niteowl7710

I imagine that since Plymouth is long gone, and Dodge is going the way of performance, there will have to be "entry-level" versions of the 200 and T&C. It's not like most people were buying the stripped out "rental fleet" American Value Package Caravans anyway, the prices on those vans climbs pretty fast once you start optioning them with the stuff families actually need, and moderately optioned - think infotainment package for the backseat hooligans - you crashed right into the bottom end of the T&C sales anyways. Our Grand Caravan was about $28k when we bought it, and we didn't put everything in it, or start at the highest trim level, the "cheapest" T&C starts at $30...that's a reasonable distance to bridge with a "down market" Chrysler. It's also still thousands less than the STARTING price of a Honda Odyssey or a Toyota Sienna, and those are pretty much your only three choices if you want a minivan in 2014. Everyone else is trying to stuff families into Small SUVs which fails miserably if you happen to have more than 2 car seats and 2 adults...5 occupants - yeah you ain't fitting them all into a Kia Sportage - TRUST ME.

This is the first mock-up, so depending on revisions it's probably a 3Q release. One of the things Revell has "picked up" on with their announcing releases Quarterly is that kits seem to come to market a lot "faster" if you don't announce them until they're 2/3rds of the way done. This is not part of Aoshima's Shizouka Hobby Show display, but rather something they just dropped to churn up speculation and interest on their way out of the office for Golden Week on Friday.

The Merc is from eBay, and I picked up the Shelby Convertible from my work LHS. That's right in the midst of hobby shop closings, I have so many to choose from that I have to dictate where they are based on what I'm doing on any given day...not gloating...no wait I am...NYAH NYAH NYAH DSC01591 (1280x844) by niteowl7710, on Flickr DSC01592 (1280x916) by niteowl7710, on Flickr

The Azera is the export model, in S.K. it's the Grandeur as the first post box art picture shows. But if you were talking unexpected 4 door kits race car kits, well one might never know what might come Cruze-ing out later this year...

Can you comment on the next trailer kit, got a thread going on for it in the truck basemen...err section, but I haven't seen anything else about it other than the mention of it on the Moebius Facebook page last weekend.

My SAL Donkey race between Hobby Search and HLJ - both shipped the same day - wound up a dead heat today. 1999 provides a '08 Toyota Crown Athlete DSC01577 (1280x846) by niteowl7710, on Flickr HLJ box contains DSC01578 (1280x866) by niteowl7710, on Flickr

Even though I am one of the vocal minority around here for more variety of modern kits, count me in for one of everything in factory stock trim.

From a few peeks of it I've managed to get, it looks like a curbside Snap-Fit style kit. Parts content looks to be on the low budget Fujimi scale of things (aka 50-60 parts). Looks like it's cast in Black with chrome runner as well, one thing of interest it seems to have decals (Cartigraf) for the headlight and taillight reflectors behind the clear parts...with the fact that so many cars these days use LED lighting, nothing has "color" to it unless the lights are on, brakes applied, etc. Pricing for the two auctions I can find on eBay are about $50 with the shipping directly from South Korea. I've seen a release date for the Azera of "June", and it makes me wonder if the auctions are for the SKDM version of the kits as the kit stock number has a "A" after it - possibly indicating a "B" version is around the corner. for export markets. Hopefully HLJ or Hobby Search will stock it with a more reasonable shipping fee, although $30 for the kit itself is probably about the ballpark price plus or minus a few hundred Yen. MRC is the Academy distributor for the U.S., you can order direct from them as it turns out, although they have no mention of it on their website yet.

Find a dusty old assembled (but never painted) Snap-Fast Plus '96 Dodge Ram Dually has led the impetus to start building out the first half dozen projects for a long stalled diorama/photo backdrop idea. I've found that since two of them are large vehicles I'm running out of space to shuffle things in and out of the "work zone" the way my work bench is configured, not to mention the other dozen or so projects I have in every stage. From body work completed (building modern cars you tend to have to shoot at least part of the chassis the same color as the car, and I hate when things don't match from being painted at separate times) to one that really just needs to be glued together, but I can't find the gumption to final up assembly. I see a lot of people talking about having more kits than time, but being a Stay-at-Home Dad I bet I have 6 hours a day (2 hours in the morning, 2 hours in the evening, and 1-3 hours worth of nap time) when I have the place to myself with everyone asleep in some form, and a few hours on the weekend before and after I get home from work. But that's if EVERYTHING goes exactly to plan...and any fathers in here knows that never happens, and the few days it does you're so busy playing catch-up from the other days. More kits than time...no...I have more kids than sleep!

3Q - at least the way Revell is running it - is Jul/Aug/Sept. I'd buy that, as the test shot is actually in colored plastic and being a Snap-Tite isn't nearly as complex as say the '67 Camaro SS.

What good is a Jaguar XJ if you don't have the "twin" Cabriolet kit to go with it? Caught people sleeping on Easter Sunday to snag it for below "market" value IMG_20140428_132200_850 by niteowl7710, on Flickr The last of the Toyota Crown Royal Saloons I needed to complete my collection of the 2000s. IMG_20140428_132139_325 by niteowl7710, on Flickr

The model kit itself isn't limited edition, but the CAR itself was, there were only 2,000 Grand Prixs given the special 205HP Turbo treatment by ASC & McLaren in 1989.

Photo was taken at the NNL East yesterday.

I thought his excuse was that the internet and message forums "don't count" as complaints as far as Revell is concerned? Incidentally I don't see the "Pony" wheels on that runner board, so this thing still can't be built as the "draftsman drawing" on the first kit's instructions showed...and the Pony decals linger on wondering what their purpose in life is at this point.

Hot of the "presses" the first of the Ebbro 4Ls is officially available for pre-order from HLJ & Hobby Search. Based on the stock number it will indeed be the open top version (as discussed earlier in this thread) and right now has a tentative release date of July. HLJ pricing is right around $37.50 based on today's exchange rate.

While Ford can't publicly turn a blind eye towards it, with 1.3 BILLION people in China, the people who want (and can afford) a REAL F-150 are going to buy one. This cheap kinda-sorta looks like it, 105HP Mitsubishi power thing isn't going to put a dent in legitimate Ford sales.

Those of us who were waiting on our pre-orders at HLJ they came in today. HUZZAH!

This is a highway robbery eBay purchase. Got both of these for less than $20. This Fujimi Q is one of the "rare" versions that actually has LHD parts & U.S. decals. I've often figured this kit existed in some form since the wiper attachment area was separate from the windshield so you could put LHD wipers on it, but the past 2-3 reissues of this kit have been JDM only with no "silent" parts carryover. Bought the lot mostly for this after getting an Aoshima Q45 and found the LHD parts on the box was just a SATCO bloborific resin "dashboard" without any other parts to convert it to LHD. IMG_20140424_130919_830 by niteowl7710, on Flickr This Cima has been SATCO'd -- it has one of their awful LUMP 'O Resin LHD dashes, but no LHD wipers, Infiniti decals, etc. That's fine I wanted it as a JDM Cima anyways. IMG_20140424_130904_038 by niteowl7710, on Flickr

You have to wonder if the private cars had "Replacement Value" insurance on them, so at least the guy who's in that Mallet conversion in the 6 figures gets his money back at least, since it wound up on the bottom and is really nothing more than a bent frame and mud. Perhaps that something covered by the Museum's insurance, but then again I'm pretty sure a giant sink hole is an act of God if there ever was one.

Did the Qualcomm cease working too? I just put the in the notes "NO CELL SERVICE!" when I got stuck in an area with none, or the time my Samsung bit the big one.

Well how iconic are some car based "pickup trucks" and wagons to people in Germany and the greater EU as a whole? I doubt somewhat outside the mainstream European cars wouldn't get much attention on a Revell US poll no matter how good an idea the people in Europe think they are...

Well aside from the whole "packed by volume" thing of chips, what difference does it make what size bottle pills come in? There's a number on the box that indicates the total number of pills your getting. So whether they come in a mason jar or a bottle packed so full they explode out like one of those gag cans of Pringles with the "snake" inside you know what you're buying. I love boxes of fried chicken and things like of that nature that say "Serving Size 1 piece, Servings - Approximately 6"...Approximately 6? Is there 2/3rds of a piece of chicken in there?

There are two versions of it. One is a Curbside "Plus" - similar to their McLaren F1 where it has a tub with an engine-ish blob inside and some top parts to finish it off. It actually wasn't that bad, considering how much of the engine you can actually see when it's assembled. The newer one (which was announced literally the same week they released the curbside one - I talk about scuzzy Revell moves, THAT was a scuzzy move) is the same kit, now with the soap dish and engine blob replace with a 19 piece engine assembly. If nothing else having a separate engine certainly makes it worlds easier to paint and detail. But much like the curbside kit, you're going to bury the majority of it, much like any Super Car of the past 10-15 years the entire chassis pan is just that, a flat, aero-tuned pan that goes front to back. The kit itself is much like the real car - a pile of boards nailed together at odd angles. It follows their Aventador and Reventon with the doors either opened or closed, but not functional from the box. The curbside box has the car "driving" from left to right, and the w/Engine kit as seen above is "driving" right to left. Pretty sure that Japanese part probably says something like "Now with Engine SUCKERS!!" too. I believe the price difference between the two is like $7.

There are a couple of free websites out there that offer Stash Management tools. I use My Hobby Info, I can tell you exactly what I have, and exactly what I paid for it - what's on my pending/OOP wish list, and it's also helpful for insurance purposes since I can export the data into an Excel Spreadsheet. If a kit I have doesn't exist in their database, I take a quick picture of the box art, enter in a few information fields and usually the kit gets added the same day. Believe me I've fleshed a lot of Automotive kits into their database as it was started by guys with a distinct Armo(u)r building preference. I tend to only buy one "trend" at a time when I'm going back in history to acquire older kits that I don't have, that way I don't have money and attention spread out across too wide an area and end up with multiples of anything. I do have some multiples, all of them Law Enforcement "blanks", and I have the decals to make models out of all of them. But within my main collection the only thing I ever wound up with repeating kits of was the AMT '66 Fairlane as I bought one, then won one at the NNL Toledo door prize within days forgetting I already had one at home.

SAL Donkey from HLJ arrived today with mostly a bunch of stale old replacement kits. I ordered the LaFerrari back when it came out and right after I got it someone offered me about twice what I paid for it - SOLD! The Veneno is a "replacement" for the curbside kit that I also sold for a healthy profit once I heard about this version which has a 19 piece engine inside the box. Then some detail toys for a Tamiya Ferrari FXX I've had for awhile. So many Super cars so little time...more on the slow boat from Japan as we speak...I see a trend in my Summer. DSC01563 by niteowl7710, on Flickr