W-409

Hey what's wrong with the Small Block? Personally I think it's great that this kit has a Small Block Engine in it. It might be because when I think of this kit the first idea I get is a Super Stock Drag Car. And Novas weren't available with Big Blocks then. But anyway if I built it Out Of the Box I'd be happy with the SBC as well... Of course there's no right or wrong answer to this, but it's just another opinion. I agree with the rear springs, they're not the best. However, they do work well and I've seen no problems with mine. But Stock steering wheel is a great addition.

Another tip on the picture thing... I like to take outdoor pics if I have to use my cell phone. When there's a lot of natural light the pics will turn out a lot better than these, even with a really simple cell phone. But with a cell phone the pics must be taken a bit further away from the subject than with a regular camera. Here is one of my cell phone pics, taken with my old cell phone. Well anyway from what I can see the Corvette looks very good! You said there are some problems with the paint, but I think the paint looks really good. Engine is very nice as well. Maybe yet another set of a bit better pics, please? I'd like to see more, as I think this very nice build deserves better pictures.

That's really good looking Charger. Nice paint job and sharp BMF work. Especially those chrome trims on fender openings are really hard to get right, looks like you nailed it. The engine bay is a piece of art as well, fantastic detailing and all those wires sure seem to be in scale. Only thing I might do would be drilling the carburetor throats open. Your engine detailing is so nice otherwise that this little thing kinda catches my eye. But overall it's a very small problem and the model is very well built. I couldn't do this any better.

Thanks for the pics Scott! Your Frontrunners look really good, I might have to buy a set when I run out of those I have now. The one I've been trying to make might be a bit taller, but your tire would fit perfectly on a bit smaller car like Nova. Thanks again!

Looking very good! The detail your are putting into this one is amazing! It's great to see that you're able to work with this project for so long time without any long breaks. I know I couldn't do that. And hey: Happy Birthday!!!!

Thanks! I had heard about Simca Vedette, but when I bought that body I had no idea what car it was. When I got home from the show I started to search from Google and found that it's a Simca.

Well that's interesting information, Thanks Fred! I didn't find many pics of those old Pro Stockers. Restored car pics were easy to find, but they can be different from original Race Cars... That's a good information for sure... Thanks! BTW: This kit would be a perfect starting point to replicate this legendary Finnish Modified Stock (MS) Drag Car that was driven by Per Allan Skinnars. I believe he still has the car, last time I saw it on track was 2009. This picture is from the late '80 or early '90s. And the same car in 2000:

I used a Miss Deal Studebaker chassis for my '59 Simca Vedette. It was AirTrax body (that was damaged in the molding process). It didn't fit perfectly, but I had to narrow the floor a little, stretch the frame and move one of those frame's crossmembers a bit to get front axle fit on correct place. A new roll cage had to be built, too. Those modifications might sound like they were really complicated, but actually it was a quite easy process.

I've built this kit a couple of years ago. It was the original issue, though so I have no personal experience with the recent issue. Anyway I had no problems with mine. Everything went well together and kit's parts are well detailed in my opinion. One problem many people have noticed with the recent issue (Molded in Blue) is that front tires are way too back so that they don't line up properly with the wheel openings. I don't have my kit here in my hands, but I believe it's pretty simple to fix. Just move the front spindles where front wheels are attached and there you have it. I think that kit has no bigger problems... I highly recommend that one!

I agree what Martin said above. I'm happy with the Jo-Han kit overall, but yeah, especially the engine bay and front suspension is quite poor. Interior isn't too detailed either, but it can be built into a decent looking unit anyway. The biggest problem with Jo-Han's body are the taillights. They look like they are too deep inside the body and maybe they're a bit small, too? But the engine in that particular kit is excellent, despite the axle hole on the engine block. However it can be built into a very nice model, especially if someone who has more talent than I do builds that kit. Here is a link to my buildup of the Jo-Han kit: http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=81219 Maybe a bit offtopic, but that being said I believe the Revell kit is an excellent one, as usual. Those little problems with the fender flares etc should be an easy fix. Okay okay, I don't have any personal experience with these new Revell Barracudas, but I've seen many of these built and a friend of mine has that Stock version and he says it should be easy to fix the little imperfections. I can't wait to get this kit to my hands... I'll have to wait so long that these arrive in Finland, though! I'd like to see some pics of the parts, too.

After more than a year sitting in the box the Torino is Back! Yesterday while the '55 Bel Air was drying I decided to do some work with this. It's not too far away from being done, but as it has been sitting for a while I will have to re-do some things because I'm not happy with how I did those things before. So yesterday I started by taking the scratchbuilt water pump away. It didn't look like real Electric Water Pump from Proform does, so I built another one. First thing was to go to the garage and take some measurements to see what size tubing I should use. The center part, which is round, is just mold sprue as it was just perfect size. Otherwise it's just square tubing. After I glued those three parts together and took the picture, I added some putty on the water pump. I will sand it smooth today and hopefully it's ready to be painted. This is how it should look. In the picture I'm taking some measurements to help with the scratchbuilding. My scratchbuilt part VS the old one I did. Another thing I'm going to do is rebuilding the carburetor linkage. Now I have a Photo Etch carburetor linkage set, so I'll be using that one. Also there were some other problems with the carburetor so it got some putty as well. I'm hoping to get that smoothed out today so I can paint it and start with the linkages. Here is the Rochester with some putty on it. Other things I will have to do is polishing the body, BMF and of course a lot of detail work before I can start the final assembly. But it's getting closer and closer slowly. However, my main focus will be on the '55 Bel Air for now, I'll work on this while the Chevy is drying. But I promise this is going to be finished in 2014!

Thanks Russ, Stan and Ron! I highly appreciate your kind comments, they sure mean a lot to me. Here's a bit more. I got the chassis painted a couple of days ago. Anyway there were some cracks on the paint. I don't know why that happened, but luckily I was able to sand it smooth without sanding through the paint so I just repainted the chassis yesterday. Now it looks alright and I'm going to paint the frame with gloss black soon. I also started working with the engine. I removed old glues as much as I could and put some Bondo to smooth out some areas. It's still far away from being ready for Primer, but I'm hoping to do some more work with it today.

That's a good looking paint job! I like the color too, fits very well on Mustang. I agree, I'm not a fan of polishing either, it's one of the most annoying things in model building. Anyway the results sure are nice just like this one.

I bet the experience with a Junior Dragster will help you a lot when racing with the Vega. Of course the car is totally different, but when you get the hang of it I'm sure you'll be able to take good RT every time really soon. And that's the thing where I have problems.

The Frontrunners that you have... I didn't find them from your web page as you said that everything doesn't show there so I'll have to ask what size are they? The Frontrunners that can be found from Revell Pro Stock kits (The ones that have Good Year Frontrunner texts in them) are often too small for Stock Eliminator / Super Stock Drag Cars. Are your Frontrunners taller? The reason why I'm interested in this is that I've been working on a master for a tall Frontrunner tire. But it's a lot of work and if someone did the same thing already I could just buy complete sets of them instead of making the master and then buying them from a friend of mine.

That's very cool! It's nice to see Super Stock Drag Cars being built as well. You did a great job, especially the paint is stunning. What kit did you use as a basis?

Another little update. I was working with the roll bar and seat belts today. It took many hours with all of the problems I had (Those dang Photo Etch parts that fly from my tweezers every time!). Anyway I started with the roll bar, which was quite simple. I had to add a cross bar so that the seat belts can be mounted. It had to be made from two parts of course. The real problem was the seat belts. The PE parts that make it possible to build wrap around style belts were a real pain, but other than that everything went well. Here are a couple of pics:

Thanks Glenn! I think I'm shooting for the whatever option. I have a couple of Gassers in progress, too and I thought I don't want to build this as a Gasser. With all of those rules Gas Coupes & Sedans had, this would take forever to get done. Slots would be good for the front. I'll see if I can find a set.

How sharp is that chassis? I mean does it require a lot of sanding or something like that? I have TDR Turbochargers and they are fantastic! I'm pretty sure these frames are the same quality so no problems there...? That's not too expensive chassis, I might have to buy one of those... Interesting project for sure. I can't say if I'd go with Twin Turbos or Supercharger. Both are really interesting engine combinations in 1:1 world. Whichever you choose, it'll be cool!

Fantastic Mercury! Your builds are always spectacular, but this might be the best one that I have seen! Extra credit for getting the black paint job right, a color that many modelers hate (Including me) and I've tried doing only two gloss black cars... Both of them didn't turn out as I hoped. But this looks perfect and nice BMF work, too. Especially textes on the rear fenders look like Photo Etch parts.

Thanks Stan and Dale ! Yep, removing the exhaus and mufflers was a "Must". I did the same in '57 Nomad Street Freak years ago and I remember I could do it back then, but the end result wasn't as smooth as I hoped. Now I wanted to do it better. Here's a little update for you all. I started working on the roll bar. The one that came with the kit wasn't very good. I thought it was a bit too thick and it was too low as well. Of course it would have been easy to make it a bit taller, but because its' thickness I decided to see if Monogram's '56 Chevy had a better one. And it did, even though it was a bit too tall but it was really easy to lower a little. I also removed the fire extinguisher from the roll bar. Later on it will be installed on the center console. Here is the original roll bar from '55 Chevy and '56 Chevy's lowered roll bar. I also put some Bare Metal Foil on the door panels. It wasn't easy and the chrome trim didn't turn out as good as I hoped, but it's not my worst effort, either. I also painted the window cranks and door handles. I've never managed to BMF those so I decided to paint them instead. They'll look a lot cleaner like that. I also glued the seats on, and they pretty much cover the door panel problems. Seats are painted with same colors than the rest of the interior. I also found a perfect set of rear tires and wheels for this project. They are very old 10,5" Racemasters with Five Spokes. I bought them last year from a long term Finnish model builder who was selling his treasures. He said he didn't remember where were they from, but he said he has had them for a very long time. So we both agreed that they must be very old, and they look like it too. I think those fit perfectly on this.

I've always thought Ford Capri is a really nice car and I think it looks amazing as a Drag Car, too. With your skills I'm sure this will turn out fantastic, as it looks very good already. The chassis fits really nicely and roll cage looks good, too. I can't wait to see more.

I have to agree with everyone else. Superb work, Scott with the Fairmont. Truly incredible detail work all over. The wheels look really good, the screws that are supposed to keep the tires on place will be a fantastic detail. And I have never even thought that someone could do that in 1/25 scale. This kind of ideas are another good thing you can get from these excellent WIP threads. Keep the updates coming, I'll need to get more popcorn!

Carl: I ask lots of questions, too. It's a great way to learn and we have lots of kind people here that will share their knownledge when asked. Good to hear I could help. Glenn: Here you go . Not a big update, but other things have taken some time from modeling. I'm hoping to do some more progress in the next couple of days, though. I did get the chassis sanded smooth after the spray filler. Then I put some more Squadron's White Putty on it and after that was smooth, I thought it's Primer time. Now when it's primed, it looks like I will shoot some flat black paint on it tomorrow. Ready For Primer: Primed:

I'll have to admit that I don't have much experience on Tamiya kits. I've built three of them and the amount of fit issues is really small. The parts snap together easily. But many of those kits don't have engines and they have simplified chassis and interior as well. I think that's what makes the difference so that I think Revell kits are better, as they usually have the parts to build a detailed model. The AMT kits Round Two is working on are nice. But many kits are old and part count is really small... I think overall Revell is better. Trumpeter kits are really nice, I forgot about that. I think they are just as good as Revells, I have one Falcon and one Ranchero kit and I'd like to buy the '63 Nova really soon. Oh well, enough Off Topic... Let's get back to building this cool car. I can't wait to see what you'll end up with!