MrObsessive

Ya, I do all glass separate. The key to making windows with clear stencil sheet is holding them in place until the epoxy sets. It'll look real messy when you're done, but that's where the alcohol and wax cleanup come in. Here's how messy it can get when doing windows as shown in my Turbine car............. If you click here this will take you to some more pics on making your "lip" for the inside of the body to hold the glass. I don't heat up the acetate.........but yes, if you're vacuum forming----heat is definitely needed. You might want to check out this interesting site for some info about vacuum forming equipment. Bad and wavy glass from the kit manufacturers has been a pet peeve of mine for many years! The best kits out there for good glass may be Tamiya, but they can be pricey! I've got the AMT '57 Chrysler 300 kit which I won't build because the rear glass is sooooo bad! It looks like looking through too thick eyeglasses! I'll have to definitely vacuform this one if I want it to appear nice. Glad I could help Abe!

Congratulations Clay and Ani!!

Here's a pic of what Dave has...............not bad at all, but the roofline might need some tweaking.

Abe, the trick to making windows look well, is to build some kind of inner "lip" or ledge inside your roof pillars. This is easier with flatter glass in late '60's and later models, but if you're trying to make glass for cars out of the '50's to early '60's, you'll need the patience of Job! In the '55 Ford I'm building, I first did the inside lip of the pillars, than made paper templates of the windshield and backlite using 3x5 cards. Here's a few pics to show including the GTO from years ago............. I'll then play around with the fit to make sure the templates fit well, and also to give myself a "rehearsal" to getting the clear stencil sheet in later. I usually try to do this early in the bodywork before painting as this step can be difficult (especially for wraparound glass) and I want to be able to get the real deal in as quickly as possible. Once I'm satisfied with the fitting of the templates, then I'll lay this against the clear stencil sheet and using a #11 blade, trace the pattern on. I'll cut the pattern out using some sharp scissors, and there you have it! You may need to do some fine trimming on the edges to get the glass to fit.......one goal I shoot for is to get the glass to stay put on it's own. That leaves my hands free to get the epoxy in later. This works well for relatively flat glass.............the wraparound type forget it! One thing to look out for when doing this--------you want your inside "ledge" to be as smooth and burr free as possible! If not, this will give your glass a wavy/bumpy appearance around the edges from the outside.................not good! I attach my "glass" with 5 min. epoxy, let 'er set overnight, and then clean the epoxy residue up with alcohol and wax. Hope this helps!

Welcome to the board! Do you mean this one?........... You've probably got this kit......... It was reissued some years ago-----(don't remember the year), and yes, it was the basis for the 1966 Batmobile. The car was actually the 1955 Lincoln Futura dream car which Ford built to preview some styling cues coming for 1957. The kit should be fairly common as it was a reissue..........I don't think I've ever seen one built up though!

Jeff, it's best to host photos from an online site such as Fotki, or Photobucket which is free. It looks like you were trying to post directly from your hard disc which can't be done--------unless you upload them to this site and then put them on your post as an attachment.

Hee Hee ..........this was a semi quickie build, and I just plain let it go. The BMF was giving me fits on this one back then too and I wanted no more foiling of anything. I've got an original built up that I may restore and make a superdetailed convertible, so that won't get left behind-----------but heavens knows when I'll do that!

They've got a '58 Packard Hawk listed on eBay right now I was looking at. The starting bid is at $70.00 with no takers as of now. That's seems pretty steep to start considering you'll have to get the '53 Studebaker Starliner to finish it up. I could convert that car myself as I have a TON of pics of that car. If it were about half the price on a "Buy it Now" I'd go for it to save some work, but at that price I can get another kit cheaper from The Modelhaus especially a transkit--------and I'd get good quality to boot Bob, what message board is Jeff Duranso posting the Marauder? (that kit's listed on eBay too)-----I may get nosy to see what he's gotten himself into!

Thanks George! I've been a fan of Juha's long before I wanted to get into superdetailing.............I've got that issue (Scale Modeler?) layin' around somewhere with the '73 Grand Am he converted from a Johan '75 Cutlass. I've got all the pieces to build that one (we'll never see it in plastic).......all except the dash, which IIRC he got from an old Grand Prix kit. It's just gettin' the ambition to do it with other projects I got rollin' around in my mind!

Well this answers my question! I was going to post a question about them, but decided to do a search to see if they've been mentioned. I see something of theirs on eBay that I would like, but with "far away" pics and with dubious feedback from the last several months----I think I'll pass. Oh well......I could always convert the model that I was interested in from something else.

Yeah, I've have some of that Ed------but it still gives the lights kinda of a gray look. The Faskolor is actually a pearlescent white which most reverse lights have a sort of frosty white look to them especially '50's-'70's cars. The Buick I didn't have much choice as that was a resin kit with the molded in headlights into the chrome bumper/grille section. It's kinda hard to see by the pic I took but it beats leaving 'em chrome!

Give this Man a prize!! Dave you're right------Juha Airio built that beautiful Buick! I'm a big fan of Juha's as he does some fantastic conversions! Click on the pic below to take you to some more pics of this beauty!

Abe, I use nothing more than various size bead wire to represent fuel lines. The arts and crafts stores come to the rescue again 'cuz that's where you'll find it. You can also check your Radio Shack (If they're still around) and look for a spool of tin plated wire too. You'll have to check the different sizes...............look for something that'll be in scale for what you're building. Also the insulation of small diameter wire can be used to represent the rubber hoses in some cars. Here's a couple pics of fuel line detail.................. Hope this helps!

Ed, I've used a certain paint called "Faskolor" to get rid of the chromey look for headlights and reverse lights. I picked it up at our LHS years ago and the bottle is still good. I don't know if the company that made it is still around. It's made for Lexan bodies but it did dry on styrene with no problem. Here's a pic of a '59 Buick I did a couple years ago with the headlights and turn lamps painted with it............... I like it because it doesn't "jump out at you" like plain white does. Not the most perfect solution short of making the reverse lens yourself as Jairus said-------but looks realistic enough for me!

Now this is an interesting item here............... I see '58 rear fenders with a '57 front end! Seems as though someone wanted the best of both worlds on their Caddie and they got it as it's beautiful!

Embossing powder is used by some folks to make signs, so if the person you're dealing with is knowledgeable-----they should be able to direct you to it. Yeah, good help is hard to find these days.........try asking for directions in any convenience store nowadays. You'd swear the people there just moved from Pluto or something as they don't know anything!

Well, I "grew up" with that show but never cared for it except for the car. David Soul also was a singer while that show was on back in '77. He had a #1 hit with the song "Don't Give Up on Us ". Anyone here remember that one??

Thanks for the vote of confidence George and the rest! I'd have a hard time parting with one of my builds for another reason.........the amount of time and effort I try to put into each build..............well it's kinda like giving one of your pets away that you've had for so long! True, you'd get paid------but it's still tough to do. The financial angle I see a problem down the road too for a huge number of folks. How much longer are people gonna be able to pay $200-$300 for a sealed unbuilt kit as high as basic things are getting?? Answer= They won't.

I've considered it to try for maybe every once in a loooooong while. My biggest fear though if I would get into something like that full time is just that-------it's now turned into a job and now no longer a hobby! Jairus, you're right about Paul having a following. I notice on his station wagon builds for instance, the same bidder usually snags it. The economy can't be too bad if they can drop $600+ for a single model consistently. I had heard from someone at one of the NNL's that it takes Paul roughly 20 hours to do each model. I find that a little hard to believe, 'cuz he's got a different car up every week. But then that could be the case if he's at it every day, and does his builds on kind of an assembly line setup.

I was surfing around on eBay and decided to check out some past auctions on my favorite sellers list. I was amazed to see what this really sharp resin Ford Wagon went for that was built by Paul Hettick (Robbbbbb57). Click on the pic below which'll take you to the auction to see what this beauty went for! Hmmm..............Let's see......I could build beautiful models, sell them at a great price, no dealing with numbskulls at work who won't do what they're told, no dealing with traffic, peace and quiet at home..............hmmmmm... Congratulations Paul! You've certainly earned it!

Thanks for the link James! I certainly bookmarked it for future use!

Thanks James! You mean this one? That was another of my favorites! The car is a 1958 Chrysler Dual Ghia Coupe Prototype. It has the big 392 Hemi in it, and is definitely one of a kind! It's built on a '58 Chrysler 300 chassis. The car looks fantastic, but somehow the roofline doesn't seem to go with the rest of the car. Slimmer C pillars or a wraparound backlite might have seemed more suitable. You don't know how bad I wanted to pop open the hood and take some pics of that motor! It was tempting being out there in the open and all! This is tempting to build in scale maybe using the '57 Chrysler 300 as a start, and making it a convertible?...........hmmmm.........

This morning to get a break from building, I decided to take a trip about 10 miles from me to Hershey, PA and check out their car museum. They had a display of some absolutely gorgeous '50's cars that some I haven't been close to since I was a kid! The display was called "Fins! The Rise and Fall of The American Tailfin." It featured cars from 1948-1961, although the bulk of what I seen and took pics of were from the mid and late '50's. There was also a vintage Cadillac display outside on the museum grounds......I snagged a few pics of my favorites-----but with a 90­°+ temps in the blazing sun, I got inside as quick as I could! Here's a taste of what was there.............. Some of the inside pics were not as good as I liked due to the lighting being a bit too dark in spots for my digicam. But I've got some definite inspiration for some future builds! Some of the cars were parked where I couldn't get decent front end shots but they were gorgeous just the same! Click on the link below to check out the rest! FINS!!

Abe, one way to mask that would be to take a piece of regular masking tape, lay it across that crease, and make some kind of tracing along the crease. Cut out the tracing using a hobby knife (Not on the body!) and then using another masking medium, (I like Tamiya Tape the best) put the tracing on that, cut away the pattern, and you'll have your masking to follow the contours. If you have Tamiya Tape, you may be able to get it to bend around that kink behind the door, but you'd have to experiment since I couldn't tell if it'd work or not.

Hi James! Long time no see! Beautiful work as always! Those little details add alot! Is the Last Detail still around or did someone take over their decals? They had some really good stuff!