W-409

Thanks Randy! I'm happy to say that I got the paint job fixed. After it was completely dry, I sanded it with 1,000 grit hoping that I won't go through the paint as then I would have to start all over again. Luckily that didn't happen so when the paint job looked smoother, I went back to the garage and sprayed another light coat of gold on the body. This time the result looks much better, so now I'll let it dry and then I'll shoot some clear on it...

This looks like an interesting project! In real life I'm not so interested in four door models (Just turned 1:1 '62 Chevy II from 4D into 2D Sedan ), but these are very interesting as scale models! So I'll be watching this one. For the panel lines I've found out that "Dymo Tape" is excellent stuff. It's so strong that you can easily push your scriber against the tape and it will not fail. As a result it gives you a perfectly straight line, or of course you can cut the tape in whatever shape you want... If there's a curve in the panel line, cut a similar curve into the tape before applying it to the model and then just scribe the new panel line using the tape as a "quide". That way I redid panel lines for Monogram's "BadMan" kit where the original ones were competely disappeared in some spots... I used Trumpeter's Panel Line Scriber for that job but I bet there are other good tools for the scribing itself too.

Great job saving an old kit! I think these old and rare kits should always be restored even though they were in poor condition...Just like you did in here. Great to see a flawless black paint job, especially with that sharp BMF work. I wish I found one of these kits too, but usually they cost too much...

Wow, a big bunch of excellent quality builds. Just like always from your bench! Every time I'm impressed by the quality of your paint jobs, they are simply flawless. All of them are very nice, but if I had to pick a favorite I'd probably go with that black '56 Ford.

Yep there have been some kits around back then, but nowadays those are way too expensive for my budget!

Seeing a kit of any Dodge Dart (or Valiant) up to 1966 would be great news. Even though I'm a Chevy guy, I'd need a couple of those... Anyway they are a fairly common sight here in Finland at different car events. When I visited in SoCal I was surprised by how few Valiants or Darts were there, here on a regular Cruise Night you'll see at least 5 to 10 Darts and Valiants each time.

I've ordered parts from Ted's Modeling Marketplace several times. I also live outside the USA but shipping has never been a problem when dealing with Ted. The service is fast and shipping charges are fair, which is often not the case when watching the eBay... Plus that he has lots of good parts and accessories in stock. I have only good things to say about that place, highly recommended.

That first chapter sounds just like me! Most of my friends are into those new cars that have nothing cool in them, plus that they all look pretty much the same. Then there's me who has zero interest in those, I rather stick with old US Iron... Anyway, to me that Chevy looks like a great starting point for a restoration project! And with your buiding skills I'm sure you could do it.

Congrats to Bruce! This year I didn't finish my Chrysler "Turbine" Car as I just didn't have time to build anything during the summer months... Well, let's see what happens next year. I already have a few ideas, but I'm not sure yet which one I'll enter with...

I'm not a Lowrider guy, but as I have a '92 S10 as my daily driver, it's nice to see one of these built! Nice job with the paint job and BMF. Overall a very nice and clean build so I like it too.

Thanks Gents! The first attempt at painting the body didn't turn out quite as good as I hoped. It's not a disaster, but I guess somehow the paint reacted with the primer creating a horrible looking finish. I'm hoping that once I let it dry for a few days, light sanding and repainting would fix it... The body looks better in the pictures than it really is, if it was that good I wouldn't have to repaint it.

Yep I guess I should do that! I have two '75 Malibu Stock Car kits on the stash, the other one of them will be modified into our Stock Eliminator car. There are just some little details like the grille that need to be figured out before starting.... As for the wheels/hubcaps, both of them look really good. But maybe I'd end up with the hubcaps myself?

Yep those tires don't quite hook up. But that '78 Malibu isn't very light car and with the original 350 SBC you'd probably catch me in the top end... Or then I could take out the '74 Malibu...?

Thanks Dan! I haven't seen any of these built either, so I have no clue either how this kit looks when it's done. After a bit of sanding and scribing the panel lines a bit deeper the body was ready to be shot with Primer. But before that I had to mask off the molded in grille and tail lights, as otherwise some of the molded in details could be hidden under paint. My plan is to BMF those when the body is painted, clear coated and polished... After the first coat of Primer the body looked surprisingly good. Usually at this point I find a couple of small errors that need to be fixed before painting, but it looks like this time I can spray some color on it next. And last here's a picture of the interior tub that got some color on it as well. The floor is Revell's Flat Black and backseat and door panels are painted with the same stuff as I used with the front seat. Of course I need to add some details to the door panels before I can install anything on place...

Yep, I was struggling with the same issue for a few days, but yesterday I figured it out... The new adress is forum.FCMA.fi. Great job on the front seat and paint!

Dang.... I hate that Photobucket. To me they showed up just fine though... Well, luckily we have Fotki.

I agree with Bill that I prefer the earlier '73-'77 Malibu body style (Not only because I race a '74 Malibu in Stock Eliminator). But I've always liked that later body style too. I think it would make a great daily driver for myself, but they're not easy to find in good condition anymore around here. And most importantly, if I find one in good condition, the price tag is a bit too high... Well, luckily I don't need to change my daily driver as the '92 Chevy S10 is working great all year round.

Wow that is an impressive build as always from your bench! I just went through the whole WIP-thread and again, words aren't enough to describe how beautiful this bike is. Old Drag Bikes are seen way too rarely, and even though I'm not exactly a bike guy myself (Even though I like old Drag Bikes and old school style Bobbers), I'd like to build one of these too. It's just too bad that these kits are so hard to find... Anyway, fantastic work! That Alclad on the engine looks very realistic, and it even has fuel inside the transparent fuel line!!

Here's my AMT Dodge Charger Daytona, built for the "Cannonball Run" Community Build on this forum. The kit wasn't too great, but with some modifications it can be built into something presentable. I have one Revell Superbird on my stash, but I'm not sure when I'll get around building it...

This solid looking G-Body Malibu has been sitting for a long time on some company's yard under a tarp. Now the tarp was off for some reason so I tried to shoot a picture of it. Those Malibus are good looking cars. And yesterday while Cruising around Helsinki with my daily driver, I saw this early '70s Toyota Celica parked to the side of the road. I'm definitely not a Toyota fan, but some of these older ones are really cool! But what really made my day was this very nice and clean Jeep Wagoneer! Seeing these is rare, but I can't even remember when was the last time when I saw one that was in as good shape as this one.

Wow, looks like we have similar interests! I have a bunch of those Ramchargers Dodges to be used as donor kits for some early '60s Mopars but I also have one that will be built some day... Dyno Don '61 Impala is currently in progress, but I'm modifying it as the Optional Super Stock version that he ran in '61 Indy. And Hayden Proffit '62 Bel Air is also waiting for its' turn together with Dave Strickler's '62 Bel Air. I also built Beswick's Catalina a few years ago, as well as one '62 Impala Super Stocker.... Hopefully you'll post some pics when you get started with them!

Yep it's not very often when you see old US cars cruising around, unless there's a Cruising night nearby. Those old Fiats are seen sometimes, but I can't say that they would be common cars either. But that Aspen looks really good. Those are often in very poor condition, so seeing one as nice and clean as that one is rare! The speed restriction sticker was used on old vans. After '81 Vans that were heaver than 3968 lbs had the maximum speed limit of 80 km/h, and it had to have that ugly yellow "80" sign on the rear end. If the van was lighter, you didn't need this, and if the car had ABS brakes and airbag on driver's side then it didn't have that 80 limit either. And to make this a bit more confusing, this applied to all cars that were registered as vans, so many Station Wagons and Pickups were also having that 80 km/h speed limit. If I'm not mistaken, Pickups are automatically registered as vans, but Station Wagons could be registered as "Passenger Cars" as well... But the reason they were almost always registered as "Vans" was that you didn't have to pay ridicullously high taxes from them... If it was registered as a passenger car, then your only choice was to pay a lot of tax from it... So that's why pretty much all STWs that are big enough (Caprice Classic for example) have that speed limit on the back. That's one of the many laws here in Finland that don't make any sense. Believe me, there are more idiotic rules as far as cars go....This is one of them. Luckily my S10 is so light that it doesn't have that 80 km/h limit!

That turned out great! You can never have too many Vintage Super Stock cars! Nice to see a different version of this kit than the Color Me Gone/Maverick/Ramchargers version we usually see built from this kit. Nice job with the paint and decals. Great job!

Saw this '82-'87 El Camino on the parking lot a while ago. Here in Finland these G-Body Caminos are unfortunately pretty often in quite poor condition as back in the day they were used as a daily drivers for a long time... And especially the Finnish winter doesn't treat daily drivers very well... So seeing one in this nice condition was really cool, I had to park my daily driver (1st gen Chevy S10) and shoot a picture. And later on the same day an older Chevy Truck was spotted on another parking lot. Unfortunately the picture didn't turn out that great, but..... I spotted this '76 El Camino probably two weeks ago if I'm not mistaken. It's in nice clean condition too, and it's always great to see these GM 3rd Gen A-Bodies as I'm racing a '74 Malibu in Stock Eliminator. And the most recent one was this '68 Firebird Convertible that I saw last weekend. It looked pretty solid too.

That's cool! We have a '60 Impala 2D HT in our family. My dad bought it in the late '80s and just a few years ago I welded new quarter panels on it. Very fun car to cruise around with, under the hood is almost stock 283+PG. It's not fast, but it always takes you where you're going.Here it is in 2015. Sorry for the little offtopic, anyway, you can never see too many X-Frame cars!