Kit Basher

What are you doing with my Hobby Shop?! (See full name below)

WOW! Thanks for putting up the WIP Dominik, it shows that you had to put a lot of work into this thing. Building that trunk lid was an accomplishment in itself. Great job on both car and boat. Thanks for sharing.

Now that is just totally awesome! Excellent in every respect. I like the blacked out wheels and the "junk in the trunk". Nice work and great photos.

The upper parts of this engine have a black wash (cheap black acrylic paint thinned with water). The oil pan area is gloss black enamel, with some baking soda added in places. Hope you have fun weathering your engine.

Looks nice!

Some of these Lindberg kits are pretty nice. This one is nicely detailed and goes together well. Thanks for the kind words, Carl and Darren.

A couple more:

This is the Lindberg Off Road 4x4. I've bought a few of these because they're cheap and have some nice parts. I finally decided to build one. It's my first attempt at a painted stripe. It's not perfect, but I'm learning. It's hard to tell in the pics, but the stripe is Testors "White Lightning" and looks kinda pearl. The red is Testors "Red Metalflake". The wheels and tires are from the Monogram Bronco. I usually don't go for body color wheels, but it works for me this time.

I was taught to do it to save the brakes. Then it was pointed out to me that brakes are cheaper than clutches. Now I drive like Mr. Obsessive. Edit: Downshifting is necessary when driving a truck like the one in my avatar.

I like the second picture better, too. How about cutting the bottom off of the whole cab, and lower it down in the T-bird? I don't know if it would work, I'm just throwing out an idea.

Johnny, if you get a saw, please let us know which one you get, and perhaps offer us (or at least me) a review of it. I also need to cut very small pieces of wood sometimes and would be interested in your results. Thanks

Great idea! Thanks!

In case it's helpful, the dimensions for modern surfaced lumber are as follows: 1"= 0.75, 2"=1.5, 3"=2.5, 4"=3.5, 6"= 5.5, 8"= 7.25, 10"= 9.25, 12"= 11.25. I'll let you make your own scale conversions.

I thought at first that you stole "Scale Master" Mark's giant ruler, but I see yours says "Pittsburgh", not "General". Beautiful work, Bill. I've been enjoying this from the beginning.

For ripping thin balsa and basswood, a Master Airscrew balsa stripper works well. As you can see, it also works on styrene. You can make thin stock on a full size table saw by ripping a wide board and taking the finished piece off the waste side of the blade. It's difficult to make multiple pieces of consistent thicknesses this way, so it's best if you can rip a board long and thick enough to make all the lumber of a given thickness that you need in one pass. You might also look at veneer as a source for thin stock. Hope that helps.

WOW! That looks perfect. Great weathering, it looks totally real!

Joe, I don't think you have to use any undercoat, but the color under it does make some difference. Here it is over black primer. It's actually darker than this pic shows. As you can see, it's metallic on its own, but you can make it darker or lighter by what's under it. Hope that helps.

"there was some pretty huge flake applied to dune buggies and bass boats years ago." Yeah, I remember seeing some show cars that had flakes that were 1/2 to 3/4 inch. I don't think they could be sprayed, but sort of "blown" onto a wet substrate. This stuff would work great for that.

That depends on what "is" is.

Good one, Mike.

What makes it worse is that an adhesive "adheres" things together, not "adheeds". I agree that people who use big words incorrectly to sound smart actually sound dumb!

Ira, could you elaborate on how you applied the Rub N Buff to the knobs? It looks great. Keep up the good work, your builds are always fascinating!

Check out this car by the master hisself. http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=62015&hl=%2Baluminum+%2Bwillys

Question for Joseph: How fragile is the foil mold? Did you have any trouble removing it from the car and filling it without damaging it? That certainly looks like an easy way to get the job done.

My current favorite is "to service", as in "the sales associate will service you now". Having grown up on a farm, that verb has a completely different meaning. For you city boys, a bull services a cow, or a stallion services a mare, a male services a female. On second thought, maybe the new usage is right, we are being serviced, and not even getting a kiss!