Erik Smith

Quick and dirty review. MIG is more chrome but is not - or doesn’t appear to be - aluminum. Feels like a vinyl. I could be wrong. See photos. This is an old sheet of BMF New Improved Chrome vs MIg Chrome sheet. The MIG will work for relative flat, simple shapes. It does not conform to fine detail like BMF. I used my usual techniques - fat thumb and wet toothpick - but I couldn’t really get it to work on the Vette emblem. Works ok on window trim. The BMF - hard to see in photos - actually polishes with just a dry QTip to almost same level as MIG chrome. Conclusion: MIG works ok - use on flat simple shapes. BMF still more useful for fine detail and masking. Definitely better at pressing into scripts and shaping around curves. Photos:

On to some interior work. Seats will be Recaro from Clearly Scale with 6 point belts. Will configure a roll bar too, since I would like a roof rack.

Or the "it worked fine before I brought it in" people. Well, it worked fine before it broke hence the reason you brought it in... I was little discerned by his handling of the parts he was removing, but, yeah, that's still showing slightly more respect than the owner of the car is displaying. It's funny how some people, or a lot of people, treat cars like $1 toys they buy at the dollar store. Even people who are environmentally concerned. You don't have to like the fact cars aren't the best for a lot of things environmentally speaking, but not respecting the amount of materials and time that was put into the design and manufacture of ANY automobile is near sighted to say the least. If people would take care of things we wouldn't need to make soooo many unnecessary new things (or if things were made better...but that's another big can of wriggly worms). Anyhow, nice video. Reminds me of how much fun I had doing the brakes on my recently deceased 1993 Camry wagon.

Pretty awesome. From what I read, he quit his day job and will be committing to this stuff full time. If he does this much part time, can't wait to see what a full time gig will be. It would be really cool to see a full kit offered - at the least, a chassis, interior tub and glass - I would gladly fork over a decent wad of cash for that. As it stands, I know myself well to enough to realize I would have trouble keeping up and finishing one of the projects as he currently offers them, awesome as they are.

nope. MPC and AMT. Revell is a pro street.

Any print form has prices that are just guesses or out of date. If you want an idea of current market value do an eBay search and filter sold items. That is the current market value - at least for people buying on eBay. The Directory of Model Car Kits is actually a very useful directory. Use it in combination with eBay to derive information.

That’s pretty cool. His products appear to be very accurate representations, and man does he have a lot to offer! Serious amount of time and money for a finished product, but as seen by Paul Hettick’s versions of some of the bodies, they get respect. Did some quick googling and found THIS for frame reference material, for those taking the plunge!

Baby projects toward the whole… Minilites are close to done - need to add some valve stems and dust. The Cologne V6 is getting more parts added - somehow I lost one of the valve covers, but had a spare, so it’s in the paint “shop” now.

Cool. Always like seeing a Mini. It is amazing how small the real cars are - we went to a small British car show last summer and they had old and new minis side by side. Yup, scale checks out.

Black steelies would look good. Hehe. Very cool paint.

Oh no. A lot of my cans are pretty old - one good thing about building really slow. Hate to see something go wrong with another quality product, though - so tired of garbage products everywhere.

Tamiya’s TS paints are really nice (some are flat though which require gloss coat). They are a little limited on colors but have basic solids. Nice thing about the Tamiya sprays is they don’t need a clear coat if applied well. That gives a more realistic car finish to my eye. Tulio HERE does fantastic, realistic paint with just Tamiya color I believe - apply in a fairly heavy coat and as it dries it shrinks up nice and smooth. I think clear top coats look good on custom and some modern cars, but the simple gloss from just the paint mimics a scale classic finish better, in my humble opinion.

I just use the insulation from a larger size wire.

You can also use latex mask (for water color paint). Paint it on, paint over it, peel it off. Works well for small areas of focus - valve covers below were “chipped” to reveal “metal” beneath

You need the hairspray. The acrylic paint won't chip away without it. The hairspray becomes soluble when you expose it to water, acrylic paint, once dry, is dry. You will have to expose some of the hairspray from under the topcoat to start the chipping process - according to my experience - then brush and work the tip coat off as you go. As Bill posted above, google the technique in train or military forums - tons of super good info on weathering.

That’s some fine cutting, Pete. Should be a cool way to display your contents.

Tiny bits of progress. I am building a mid-race version, so will be a little dirty - and the car will not be a show car. The cologne V6 got painted in all black, I exposed some little bits of chipped paint and put a light coat of road dust on. Wheels will be 13” minilites from Fireball Modelworks.

Impossible. The Council of Immortality voted unanimously, after hearing testimony from The Great Ak, and gave Saint Claus the Mantle of Immortality in recognition of his life spent making children happy.

Very nice interior. Thanks for documenting your work - I’ve got one of these to build also and this helps!

Make sure your painting area is clean. Looks like a lot of dust in the paint. Tamiya is pretty forgiving and has a high “shrink” rate (there is probably some technical term for that), so your final coats need to be wet - they will look heavy on the model, like almost ready to run, but when dry it will be smooth and details that looked obliterated will be visible. That’s my experience.

Nice looking model! I actually abhor these things in real life, but in model world? Bring it. The D-50 I had (1:1) had automatic hubs, so not visually different than the kit’s. They would sometimes engage on the Highway.

Tamiya part number 74161 Burbank’s has them for $7

Mostly all builders or collectors with plans to build around here, so we see that kit a little different honestly. I would never pay $60 for it but I also don’t care about Three Stooges merchandise.

Awesome. Very well done.

Yeah, cool deal Bill. I’m still buying resin casting stuff and wondering if it’s still worthwhile doing so… Im anxious to see what you get going with this.