Modelmartin

I am still jonesing for a 51 Studebaker Starlight coupe!

Well I have built both an IMC GT40 and the Heller 917. The Heller was worse by a good measure! The worst 1/24-5th plastic kit I have run across is the Heller Mercedes 540 K. The main part of the body is split down the center! The rumble seat is a raised panel - not a raised panel line! The doors, hood sides and door inner panels are all chromed. They think you can paint the body color around all of the chrome trim! Some of the other trim is separate and on the chrome tree and then some is just molded on the body as it should be. The wire wheels are crappy. The hell of it is, it is a cool car and the only kit of a late Special Roadster and the body shapes are right on. The Heller Delahaye is nasty too but not in the same league. I am a highly skilled builder and can scratchbuild most anything but this Mercedes kit is depressing. I will conquer it!!

So you think you know what reasoning I use, HUH! I am an over-educated leftie and you can put whatever the blank you want on your models! Sheesh! It is really aggravating to see people blame everything they don't like on us "lefties". Turn off the talk radio, start up your brain and figure out why things happen. It is because a majority of people want it to happen or don't care if it happens. Things don't happen without the consent of the governed. That is real basic. Those of us who are progressive/liberal have opinions in all shapes and sizes. Many of us are very libertarian. I think the state sponsored extortion of the tobacco companies is wrong. It is a legal product. If people are suicidal enough to use it - that's fine. I don't want to pay for their health insurance however but I am forced to. I drink beer and hard licquor. I like fast cars and I don't denigrate people who I disagree with.

In your hand!

Jimmy Flintstone produced pre-cut flame stencils. I think they were called Tar-pit Flames or something like that. Also, many years ago S&S made a P/E stencil for cutting flame masking material.

This thread is morphing! Freedom and democracy are very messy things which some people find disconcerting. I don't think Harry was saying Jairus is a totalitarian dictater. Only his kids can say whether or not that is true! He was just saying that he doesn't want access to the internet controlled by the government. I can agree with that. Enzoenvy makes a point about what is advertised and violence is marketed pretty heavily everywhere which I find disconcerting. Greed, avarice and envy are used to market products everywhere we turn. Unfortunately, those things are not focused on a single type of product that can be regulated. Or not! We have drug companies pushing drugs on television and in magazines for profit and lots of it! That is wrong and immoral. Another point is the silliness of all of this hoopla about kids looking at porn. OK , let's have a show of hands of all of us who at a young age sneaked looks at Dad's, big brother's, funny uncle's, neighbors, etc. girly mags! The only thing warped about us is our fetish for model cars! People are not "protecting" their kids. They are sheltering them and worrying more about the discomfort of talking about sex with their children. Keeping them ignorant doesn't do them any good. Me shut up now.

Come on Jairus! Get it online from home like everybody else! Back to the subject - is a picture of a car with alcohol or tobacco sponsors on it the same as an advertisement under these laws? These aren't advertisements. I know the sponsorships are for the purpose of getting the name in the media( TV coverage, print media, etc). These are model cars. They are a historical depiction of something. Is the other magazine being too zealous? Inquiring minds.......... I believe there were issues about German WWII models not being able to have swastikas on the decal sheets or boxart for the German market where the Swastika is outlawed. I can understand that.

Cute! With clip-ons and a fairing it could be a speed record tricycle!

What! No tubs, no V8 with blower/stacks/tunnel ram? Seriously, I really like your build of this model. The skirts are a great touch and the detailing is excellent. Beautiful job!

The weeping is uncured resin. The dude didn't even mix his resin thoroughly!! It's like sqeezing some catalyst on your bondo and stirring it for 3 seconds and spreading it! It sounds like he used floor sweepings to "extend" his resin! Someone mentioned R & R - his resin has been fine and a majority of his master models are good enough to excellent depending on who did them but his castings always had a lot of pinholes in hard to fix spots. R & R is very buildable despite that, much more than TKM. They aren't even on the same planet. TKM is otherworldly and not in a good way.

Last weekend at NNL South I picked up a Top Studio Detail set for the Tamiya YZR-M1 GP bike. This thing is insane. P/E, turned and cast resin details along with good instructions. They even have cast resin electrical connecters for the wiring harness. Also got the Spiderman decals from Scale Motorsports. Looks like I will be Yamaha-ing soon. Yesterday I got my A/FX Buick funny car "Beware" in the mail. Not too bad and a good one for my unusual funny car collection.

I tried ordering a few bodies from A/FX last year and got nothing but really wanted them. I saw a buy it now for the Buick Beware Funny car from Dragin Plastic and decided to take a shot at it. It came in the mail yesterday and it is a decent effort. I'm glad I got it. Now I need to find the Bronco Funny car!

My personal opinion for all that it is worth (little!); I don't do big scale, I don't do boats, and I find it really, REALLY odd that contibutions are being asked for. That is really flaky. If it is that significant and historic and that many bigshots involved than perhaps it can be run as an actual business enterprise and finance it yourself and put the product on the market and make some sales. Spellcheck! How about grammar and usage check also!

I don't really groove on the Gregg and Jairus column myself. What I do like is Contest coverage and am really glad you switched to bigger photos. How to's are fine but I would like to see something similar to the Don Emmon's "Detail for Real" columns in Model Car Science. Articles profiling people in the hobby would be cool whether they are builders or people working for a model car company or an aftermarket supplier. Overall I enjoy Model Cars very much, much more than the other magazine -I forget it's name! I still get the other one because I need to keep the set complete. I actually subscribed before issue #1 but corporate ownership has taken the enthusiasm out of it. I always like the Sketchpad by Jairus. It is one of the top features of the mag. I think I am like a lot of model car guys I will buy any magazine published but it is always nice to be able to enjoy it, too.

It's OK.

Me Too!!

Those Tamiya Minis are great kits and it looks like you having fun with them. They look great so far. The Fujimi kit is pretty nice too. The Fujimi needs a little surgery to lower it just a touch but otherwise builds easy and looks great. I have built several of each.

A slammed custom is one thing. It would be the same amount of work to turn a chunk of 2 X 4 into a custom. We are talking about model car kits here! The Seville I bought had an OK body shape. I had no big complaints there. All of the chrome work -bumpers, trim, window trim, etc. were crude and irregular and molded to the body. No way that that could be redone in under 100 hours by a skilled model maker. As model cars they are ridiculous. As promos they are still a joke. I personally don't care if people buy them and they are in business for another 30 years - I will never buy one and will never reccommend one to anyone.

Very cool!

The funniest thing is that Tom Mills has been producing this stuff since the late 70s!!!! His market is promo collectors, not serious scale model car builders. Think of it as folk art and you'll be OK with it. I got the bustleback 70s Seville from him in the early 80s and was not real excited about the quality.

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I wanna be a Kahuna!

It was my first visit to NNL South and I give it 2 thumbs up! Well run, fun guys, great models, nice facility -what more could a NNLer want? I will try very much to come back next year. Maybe the Mercedes theme will motivate me to finish my 500-540K collection.

The contest that Mark attempted to organise was a precurser to GSL and he was going to piggyback it with an IPMS National in Salt lake back in about 1980. Only one person entered it. Me. I got my $5.00 back when he cancelled it. In his next column in SAE he took the national model car community to task and asked " where are all of the national luminaries of the hobby who shall remain nameless?" Shortly after that a group of builders met in Tom Woodruff's garge in Jackson center, Ohio for a little jawing and then driving down to the Hot Rod Nationals in Columbus. Tom put a grocery bag on his head and a picture was taken. The picture of Mr. NNL made it's way to Mark. It was all in good fun because Mark came out to NNL #2 in Toledo which was held in one motel room at the Toledo Turnpike Motel. Ah! The Memories!

Mikelo, I love the cabinet spray booth. I am in the process of building a new garage with an upstairs for my model car business and will use that idea. Thanks.