Jeff Sauber

Hey, here's an idea......... Let's start a severe drama thread to see if Pat is up to par and ready for battle!! Ok, you guys go first and I'll hang back to see how many accounts end up in coffins....

Hey Pat, why the big announcement?....wouldn't it have been better to remain sort of stealth and pick off people from the tree lines?........

I can tell you that trying to build up a Pyro kit is a daunting task....I managed to squeeze out a decent looking finished product with this '48 Lincoln, but I wouldn't really recommend these kits to anyone.

Got a little body work done today.....Still have to smooth out a bunch of stuff and make a few more adjustments, but it's looking a bit better.....Here's tonights work.

Very nice!!....Love that paint combination.....Looks real clean.

Wow!! just wow!! nice work indeed.

Lyle Willits actually the founding father of this technique, but as you can see, I was eager to give it try. I'll try and get some up close shots of the hood work later today or tonight...It's a very cool technique that works quite well. I may take it a little further and add small strips of half round rod to simulate the "raised area" of each louver, or I may just keep it with the smooth, flush, look......I could go either way.

The louvers are actually N-scale stairs from plastruct. Basically, you just lay down and [lightly tack in place] strips of the stairs in a grouping of your choosing and carefully trace out the width and length that you want onto the hood..You can then begin to CAREFULLY scribe out the hood material to open up the slots that the stairs will fit down into. Try to trim as close as possible in order to cut down on the gaps between the "stairs" and hood slots, otherwise you'll just end up having to fill the extra voids with your favorite body putty or the like.....hope this helps.

Thanks, I'm hoping to get it all wrapped up in time for the NNL east or Mid atlantic NNL.....[which ever one I can try and make it to]. Most of the main work is done, I just have to get the interior work moving along and fill a couple of imperfections in the body...I'll be posting updates here often, since this is a good project to document during it's buildup sessions.

The set I used on my "Christine" model are offered by Pro-Tech and are quite nice. They are turned aluminum pieces and are nicley scaled to size. Check 'em out on the "pro tech site".

well, I have gotten back to this little project today and have been putting together some interior ideas. Here where it stands as of this afternoon. I cut some templates and inserts for the custom door panels, and the dash will under go a make-over as well..More to come.

Thats a great looking FED, the 392 hemi is superb. Beautiful work!!

Thanks Charlie, it's always a great pleasure using your awesome braided hoses and photoetch product line......These items really give the model a very realistic look, and are also quite user-friendly...I'll be placing more orders in the near future, I'm already getting started on another max-detailed race car!!......

I got the rest of the wiring in place. I may add a couple of other very minor details, but I think at this point I finally have the project 99% wrapped up and ready for the display tables..

Mine is a 2004 dodge ram 1500 quad cab, and yeah, it's got the hemi, but at today's gas prices that leaves a little to be desired....[sorry no pics at the moment]

Wait a sec fellas.......how do we actually know that's George holding the model? I say fraud!!...............[just kidding]..

Wanna freak out the judges who like to pick stuff up? Don't attach the chassis, or interiors to the bodies, and as soon as an over-eager judge goes in for a "hands on inspection" and feels the car's sub-assemblies begin to seperate, he'll be put that car right the heck back down!!...... Personally, whenever I display my work, I use a custom display base that I fabricated along with mirrors, so theres no need to fingerprint the hell out of my cars by touching them and trying to get a peek up their skirts..... I spend a couple hours polishing out my finishes, so I'll be darned if someone is gonna come along a feel up my merchandise and leave great big globs of greasy grimy paw prints everywhere, or accidently cause parts to come loose or whatever.

I've been wanting to do the movie version of the car, but believe it or not it would take more work than the race car did, to get it all looking right, and properly detailed.. The AMT kit body is way off and inaccurate, and would need serious correcting to fix the errors.....I'm sure I'll get around to doing it one day, but for now, at least I have the race car version completed..

Great details....I really like the inner door work....cool stuff.

I just coiled up some 26 or 28 gauge craft wire, added a couple of small scratchbuilt fittings, and tucked it under the brake vaccuum booster. It's just some simple brake plumbing, nothing too fancy. I think the master cylinders all look so bare without any lines comming from them. You don't have to plumb the whole car from front to back if you don't want to, but I always try to at least add a couple lines to the fluid resevior for good measure.

Thats a tough lookin nova you have there....any other detail shots?.....what I can see, looks great though.

As far scratchbuilding all that little metal stuff goes, I don't have any fancy machining equipment or anything like that. I use a set of special jeweler's files and do most of the shaping, filing, and cutting, by hand. I do use occasionally what I call a "poor man's lathe"...it's basically just a multi speed dremel tool carefully mounted in a bench vise, For what I do, the system works well. I also have a multi speed cordless drill and a bench grinder....

Thanks Dave, yeah, the AMT mustang is an ok kit, but the fitment of some stuff was a bit off. It did had a nice 289 motor, but I decided to go with a BBF with this one and swapped in the mill from the Revell 70 torino kit. Theres still a little fitting and fussing I need to do with this thing, but I should have some paint on it sometime soon....I was thinking of going with an off white body color with a metallic blue custom hood stripe.

"Kumbaya my lord, Kumbaya"........