James W

Congrats on finishing a model. Focus, focus, focus.(jus' trying to encourage ) Nice work on the body paint, the layering is very good. Keep it up. More trophys will follow I'm sure.

Cool! my wife has been looking for a sectional! Maybe I'll show her this one.

To Jan and the rest of the family, my prayers are with you. Bob I will miss you every time I smell burning plastic or hear the term M.E.K. I met Bob through SABA in Portland Oregon around 1990. He is a true ambassador to the hobby. He encouraged me (and many others I'm sure)to enter the GSLMCC at a time I thought that kind of competition was only for the elite of the hobby. I spent many hours at model shows and club meetings laughing both at Bob's masterfully woven stories and at his expense, as has been mentioned previously here, he could weave for long periods of time. He would tell of traveling to Harrah's in the Revell years, when he had 'carte blanche' access to the cars. When a new security guard was on the floor he would jump into some priceless car and wait to be confronted. He would tell of riding his motor scooter around the SF bay area dealerships to pick up new car brochures when he was in his teens. How he started the model car contest at the Portland Roadster Show which ultimatly lead to the founding of SABA, early club meetings included the cutting out of $1 coupons to help finance the club. How he blew the whistle on AMT for only awarding AMT kits in a contest, a move that lead to a job at Revell. And many stories about Revell, I hope someone wrote them down. There is only one Bob Paeth and he will be greatly missed.

Thanks For thinking of us here in Salem James, I took those flyers to the LHS here in town but am unable to go to the show this weekend. I do have a hot rod 37 pick-up that could be ready for the Portland Roadster Show in March(?) Bob Paeth will tell you all it is the oldest running model car contest in the states, maybe the world. SABA has been a modeling force in the Northwest since the early 80s. There are also many fantastic model builders in the area. I don't know of many who use this forum however. You are not alone Rod.

That's great news to hear Bob. We will be praying for you. Take care of yourself, lots of rest.

Just a little tip for when you go back to the store to get more plastic. I carry a slip of paper in my wallet that has all the Item numbers of the packages I have at home.(Evergreen has a three digit No. on it's bags) Otherwise I tend to keep buying the same stuff over and over. If you buy Plastruct, I recommend using thier liquid cement. It bonds the Plastruct as well as other styrenes very well. SOME of the other cements will not melt the Plastruct, and that is what make the bond happen. Maybe someone else knows what DOSE work on Plastruct. Have fun.

I like the idea of a vintage Merc racer, but where are you going to find an unchopped Merc? I do really like it. nice job!!

I heard they made this kit from the die-cast masters, so it's a bit 'ham fisted', not as delicate as it could be. I'm gonna wait for the pre-painted kits, it's bad enough I have to prepare my food!!!

Excellent tutorial! I learned a few things. Always good to see what the other guys are doing and you explained yourself well. You should hit Gregg up for some magazine time!!

Very nice!!! Love the Wide Whites. What is your secret to getting the paint so scaly?

Hey that's looking goood! The rusty spots are right on. One thing I see looking at the whole picture is that the silver paint is too consistent. It would be weathered on a car like this. Try brushing on some flat clear and then working it over with some fine sandpaper. Silver is a hard color to work with sometimes, so do a small area and experiment with it. Every time I build I find different things I 'd like to try next time, makes the hobby a never ending adventure. You've really got a great start here. keep going.

The Valiant has been in a box most of the 5 years I've beeen in my current house. Space is always at a premium with a hobby like this. It will most likely stay out now as I've always liked it and I'm sure I can 'work it in ' somewhere. I no longer rebuild my own stuff, and I decided not to rob old builds of their 'jewels'. It is fun for me to look back. If I need to re-live the past I try to find another starting point. As I said at the begining of this thread, I wanted to know what YOU guys think about rebuilds.

If it came back looking like your AMX that might be tempting

Dave, I bet you cut the tops off those front tires just because! Very nice ride. Well done.

Upper right field, next to My Controls. "View New Posts" It's what I do all th time, but I didn't know about it 'till someone showed me it. BTW, invest yourself in school now. Life is coming fast and you won't get another shot. At this point you can become anything you want. In 10 years it will be a lot harder to make up for lost time.

Here is the dilemma I recently wrote about this kit in a topic on first visits to a hobby shop. Since then, I dug it out of the box and have been thinking about redoing it. My question is not about this model specifically, but the idea of revisiting a kit you built yourself and want to re-do. This kit is a good example of a subject that is a little hard to find, so that in itself may justify a re-do.(you can't just pull another off the shelf and try again) But it is a piece of history, mine anyway, what I did 20 years ago. The wheels are a little dated, they got swapped 12 years back. (I love metal axles don't you) But I was thinking I couild do better, repaint after fixing the mold lines, factory rallye wheels, maybe a tail stripe. Oops, sounds like it will just be dated again in a few years, then what? How about it. Is it a good idea to rebuild the same model you already finished? Do you have regrets about doing this in the past?

For rust through, I cut from the inside of the body with a ball cutter in my moto tool. You can get paper thin with this technique. to break through I then use a sharp xacto blade to break the plastic open again from the back side. If you go through the plastic with the ball cutter that is OK, just rough up the edges. Don't over do it. Better to sneak up on what looks good. Find reference pictures on the net or take pictures around your town. For surface rust, paint the whole car red oxide primer, mask rusty areas with rubber cement, then paint the body your color of choice. After painting, remove the mask and dry brush rusty areas with multiple shades of orange and brown flats. You can finish with pastel chalks if you like. Again reference photos help a bunch. Have fun.

Welcome back to the forum. Your kids should be old enough soon to pick up a kit themselves. My son and daughter bothbuild occasionally just to be with me in my room. It cuts back on how much I can do, but they are only that age once. Even if yours don't want to build, although it sounds like they are kind of interested, invest in them now. The plastic can wait. The vette looks good so far. I'm sure the Nova will look great.

I got to go to Elmer's hobby shop in Salem Oregon only ONE time. It was '83 and I could finally drive. I had asked my Dad if we could go a couple times but he said it was just full of 'junk'. So when I got my license, I went down one Saturday. There were stacks of late 70's kits on the floor, old displays like Grain of Wheat bulbs and Pactra paints covered with dust. A cold water Coke cooler stood just inside the door. No Coke in it . Behind the counter on the wall, the whole line-up of '61 SMP kits were on display. Other old kits as well. By this time, Elmer was gone and his family had taken over the shop. They re-priced all the kits to reflect there current values. I had 12 dollars in my pocket, enough to by 3 models at Eastwood Hobby a mile away. But I was on a mission. I must have spent half an hour looking over the vintage kits. Finally I settled on a '61 Valiant by SMP. It was the only one I could afford. The rest were $14 or $15, some an astronomical $20!!!! I took it home and immediatly painted and assembled it, there was no thought of saving it for some future time when it might be worth more. It was always hit and miss,you never knew when the store would be open. Elmers closed it's doors for good some time later never to re-open. I never got another chance at any of the kits on the shelves, or the floor, or behind the counter, or in the storage room. The family was rumored to be holding on to these kits looking for a buyer. Good Saturday-Morning-Hobby-Shop-Folklore, just bring it up if your ever in Salem sometime. There was a story written about this shop in a magazine 15 years or so ago. Dose anybody know the magazine?

Here they are. Proof you are not alone Jairus. Get that plastic back out of the box now. I have built a frame. I am working on finding a front axle I like. The wheel base will be dictated(political jargon) by the engine/radiator. I don't want it to get too long, but the fan needs room behind the radiator. Right leaning powerplant seen here. I added some rake to the body. Working title "Patriot Coach" Sorry the images are so large. It is getting late and I'm going to bed instead of fixing them.

Jairus, I knew that chassis looked familiar. I've been working on building a frame to match the stance I created by proping up tires next to a sedan body on blocks. (see earlier post) Yesterday I found a suicide front end in a magazine I am going to try to replicate. I hope I can finish this thing in a timely manner, some of you guys build like the wind! Oops, I'm a conservative. Can I use a suicide front end????

What about families with young kids? What about people who have heavy stuff to carry? What about people who just are having a bad day? Shoot, why can't we ALL get the closest spot to the store? It always burns me to see 10 empty cripple spots in front of a store because of some arbitrary law on the books to calculate how many there should be.

Did you hear Pres. Bush this week? Some reporter asked him why he wasn't telling people to conserve and he told them that people were figuring that out on thier own, according to their own means. That is my kind of representative. He dose not assume people are stupid like this reporter obviously dose. As for reinstating the 55 law, there is a reason it got repealed, it was a dumb idea in the 70's and it makes no sense now.

You should see it Corner!!

OK, OK I know what your saying... but back when I could only spend what I had in my pocket, coming out of a hobby shop without a kit was unthinkable. I remmember buying a 1:72 bi-plane 'cause it was only $1.50 and I couldn't afford a car kit. Shoot, I used my first xacto blade for ten years, and it was a hand-me-down. Yes I like tools, but I have way more kits in my closet.