MrObsessive

Yeah, that's the downside Steve as when he intro's something new, the price can go sky high witness his recently intro'd '56 Studebaker Commander. Now that the kit's been out for awhile, prices are more reasonable as whoever wanted one, now has one. His casting are very good..........about right up there with The Modelhaus as far as quality IMO. I've got from him so far, his '71 Riviera (little too flat in the roof area though), and the '71 Olds Delta 88. VERY good quality with no pinholes that I can see. The only downside is that none of his parts are chromed, and some don't have glass-----you'll have to either make your own, or get one from another kit. Most of his kits though are meant to be a sort of trans kit for something else, so they can be easily worked with.

Those look good Howard! I've got a built up '64 Spyder in the stash, but that wagon looks mighty tempting! My Uncle had one of those many years ago (a Lakewood?), and it would be neat someday to make a model of it.

Whatever really strikes my fancy at a particular moment. My current WIP-----the "Green Hornet" Shelby is the result of a major desire to remake a better one than the one I built over 20 years ago. I like to do different eras in cycles too. Right now with the Shelby, it's the '60's muscle era. After this tough project, it'll more than likely be something relatively simple such as a box stock more modern car. Then it's back to the '50's. I have a number of projects lined up in my mind that actually take me through the end of next year, but of course that's subject to change. Something can come along which will make me drop everything and race to get started on it!

I bought the sedan kit before the convertible came out, and that's a good thought! Much easier to work with the open car, than having the extra work in sawing off the roof. I have the convertible and I'd hate to cut that one up, so either I can find a junker body, or simply buy another whole kit. As I mentioned however, the moment I get deep into building one, Revell will announce they're making a '57!

Wow! How'd I miss this one?? Beautiful job Rich! There was nothing like late '50's Mopar styling, and I sure wish I could have snagged one of these when The Modelhaus was making 'em. Who knows...........I've got a '59 Dodge body that I could backdate into a '57. Personally I like 'em better without those "sharks teeth" in the bumper though.

I believe the one car you have pictured is actually "Lil Red"............... They have it listed as the Green Hornet, but 'Lil Red came the year before, with a supercharged V8. I'm not sure of the engine size (maybe a 428), and pics are hard to get as the car was crushed after its time was done showing off to the press and automotive world.

Hey Jim, you got mail......

There's only a couple ways I can think of in trying to replicate those vents. Either make them out of PE fret, or make each vent out of .010 plastic strip carefully spacing and angling each one out. You'd need to cut out the entire openings in doing this, and then there's the trouble of keeping everything symmetrical. One other possible method that just came to mind while typing this, you can very carefully grind away at the underside of the vents in the hood with a moto-tool (slow speed of course) to open them up that way, but that's tricky too. Not an easy task for either method, and it's something I was thinking about on my Shelby build, but I may just let that detail go.

Despite those being FWD, they were good looking cars! Nice clean build, and yeah, you don't see these around at all-----model or 1:1.

Very beautiful Randy, despite the kit's foibles! It sits the way it should which to me can make or break a build.

I've done this on YouTube where I needed to make a very pointed and lengthy response to someone who wants to post something with no backing or is trying to be a troll. YT gets interesting at times where I try to post a comment (usually a long one), and somehow the post won't show up are I'll get a "comment can't post" message. Soooo, to get around that I did just as you've described, signed out, logged back in again, copy and paste and BOOM! Post the message anyway. Saves a LOT of hassle, and there's no way I'd remember all that I wanted to say, especially if it's several lengthy paragraphs that's needed.

I LOVE this shot! I'm doing some final tweaks to the grille opening and this pic show some very slight changes I want to make. I've got a ton of pics as I'm building the Green Hornet, but this particular dead on shot helps things a bit.

JC, I have a set of those '61 plates, and mine looks exactly like yours! I think the last time I used them was on this '55 T-Bird I built back in 1999-2000, and then again on my '59 Chevy last year and yes, they needed "help" staying on the plate! I think I've had mine since the early '80's and heaven knows how long they were around before that. And yes, those plates are as old as I am! Bestmodelcarparts does make some nice decals----I've gotten dash gauges from him and they really dress up those dashboards.

I have both and yeah, I can see where different slides could be used to differentiate the two. Actually, I bought the Bel Air for a possible '57 Nomad kitbash with their '56. I've no idea why that one gets ignored.........It's just as popular as the '56 if not more so, and no, Revell's long ago tooled '57 Nomad just ain't it!

Round 2 has released their monthly video of what's upcoming for February. Only a couple kits get my attention (one of them was just reviewed here), although there are a couple 1/18 diecasts that interest me. If you want to jump to where they're talking about the kits...........jump to 4:55 where he gets into what's out.

Ron, that stance is about perfect! That's how that car should sit.

I second the motion for using BIN..........I've used it a number of times and I've had no problems. Here's the can in its base form----you'll have to mix it up once you open it. Call me paranoid, but I haven't trusted Revell's plastics for over 10 years now ever since I was hearing horror stories about plastic crazing on even somewhat mild hobby paints in the early '00's. Their plastic is not as dense as it used to be IMO and should have a barrier coat on it to prevent crazing whether it's molded in red or not. I hate surprises when it comes to paint...........I put in too much time into bodywork and getting things ready for paint. This to me is more peace of mind that things don't go to ruin. BTW, I also use alcohol to thin it if need be, but out of the can I've not had to do that much. I also use an old Badger Crescendo airbrush to put it on. Like 935K3 said, don't use the aerosol can. IMO it's worthless and will make a mess.

Excellent tip about the whitewalls! I'll have to keep this in mind if ever I need to make homemade white or redlines.

Then the safety Nazis jumped in and effectively killed that type of styling. Now we have pillared everything ('cept for the super expensive stuff), and windshield pillars that are waaay too thick IMO. Maybe someday engineering advances along with public tastes will one day bring back the true two and four door hardtops. At least they still make convertibles.............for now!

That is one beautiful save! One of Virgil's Exner's "last gasps" and certainly is a standout today!

Slowly but surely still plugging away at the bodywork on this one. My focus for the last couple weeks or so has been mainly on the front end. While not totally terrible for someone just wanting to build it, to my view it needs some tweaks to make it more accurate to my eyes. Here's a head on shot of the front-------the grille to my view is too tall and "blocky", and the bumper sits too far down below the headlights. Looking at 1:1 pics of the car, the bumper should sit just below the headlights without all the real estate as seen here. To make things easier for me to modify this, I figured it's better for me to entirely cut away the front end, and reattach it later on. You can see here the whole front end sawed away.............in my haste, I should have made more of an angular cut along the leading edges of the front fenders. In later pics, I did add some plastic back to those areas for a more accurate appearance. Here's the front clip------I took a flat file and got rid of the excess below the headlights. It seemed to me that the angle of the grille wasn't quite right either from the side view, so some plastic was added here. Originally I thought I would need to change the radius of the leading edge of the hood opening in the clip..........later on looking at my reference pics from other angles, this step here wasn't really necessary, and in fact, I ended up grinding away a bit more than what was originally on the clip. I wanted to take a break from bodywork for a spell, and take a look at the wheels. The wheels I'm going to use are the 10 spokes that were once available separately in 1/24 from GMP. While they are not 100% accurate (spoke shape a little off and too bright IMO), they look MUCH better than the kit wheels in the AMT '68 Shelby kit! You can see why those wheels were difficult to get on and off. I didn't want to take the chance and cut off the excess on the wheel----these wheels are pretty much unobtainium, and a GOOD set of these are high on my wanted aftermarket items! If you see these turn up on eBay and you're interested, get set for a bidding war as these are very much wanted until someone casts as good a set. OK! Just a preliminary mockup of how this'll sit with the wheels. Of course, this is not the final stance--------I just want an idea right now how I want the track to sit and how the tires appear in relation to the body. Back to the front end, I got the headlight doors and outer grille shape pretty much the way I want it, and as you can see, defined the Shelby headlight "eyebrows" a bit more-------another '68 Shelby signature. I cut away the middle part of the header, and reattached it later for a better fit. Well! Aside from some small details to clean up, this is pretty much it! To me, much better than the kit body originally had, and I had to do some wrestling with the hood as it was a bit warped out of the box. To cure that, I put the hood in the dehydrator at 140 degrees for about 15 mins. Bent it to shape while it was toasty and so far it's keeping its shape as I type this. I'll have to remember NOT to wash the hood in hot water for final cleanup before painting as its memory will come back and it's warped again. Same for drying the paint-------no dehydrator for this one for the same reason. While I had the ambition, I did reshape the spoiler and end caps to a different angle. The appearance to me previously was a bit too upright, so I changed it to have bit more slant. Before................. After............. That's as far as I've gotten..........now to go back and tweak the grille trim so that when it comes time for BMF, there won't be any major gaffes. Also, try to get the wheel well trim on. There's still the vinyl roof seams to get on, and then hopefully by the beginning of next month, I'll get started on the engine. Long ways to go just the same, but so far, I'm happy with how this is turning out. Thanks to all that are tuning in!

At our local auto show last year, I sat in a new Camaro. I didn't like it at all as it felt very claustrophobic inside with the too high beltline and thick A pillars. Too me not much of an improvement if any at all over the last Gen. The Mustang on the other hand while it was fine to see out of, just felt small to me and somewhat cramped. So, I won't be switching cars anytime soon------------I like my Challenger just fine and yes, on long trips it's one of the best things going.

Hmmm..........This "bubbletop" would more than likely be a custom job as Chevy was the only one to keep that roofline in '62 for the Bel Air. That might have been proposed, but the powers that be decided for whatever reason to go with the more formal roofline like the first one you have pictured. Very nice looking car though!

Ha! That's the same story as mine! My car showed up at the dealer Christmas Eve '14 (literally that evening) ..........I saw it the day after Christmas and it was mine. The salesman told me the car sold so fast that it was not even in the inventory yet as he originally couldn't find the stock number. I have literally only seen two of the new Camaros on the road in this area since they were intro'd. One in the parking lot at work (a visitor), and one that happened to pass me on the highway on the way home-------that's it!

Same here! I like this one a bit better----------nice stripes always get to me! For whatever reason, I just don't see these on the road! Are sales not as good as Chevy expected? I see a lot more Challengers (new) on the road nowadays........certainly more than the new Camaros.