Longbox55

Shawn Carpenter used to make the conversion kit, which also included the different hood as well. As I understand it, though, he had to drop them after getting a "cease and desist" letter from GM. You might be able to find one of those kits on the secondary market.

Thanks for the correction. Seems the source I got the information from was incorrect, as they listed 10k for the county, rather than just the city.

I've read that the caution speed at that track is anywhere between 25 to 40 mph, with 35 being the most reported speed. In the one video that has been seen in its assorted edits, the camera isn't very stable, and zooms in and out. That does give an illusion that the cars are not running the same speed.

Sounds good, that should look just about right for a set of old crusty Cragars.

You might want to knock back on the rust in the centers of the wheels, real Cragars do not rust in the centers, as the centers are aluminum. They tend to have the chrome peel off, and get the chalky corrosion on them, or the chrome will pit badly. The other rims of them do rust, however, as they are steel. You have that look nailed.

From what I understand, the jury of 23 are going to be selected from people from Ontario County, which doesn't have a very large population to begin with (somewhere north of 10,000 from what I saw). With as big as dirt racing is in the area, it's going to be hard to get a jury that doesn't have at least a few in there that isn't into racing, be it a fan or directly involved. The real trick is going to be to find jurors that are neutral in the situation, that can give a verdict based only on facts, and not on any sort of preconceived bias or local loyalties.

Neat truck, but they misidentified the year. That truck is a '55, not a '57.

Yes, or at least the coupe did. I can't say about the convertible, as I don't have one, but the coupe for sure. Both issues of the '53 Studebaker that I have (one from the early late '80s/early '90s and the last reissue) have the clear hood as well.

Entex did a clear kit of the Wankel Rotary engine.

http://www.autocarepro.com/gm-recalls-death-tsb-know/ Here's the actual article about it. It's from Brake and Front End, which is an auto repair industry publication. Just for the record, I am not defending GM. In any case, be it design defect or cheap part to save costs, GM is still at fault for using an inferior design.

That's not the real reasons behind the problems with the ignition switch. The real reason the switch was changed to the design used was due to complaints that the GM ignition switch was "too hard to turn compared to Honda and Toyota" by the consumers. Unfortunately, the switch design was simply not durable enough. I got this information direct from the TSB.

No, Ardun heads were true hemi heads. The "semi-hemi" term with BB Chevrolets comes from them having canted valves, similar to a hemi head engine, but they do not have the semi-spherical combustion chambers that are found on true hemi head engines.

If you're looking for something to replicate a heavier cable, you might take a look at nylon surveyors twine from the local hardware store. Some of the smaller gauges make a convincing heavy duty cable, especially after a dip in some Testors Metalliser to give it a metal color. Burnt Iron looks best to me, as it give a somewhat greasy, dirty look that a cable would have on a 1:1 truck..

Actually, it's a Revell '65 Chevy, which comes with the Stepside bed. The AMT kit is a '60.

I'll give you one more tip that might prove useful; Rather than using bodies to practice one, get yourself a pack of white plastic spoons. They are generally made of the same type of plastic that model kits are made of, and can be had very cheaply. While they are not the same as using a body, they will help with getting technique down, and also allow you to test a given finish to see how it looks before you apply it to a kit body.

While CarToons was published starting in '59 (quarterly, went bi-monthly in '62), they did not offer a subscription to it until '85. Before then, it was strictly a news stand or magazine rack item.

Stroker McGurk did appear in CarToons in some of the late issues, about the same time that they reprinted the Unk and the Varmints strips. http://www.shop.georgetrosley.com/Krass-and-Bernie_c23.htm BTW, I still have every issue of CarToons I ever got, from the mid '80s all the way to the last issue. I actually was one of the first subscribers when they finally made them available (1985). I recall they gave me the option of either Hot Rod (which I aleady had a sub to at the time, along with 4 Wheel & Off Road) or Car Craft to finish out the sub when they stop publishing CarToons. I went with Car Craft.

You've been given some excellent advice on getting a nice glossy finish, but something I notice that wasn't touched on that will also help is sanding and finishing out the primer before you apply any paint. The final finish will only be as good as what is under it, so making the primer as smooth as possible will go a long way to making the final finish better, and will reduce any work that would need to be done to the final finish. There a few different methods you can use, most will sand out the primer to a smooth, not necessarily glossy, finish using a polishing kit. Another method is to learn to spray the primer as smooth as possible, something I have yet to master fully, but it can be done. A few pics of my own work with assorted finishes to show what I mean. This one is all lacquer, Duplicolor primer sanded out to 3600, color coats are Duplicolor and Tamiya which were not sanded (the Duplicolor used are metallic), 2 different intercoat metallic clears, again, not sanded, and finally Duplicolor clear, which was polished out to 12000, then buffed with polishing compound and waxed. By sanding out the primer, especially on the roof, saved my lots of work to get the final results. Everything but the intercoat clears and the final clear was shot with spray cans. Here's on that demonstrates both primer prep as well as what Bill had posted about using enamels. IIRC, I only went to about 800 grit on this one, basically made it smooth. Same primer as the van shown above. However, this one was done with enamel tractor paint, Massey Ferguson red and Massey Ferguson Gray, shot directly from the can. There has not been any sanding or polishing on this one. Another shot of the same truck, before the second color was added. The gloss of the gray shows up better in this shot. One last pic. This one was done with no sanding or polishing at all. The base is a buff color enamel tractor primer, which shot very smooth right out of the can. The color coats are Testors enamel, no final clearcoat, but the color itself was cut 50% with clear, as it has a very heavy load of pearl added to it.

You're right, it isn't a literal translation, but it's pretty close.

I know I'm going to open up a whole can of worms and bad jokes about this, but the name Chevrolet, which is of French/German/Swiss (the area they were from is a bit fuzzy as to what country it was at any given time) origins, literally translates to "goat milker".

That is correct. Same goes for GMC. A little additional info, the wood floor was an option on Fleetside/Wideside trucks all the way up to '87, as a easy to maintain option for working trucks. All Stepsides/Fendersides had wood floors, no option. Also, if you were to do a bare floor on GM truck, the wood used was Southern White Pine, rather than the Oak that is popular with "restored" trucks. BTW, yes, I'm guilty of putting varnished Oak in mine .

While not legal for use in Trans Am racing, I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere, someone actually tried to road race a 396 Camaro in races under a different sanctioning body. While not a Camaro, I do know of one case where a guy tried to road race a '71 'Cuda with a 426 Hemi over in Denmark. He had purchased the car new specifically to race it, it was the first of three Hemi 'Cudas that were built to European specs. Needless to say, it didn't work out so well. Sure, the car was much faster than its opponents, but it didn't turn very well, and got rolled in its first race. The owner then sold it, where it got rebuilt and used a drag car for many years.

According to their site, it has a single gear direct drive transmission, which pretty much fits in with any electric car I've ever been around. Something I did notice, though, si that when the driver does "shift" the lever, the camera switches to the dash and a message reading "regen" pops up. Perhaps its a regenerative braking mode.

I did a little checking, the L65 was not available in the first generation Camaro, per the General Motors Heritage site. The LM1 255 hp 350 was available, though, but only in '69. https://www.gmheritagecenter.com/docs/gm-heritage-archive/vehicle-information-kits/Camaro/1967-Chevrolet-Camaro.pdf https://www.gmheritagecenter.com/docs/gm-heritage-archive/vehicle-information-kits/Camaro/1968-Chevrolet-Camaro.pdf https://www.gmheritagecenter.com/docs/gm-heritage-archive/vehicle-information-kits/Camaro/1969-Chevrolet-Camaro.pdf

Oh, that's just WRONG on so many levels! I like it!