part of the block.

My daily driver is a pick-up truck............are the cars pictured in this thread supposed to be a modern replacement for my spare tire?

I don't think the molds are gone as there's a part or 2 in the Big T 3 'n 1 kit carried over from the big drag. If I remember right, the Big Drag floor board is in the newer kit.

I started "welding" with scrap black plastic but it was difficult to see & and photograph, so I switched to white. Here's a shot of the inside before any clean-up. The left side has been rough sanded, the right has not... I'll melt a little more plastic into voids and then sand again... I sprayed a light coat of red primer/sealer over the gray for photo clarity and to use as a guide coat when I start the final sanding. Even though the rear of the roof has been raised nearly 1/4" no filler or adhesive was used, it's all plastic and can be handled, sanded, drilled or whatever right after welding. No need to wait for adhesives to set-up or dry before working on it.

Another spam attack! Guys, I don't know how many of you folks have been hit by this current flurry of garbage but over the last few weeks spam has been going out in spades through e mails in my name "Don Garrett" & grandpamcgurk. If anyone recieves an E from me with an attachment or link DO NOT OPEN IT!!!!!!!! Toss it in your spam file or quaranteen it. They are not from me.....period! I'm going to change all my pass words and may even change from Yahoo to another E mail source. These (I'll refrain from calling them what I'd like to) hackers are getting pretty clever and difficult to track down. I've have all sorts of safe guards in place but like I said......unless I state (personally) in a message to you that it's a pre-screened link or attachment......it's not from me.

I don't like to use any more filler than I have to....shrinkage, ghost lines and so on over time can spoil an otherwise great paint job. Glued butt joints are weak and prone to crack with any sort of handling even when backed up with sheet plastic glued on the back side. Fillers are usually softer or harder than the surrounding material and don't sand/finish at the same rate........more problems. Sooooo...I "plastic weld" the joints, fill & build up areas with the same plastic that the body is made of. NO glue or filler! What I'll wind up with is a body that's one piece and all plastic. Here's a couple of pics showing the spot welds to hold sections in position and I'll post more photos using scrap plastic from the kit as filler. I'll also show how I fuse fine copper or brass mesh to the inside of the body to add even more strength to the shell. Be warned...melting plastic stinks and the fumes are probably bad for you. It's also very easy to warp or ruin a body if you don't take your time and apply too much heat in one area...not for everybody, but it allows me to do things would be darn near impossible simply gluing chunks together.

Lets see if we can fix some the uglies this Lindy body came with........ Here's the 2 piece body glued together out of the box. I opened up the wheel well to accommodate the big rubber and started tapering the back of of the body so that it wouldn't look quite as clunky. Just a little more trimming should give it the "look" I'm after.

In between fume sessions, curing time, screw-ups and sticky fingers working on the Cuda body molds & TDR stuff....leaves me with very little building time. Anyway, nuff whinin', on with the build. I did an eyeball mock-up using one of those metal 1/6th engine kits...... Being I'm after a "look" rather than accuracy to scale it seemed reasonable...NOPE...looked too big. Tried a 1/8th TDR 426.....BUMMER.....the old orbs said just a little too small. As we all know there aren't a abundance of parts available between 1/8th & 1/6th. The engine parts below were cobbled up from sliced and diced 1/6th scale metal and plastic parts. The kit 1/6th carb is on the left........a 1/8th TDR carb on the right. this pic shows the cut down 1/6th in the middle (primer). Same deal with the cylinder head. Valve cover..... This one is for size comparision and the engine block.....1/6th, 1/7th? and TDR 1/8th. Now I'll cut down an oil pan & fab up an intake.

Oh my, looks like I'm getting close to what I want this grille to look like. I just knew it was hiding in that clay & putty somewhere. Still have a little touch up to do around the nose & eye openings but I'll soon be able to add the hood/cloak and call it done. The body however is a whole different ball game. It a 2 piece deal (yuk) and I plan on some radical ? mods. I want to raise the rear of the roof but not the front...I also plan to pie section the body to build in an exaggerated "rake". I have to open up some huge wheel wells for the tubs and I want to taper the rear of the body.....guess I'd better drag out my "irons" as I'm going to be doing some plastic welding.