Sport Suburban

Thanks everyone for the kind words. Much appreciated!

Thanks. Both of those are Johan. The 70 is a resin conversion.

Thanks Snake. I just airbrushed Testors Olds Engine blue and Testors Guards red. My next Sox & Martin is a 72 MPC Cuda kit!

Here is what I started with. Mostly original unpainted kit that I bought off eBay. Funny little story to go with it. A few years back I contacted Shawn Carpenter to see if he was still selling his resin kits and wanted on of his 68 GTO convertible kits. He got back to me and let me know he no longer was selling that kit. I kept looking for a good rebuilder and after a few years this shows up on eBay and I go for it. I paid a premium but it was all there and needed almost nothing. When I was sending payment I noticed the seller was the very same Shawn Carpenter and this was from his personal collection that he was slimming down. The cowl is resin along with one wheel. Everything else is original plastic.

Here is one of my grail kits that I finally was able to build. It's a 68 GTO convertible MPC kit and the one I had a hard time getting. It is painted Verdoro Green by Scale Finishes with automotive clear coat. Interior is light lime green. Chrome was restored by Chrome Tech and everything else is strait forward restoration. I'm real happy with how this one came out! I did add mirrors from an AMT kit. I think they are from the 69 Olds 442 kit.

Here is another long term project that I finished in 2018. No longer a restoration but started that way and progressed into this 70 Cougar Eliminator convertible. No real Eliminator Convertibles were made but I really wanted to do one and set it up with a Boss 302! It started with an original build up hardtop MPC kit. It has a cracked a pillar that was easily fixed but the body is crazed and the emblems and wipers are sanded mostly off. Perfect for an Eliminator. So that was my goal but needed lots of parts. I was gathering stuff up and also bought Missing Links resin convertible kit. I eventually lost motivation in building the hardtop as I already built one and really decided on building the convertible. I had enough parts to build one. So I switched to the convertible and built this.

Here is another one I finished in 2018. This 66 Shelby GT350 convertible is built from kit bashing two Revell kits. The 64 Pace Car convertible and the 66 GT 350H. Pretty strait forward kit bash and real easy to do. This is my second 66 GT350 convertible build. It also has Plamoz wheels meant for the 67 Shelby kit that I had chromed. Not truly correct but I like them. Decals are older Fred Cady decals that I had a long time but could not get the hood stripes to lay down and appear strait. The hood was stripped and repainted and the stripes on the hood is now painted. I should have just painted all of the Le Mans stripes and only used the side decals. I just love this tooling model kit and really enjoy building these kits.

This was a beautiful build and I really liked it and this is how I bought it. Originally I was going to add the side stripes, change out the magnum 500 wheels and red lines. They went onto my 69 GTX Johan that I didn't have wheels for. I had the Johan Rallye wheels but no tires. Tires are AMT. Last thing was to rechrome the chrome items. They were painted and looked decent. Once I took it apart I damaged some paint and decided I would strip it and remove the antenna. It snowballed from that point. Once I stripped the body it came out real clean but the vinyl top trim was applied over the primer and just fell off the body. So did a small piece of trim added to the trunk panel. So I decided to redo the added trim and re paint in the same color but from Scale Finishes. It is a little darker and cleared with automotive clear. The interior only has some hilights added and the chassis and engine have some small changed but mostly untouched.

Here is another one that I finished up in 2018. Not really a true rebuilder as it was a very nice built model when I bought it. It was already painted Lemon Twist and looked really good and had a vinyl top added. I'll post the before pics then explain the changes.

Here is another one of my previously stalled projects I finished in 2018. 69 Camaro RS SS 396. It is also supposed to represent a rare L89 aluminum head 396/375 HP engine although I was not sure if the heads are raw aluminum or painted orange. This one was a tougher build as it seamed everything I changed would fight me. Hood is from the AMT 69 Camaro. It was trimmed to fit as it is bigger and also needed to be thinned. The hood hit the air cleaner and also the core support braces. I painted this one twice as I didn't like the fathom green from Testors spray can. It is now Testors British Racing Green met from a jar. It looks closer and I like it better. Then I added photo etch SS emblems and the lower rocker grills. And last up was the exhaust from the Revell 69 Nova COPO kit. Actual exhaust fit the chassis real nice but the manifolds did fit the crossmember so I clearanced the crossmember. Last thing I did was modify the bumper guards on the rear bumper and rechrome it. I'm now rear happy with this green machine!

Yes. I built one and would like to do a convertible someday. Just don't know if anyone makes the body currently?

Here I see another one I finished but was a quick redo. This is an older build of mine of a 69 Shelby GT500. I wanted to redo this one because it was one of my older builds that did not have any foil on it and was painted an incorrect green. I had a can of Testors spray paint in Grabber Green that started leaking at the seam. That prompted the redo on this one. I tore it all apart and stripped the paint and redid it. I'm real happy with it now!

I finished this one up this year. I would have to say that this is one of my longest works in progress. I actually rode my bycicle to the hobby store back in the late 80s and bought this kit new. I did a little preassembly by glueing on the nose and started the engine. I didn't know how I was going to paint it and was discouraged. It sat in the box for many years along with the Sox & Martin Cuda I also bought. Life happened and I was out of the hobby for awhile. I got back in the hobby and over the years bought slixx decals and a resin hood from AFX-N-Scale about 12 years ago but not real happy with this kit. Fireball Modelworks carbs were recently purchased as they are very nice and one of the things that bothered me were the carbs that came in the kit. I don't know how many times I have tossed this back in the box but I'm glad it is done now.

Here is what I originally bought.

Here is another one of my restorations for 2018. A 71 Grand Prix MPC rebuilder. This one needed some work and a number of missing parts but nothing major. All the 71 parts were here. A Revell 69 Camaro gave up its mirror for this one. For some reason MPC really didn't give you outside mirrors. A few other things that is funny with MPC is the usual automatic interiors with manual transmissions! Another thing that made me laugh is the fact that both front door panels have all four power window switches and the rear windows are manual crank.

Thank you! I know, I just prefer the over restored look or a semi gloss black chassis.

Here are my other two 72s that I had. The white one I still have and it may be a Hurst version someday. The silver one I traded off to a friend.

Here is another one I finished up this year. Another restoration as well. This is a 72 Pontiac Grand Prix. I really like the 69 and 70 version better but had to finish up the set buy doing the 71 and 72 cars. I had collected a few builders to make a few good ones. This one landed in my lap as an unbuilt kit so it was an easy build. I had the chrome redone but everything else was good on this one. I really like the color combo on this one. This was one of the preprinted versions. I did strip it and redo it.

Thanks! The Revell 70 Charger RT stock kit has the redlines.

Here are a few before pics. This was a nice survivor and only the rear bumper was damaged, missing a tail light and part of the bumper, the dash and steering wheel. I bought two 62 Continentals to build one more and got a few parts from them and trading.

Here is another one I finished up this year. Another restoration as well. This is my favorite year for this car. 1961 Lincoln Continental Convertible. Really like this grill and didn't want to do black. I have a 62 as well and that may be black. Modelhaus provided the tires, rear bumper and hood ornament. Rest of chrome is redone by Chrome Tech.

Here is a early pick of the restoration project as I bought it from eBay. And a few more pics after collecting another chassis parts and re chrome work.

Here is another one I finished up this year. I have been focusing heavily on stalled projects. This one was a restoration that took a few built up projects to restore this one. I bought enough 67-68 AMT Cougars over the years and I needed to get one finished. I have one more 68 and a 67 to build still. This one is pretty much all stock 68 AMT kit that was restored and rechromed by Chrome Tech. Mirrors are from the AMT 67 Mustang GT kit and I need a few more of them!

Here is another one I finished this last year. A 60 Impala from Revell. This one is pretty strait forward build right out of the box.

Oh and the caps are resin ones from Missing Link!