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I would see about buying it, if I could convince Ed to repop it. Seeing as how Ed Sr.'s stuff is getting pretty rare these days. Ed jr. is awful funny about repoping other people's work because he's had some of his own work stolen and repoped then sold on Ebay. So I can see it, plus Ed is a businessman of tip top integrity! He's also a pretty good friend so I can say that because I know it about him, we've talked about such stuff. Let me see if I can get ahold of him and we can see what we can do, it would be all dependent on if Ed would be willing to redo this kit. I'd love to have one and love for other people to have one too! Be a great way to memorialize his dad too.

In one of the short lived Rod & Custom & Model Cars magazines they did an article on the Strombecker Midgets 1/32 scale (I think I remember that was the scale). Pretty much a go faster and more detail article. The magazine shows up every once and a while on eBay, so do the Strombecker Midgets which are normally just north of unobtainium in price. For what they go for and what I’m willing to pay, I’ll probably never see one, unless some crazy person shows up with one and I actually get to hold it and look at it! LoL! Does anyone 3D print a Midget Body and details to build up a slot car? 1/32 would be a great size, for me at least as that’s the scale we run around my place. The parts Box (Australia) used had a Midget Racer that was supposedly the Strombecker Midget, but I have never seen one in person, so I’m not certain what the scale is or if it really came from the Strombecker Midget Racer.

They do show up on eVilbay every once in a while. I found a Drag City Castings '50 Olds Tuck & Roll interior kit for reasonable price. It was right around the price Ed was selling them for, so don't count out eBay.

You might check Exact Match Car Paint Made Easy | AutomotiveTouchup I've used them before for full size projects, a 12 oz. spray can is $28.95, they also have compatible primer and clear coat. If I were spending that kind of money, for a single can of paint, I would go with all of the same product line, just to be on the safe side. You might be able to get pints mixed locally for less than Automotive Touchup wants for their pints then spray it through an airbrush. For models, I have got away with using the brush in bottle touch up kits sold in most good Auto Parts stores. Just drain out of the container and thin as needed. Nassau Blue and Daytona Blue are popular enough for muscle cars that you might find one or both in the Duplicolor line, or something for a late model with a different name but a close shade.

I have two shakers one is a small hobby shaker that works great for enamels, lacquers and anything oil based. The other is a Vortex Test Tube shaker which works really good with acrylics like the small Vallejo dropper bottles, it has enough oomph that it will stir up the big squeeze bottles of hobby acrylic paints, both are small enough that they don’t get in the way, that’s what matters!

I just watched the first JB Weld video Bill recommend about a month ago. I’ve used and been around epoxies in Engineering and prototyping (at Boeing’s Model Shop), where most of the time we used Devcon metalized to epoxy; but when they ran out we used JB Weld for tooling and prototyping, the tool rooms carried it for that reason. Biggest takeaway from that video (already knew it) is to roughen up the surfaces to be “glued” together to give the epoxy a tooth to bight into. This video includes recommended grits of sandpaper to give tooth to the surfaces, it’s worth the watch.

I thought the same thing; with the stitch and glue technique, the stress may be minimized by doing the stitching progressively. Place a stitch or two then glue…. Until the panel and contour you’re looking for is close enough to finish off with filler. This also might be an application where either medium Viscosity Super Glue and Baking Soda or Acrylic powder is mixed onto the body work then sanded in. Creates a harder than styrene filler which is less prone to cracking. I have also used the lightweight fiberglass cloth the kind for RC Aircraft modeling. The super glue as it is lighter than most of the common hobby shop and big box polyester resins, without going something specialized read that expensive resin. Work the superglue into the mat just like you do with resin, it will set much like resin as well. I was thinking this might be used to reinforce the inside of your bodywork and be thin enough to work around. idea #2. Create a lofted latticework which fits the contours of the interior, a contour gauge (pin gauge) would be useful here to get the outside contour minus the thickness of the body will give you the inside dimensions of a part or panel applied lofted section. Depending on how much the contour developers the contour splines (cross ways) could be spaced every 1/4 to 1/2 inch with 2 - 4 stringers to connect the contour splines. Which is exactly what you’re creating cross slices along the bodywork, you’ve likely seen this type of latticework lofting on shows featuring Foose and other custom bodywork shops. Ace has probably done this too in some of the plaster and plastics shops he’s worked at, with 3D printing I fear this old technique could be lost. In some of the more intricate contour development the splining may run lengthwise as well, normally in the aircraft tooling shop I worked the contour between splines would be filled in with either self curing modeling clay or just plain old plaster. Something like lofting might be way overkill just to develop a clamping point. Although it could work on a less developed lofted section too where you develop the contour over a shorter section to give a clamping point. You are only limited by what you can dream up, any tool you can get the job done and it works is the tool needed, who cares what it looks like it’s not the finished product anyway!

Jack, that Chevrolet Stocker looks great with those tires! Carl, If I remember right, this series of Modified Stockers go back the Model Car & Science days. The tips that I seem to remember seeing was that they sanded the tar out of the tires to get shape, any of the asphalt and dirt tires back then were miniature compared to the AMT Slicks the Stockers came with. Their next trick was to take metal window screen, (which is probably next to impossible to find now) which they laid across a hot clothes iron and rolled the tires ending up with a decent waffle design on a forty-five-degree angle across the "tread" of the slick. Now if I were doing this kit today, I would first take those tires and mount them on a tire truing lathe made out of a nut, bolt and a couple of washers and spin and shape those tires as much as the thickness of the carcass would take and not blow through (they are hollow), plus enough to get a tread siped into the tread of the slick. Probably would use an Xacto saw to do the siping, you might be able to use an Xacto knife to lightly carve the sipes into the tread. I'm sure somebody on this board has crossed that creek a time or two and has some better ideas fresh on their mind to add. Or else you could just do what Jack did on his sweet little Chevrolet Modified stocker and get some of those Plastic Performance Tires as well. Looking at those AMT Slicks today, I think they are a bit on the squared off side of things to make a good dirt or asphalt tire where the edges of the tread round out and blend into the sidewalls. Another resource that just came to mind would be to check out Clay Kemp's YouTube videos he's starting to amass quite a few these days, they are all pretty interesting as well as informative. He might just have some tire mangling treatments for asphalt stockers. The Fourth tire, inside Driver's front tire which I don't believe these kits ever included should be slightly smaller to set the stagger as the chassis on asphalt modifieds of this era were set up stiff enough that the cars tricycled through the corners lifting the inside drivers front tire halfway down the stretch, maybe never touching down on a really short track.

Yep, Thanks Bill that was the one that I mentioned I had and lost. It may be in the Del Rio boxes where I originally stored it but who knows, stuff gets moved and moved to other boxes... life goes on!! LoL!

Carl, you're right they are called "Lay Film" I think, though I have no real idea that they are supposed to cover light sources to give colored illumination effects. (Makes sense, I think I looked it up once because I had no clue what it was for, that's how I have a slight clue now!) LoL! The Lay film that I have from Hobby Lobby comes in all the Popular 60's-Gasser window colors and clear I'm not digging them out right now, but they are like 0.005 and 0.008" thickness and can be used to do side and back glass pretty easy.

Does anyone have a copy of the Engine Assembly Instructions for the Revell Fireball Roberts 1957 Ford that they could scan a picture and post. I had them at one time and can't seem to locate them, using the supercharger on another 312 C.I. engine so need a copy. Please.... Thanks ahead of time I'm sure someone has a copy somewhere!

That is correct, Banned by both Pre-1972 NHRA and AHRA Rulebooks. What makes the windshield look tinted is the windshield looks tinted in comparison to the other tinted windows.

Opinion: The cheaper compressors are usually just plain loud! That's been my experience with them. I've got two loud ones out in the garage right now, one relegated to pumping up tires and the other to outside projects, nothing inside! Both were supposed to be quiet when I got them. So, when I came across the California Air Tools compressor, I was pretty skeptical, until a couple of my airbrushing buddies who had them recommended the CAT compressors. So, I pulled the trigger on a dual compressor 5-gallon tank compressor, it fits the bill its everything I needed for in the house air compressing, whether it be spraying through any one of the multitude of airbrushes or running nail or staple guns, it works amazingly well and quietly too! A vacuum cleaner is way louder than this compressor at full tilt! From what I have seen and also heard, Harbor Freight has come out with their own brand of quiet air compressors, for anyone on a budget, they are probably worth a real tryout. The issues with "jurry-rigging" refrigerant compressors for use as a "quieter" air compressor are many. In most cases, you don't get all the safety switching and built in safeguarding, the compressor is rarely properly paired (too large or too small volume) to the tank as is provided by a well-engineered, commercially available air compressor. So, even if you're a Mechanical Engineer, the money saved is not going to outweigh both safety and liability factors. Before the "Quiet Compressors" were readily available and the prices were still way up there, it might have been a viable solution to noise reduction, that time is relatively "long ago" in comparison. CFM Volume Requirements: A good rule of thumb for air supply is to multiply the CFM requirement of the air tool that uses the most CFM that you'll be using by 1.5 to get a realistic CFM requirement rating, then base your compressor search on that number, not the size of the tank, it's the CFM the compressor is capable of delivering to the tool being used. You'll be happier with more compressor than is required than kicking yourself for buying a smaller one purpose compressor. Noise Related Stuff: For me it usually isn't the volume of air that the compressor supplies (if I used the 1.5 CFM multiplier), it is by far the noise. After years of working in industrial and construction noise my ears are now both sensitive to loud noise, I wear hearing aids to boot. With a normal air compressor, I'd have to turn off my hearing aids and swap to hearing protection, which are now a custom vented ear plug. With the CAT compressors, I can leave my hearing aids on or turn them off as a passive plug and not be bothered by excessive noise. Just a subdued thrum as the compressor does its job. For anyone else in the same situation, I wholeheartedly would recommend the quiet type compressors. For those not in this situation, I also recommend the quiet type compressors so in the end you don't end up with hearing loss from years of accumulated noisy tools. Hearing aids really don't restore your lost hearing, they just amplify sound. Like the sounds you want to hear and all those noises you could care less about. Unapologetic Reasoning Regarding the Loud Noise: *** Sorry, this wasn't an infomercial against loud compressors. Our hobbies shouldn't end up hurting us in the end. I now feel pretty strongly about helping others not to lose their hearing through their hobbies and work-related noise. Believe me, when you young guys get to be a grandpa and can hear your small grandkiddo's voice clearly or even hearing that soft sexy female voice and not having to ask them to repeat it constantly - you're going to thank yourself for it! ***

As soon as I read Mike Sullivan, the Flag Fiat came to mind as did the Blue & White Fiat Topolino! I had forgot that Mike ran a Dragster before the Altered...

I've used the same method for as long as I can remember, like I first saw something like it in Model Car Science when I first started building model cars. Their tip, I think it was from Don Emmons was to use fine steel wool to buff the tires and take the shine off. A long time ago I switched to a well-used Green Scotchbrite pad to buff the tires, a new pad is too aggressive for my likes. Has anyone tried an Air Eraser and Baking Soda to de-shine the tread and sidewall areas?