David G.

@Michael F Ah, so you are. I stand corrected. If this is the worst mistake I make this year, I'll be doing great! =D-

@Michael F Thank you for posting this! Great color combination, excellent construction and detail, it's a beautiful build! And it's our first long roof Merc! David G.

Thank you so much Carl. Thank you most kindly Bil. It's a great feeling knowing that someone finds inspiration in my work. David G.

Thank you very much Dann. It's great seeing you back on the boards. =D-

Indeed you do, thank you Dann. =D-

You've made some good progress on this David. I've always wanted have a go at building a scale structure like this and I'm finding your posts enlightening, informative and entertaining. A thought about the errors you've related experiencing. One thing I've found in my experience when measuring, cutting and fitting is that I sometimes neglect to take into account the thickness or volume of the material I'm working with. If I find that my results don't seem to match what my measurements and calculations predicted, that's the first error I check for and it's frequently the solution. Please forgive me if that's turned out as an insulting assumption but I believe that you know I do mean well. David G.

Hello Everybody! I finished this one late yesterday, here's my "next the last step" post. I've secured and "re-chromed" the upper header tubes. The lower tubes have been realigned, secured and repainted. They're a little rough but after this, it's likely that nobody will ever see them again anyway. I've installed the bumpers and license plates. At first I thought the red & white would be a nice contrast to the blue and chrome car but now it seems a bit too much red. I'll have to see if I can tone that down a little. I'm also not happy with the rear window alignment. I'll probably do one more posting for this one but other than that, Fin! Thanks to all of you who followed along and helped to keep me inspired and interested through your inspiring and interesting posts. More later. David G.

Thank you Greg. The chrome certainly does help to bring it to life. I'm also glad to know that my build thread may be of some help to someone. Thank you kindly Carl. The custom work you did on yours was clean, logical and very well done. I'm flattered that you compare this to yours in such a way, thank you. Thank you Daniel. Unsurprisingly, I wondered that very same thing myself. If anyone could make it work, I'm sure you could. That they did David! I was a little surprised that there were no locator pins engineered into the tubes or manifolds. Everything was a floating butt joint which made it nearly impossible to use the standard "tack one end, secure the other, then secure the tack" procedure. Which is why ended up drilling and pinning the whole assembly; made even more challenging with the kit 90% assembled. It's like I say: "Model builders, we're problem solvers who create our own problems to solve!" As for including a Cord in you Collection d'Elegance, I agree that you should. The Cord and her sister the Auburn Speedster certainly do fit nicely into the Art Deco esthetic of the Delahaye 135 and the Talbot Lago. My opinion may be a little biased but I've always been partial to the whole Auburn, Cord, Duesenberg line. We Americans don't do a whole lot of world class work but when we do... we do. =D- Thanks again to all of you who took the time to post a comment. David G.

Hello Everybody! I spent one whole build session applying BMF for the grille trim. I also took this photo to see if I could duplicate the box art photo, not too bad. Another couple of hours for installing the header tubes. This was probably the most challenging part of this build. I ended up drilling and pinning the tubes, manifolds and exhaust pipes. With all the manhandling it took to get then in place, some of the chrome paint got worn away. I can fix this later. Another thing to fix later will be the alignment of the tubes to the exhaust pipes on the lower end. Once the upper ends cure. As always, thanks for taking the time to look. Also, thanks to those of you who also take the time to post a comment. David G.

Thank you Carl. You probably recognize a few of those builds, eh? David G.

Thank you Zackary, I'm glad to know that you like it. =D-

Yeah, there was sooo much that needed to be adjusted when I built mine. I found that the interior and rear window interfered with the trunk hinges and needed to be filed down quite a bit for the trunk to fit properly. Pretty much every feature of this car needed to be adjusted, tweaked or corrected. I didn't even bother with the exhaust. I wanted to use the side pipes included in the kit but couldn't figure how to mount them so they looked operational. I think you did a great job with a rather difficult kit. David G.

I use Micro Sol and Micro Set decal setting solutions and for me it often takes multiple applications to get the decals to lay down properly. For stubborn decals I'll usually allow a few hours for the solution to dry then reapply. Then I'll let it rest over night and see what it looks like in the morning and plan accordingly. I hope this helps. David G.

Impressive work on those hinges! David G.

Thank you very much Ken. =D-

I love all the upgrades you made to this one Carl. I also enjoyed following your WIP on this build. The results are fabulous! David G.

A very nice build of an old and tricky kit. I built one of these last year so I know how much work this kit can be. Well done! David G.

Nicely done, love the color! David G.

It sure does look the part, excellent work! David G.

That's a great looking Roadrunner Jim! David G.

That's a tidy bit of work David, the roofing looks great! David G.

That's some good looking paint Brenton. David G.

What a delightful project this is shaping up to be David. It seems nearly as involved as planning and building a full scale structure. Beautiful work so far! David G.

Thank you most kindly David. Yes, I would have liked to made the hideaway headlights and hood operational but as you mentioned in your comment, this will still be a satisfying build in the end. And that's what it's really all about. Thank you Noel. I think the challenges we face and overcome in a build add to the sense of accomplishment we feel as we finish it. David G.

Thank you Ken. =D-