Tom Geiger

tastes like lard

Smart company! With employment up (national unemployment rate 3.7%) employers are hurting for new hires so wages are going up. It makes sense to pay your employees before another company hires them away.

As Leslie said, you could trim the fit between the body and chassis so it slides off easily. As far as needing resting spots for the chassis, you could add Evergreen strips to the inside edge of the body. I do that on kits to create a glue point. One thing I am planning on trying, is using magnets to hold things in place. I've been looking at those magnetic business cards companies give you to post on your refrigerator. Thin and could be cut to work.

Great project! When I was born, my first ride home from the hospital was in a Studebaker. My father loved the '53 coupe, and doing the best he could, acquired a '54 4 door sedan. When I was around three he and his buddies painted the car metallic green. I saw it and exclaimed, "Daddy's new car!" and touched the door, leaving my little hand print. Yea, my mother loved to tell that story. He traded in the '54 on a new '62 Lark. Man could those cars rust! He got rid of it in 1966 because it had visible rust on it!

I just checked... The Falcon stocker, and the stock car it came from are a bit larger than 1/25 to my eye. The AMT '67 Mustang chassis is way too small for the Falcon kit. It just sinks into the hole under the Falcon stocker body! The Monogram '66 chassis will need to be trimmed on either side, but looks good under the Falcon. The tail end will need a little length too. Note- I do have the AMT '67 Mustang chassis under an older AMT '66 Mustang. It fits wonderfully and is a great upgrade.

Thanks Dan! I agree with your thoughts too. One of the aspects I enjoy is looking at a challenge and thinking, "Can I do that?" And the thrill of conquering it! And yes, Modeling IS Meditation! I can have had the worst day, feel tired and dejected but after an hour at the work bench I feel refreshed and ready to face life again!

This is gonna be cool! I've noticed a recent trend to 4 door street rods of this era. I like it.

Bill and I went to TROG (The Race Of Gentlemen) this weekend at Wildwood, New Jersey! Totally wild! Most popular body was a Ford Model A. But then there were interesting things like a Packard straight 8 and a Hudson Super Six stuffed into them!

I'm gonna have to find me one of them Capris! It's listed on the Internet as a 1969 Ford Capri, with left hand drive, that would be the German produced version. I lived in Germany back when those were new, and our neighbor, a US Army Major, bought a white one. It pretty much was a mini-Mustang!

I always say that I build to satisfy the creative voices in my head. I love to see my ideas emerge in 3D in front of me on the work bench. I try to build my subjects in a unique way, it's just my style, my art. And I find it fulfilling!

as blinding snow!

and in the other thread we deduced that the topic of the board, "models" may be misconstrued as women... thus the dating ads etc. Right now I'm seeing a big ad for Chrysler Pacifica mini vans! Yea, I looked at a few on a local dealer's webpage a few days ago.

That is very cool! And your water looks real! Back in the 1950s and maybe into the 1960s they buried junk cars off New Jersey beaches as erosion control. Every so often when there is a hurricane, some of the cars emerge!

That was quick! Looks great! Keep on building!

In the beginning... Here's an Anglia that I painted in my teens that has survived! I didn't know to prep the body for mold lines and such. At least I did know to prime the body with silver paint, but still the Testors lime metallic is all runny! Also notice how I free handed the roof with a brush! The final straw was trying to brush paint the dark red plastic on the interior with Testors white from the little bottle! Then I decided to give modeling another try in my 20s. I was collecting car brochures and had the one for the 1960 Desoto so I thought I'd copy the cover car. I believe I painted the entire car with hardware store white paint. Then I masked off the roof and attempted to paint the body with Testors Burgundy spray paint. When I messed up, I'd sand the mess and give it another shot of paint. What I didn't notice was I was sanding the detail off the chrome. Still, once I got the body finished, I then went for the trim with Testors sticky silver. I didn't know to mask and made a general mess of it. And here's my brushwork on the interior as well. My problem was that yes, I was probably 10 years older than the previous model, but I was still using my 15 year old kid skills. I had not progressed at all. I had no peer group to confer with nor teach me. Of course I gave up. At around 30 I got the bug again. I found this Johan Studebaker in a hobby shop and brought it home because my father had a 1962 Lark sedan when I was a kid. I figured I'd try really really hard this time! Again, I started out with hardware store paint.. Pergament's (long defunct NJ chain) store brand antique white. Somehow it came out nice and even shiny over the Johan black plastic! Then I used Scotch Magic Tape to tape off the chrome trim before I brushed on the Testors sticky silver! I was really pleased with this model! I found Scale Auto Enthusiast Magazine in a magazine store in Boston and bought a copy. I stayed up all night in my hotel reading it cover to cover. It was the first aftermarket issue, and I was amazed at everything I saw. The store had back issues on a shelf under every current magazine so I went back and bought three more issues. In the back of one, someone had used their annual free subscriber ad to advertise the Tri-State Scale Model Car Club. I sent them a SASE for information (little did I know that this was a pivotal moment in my life!) I brought the Studebaker to my first club meeting and timidly put it on the table. Immediately a guy came over to look and started criticizing me. Told me I wasn't allowed to use hardware store paint on a model, I needed to airbrush. That I didn't open up the hood and put a full detail chassis under it. All things that were way beyond my understanding or wildest dreams at the time. He just chewed me up and down. I was devastated and almost quit the hobby right there! Later on I learned to understand the character! Yea, he was one of those guys who chewed on everyone critically about perfection, but had never completed a model himself. I wound up knowing him for 30 years and don't think he ever finished a model! So I kept at it and the club had a little contest at their Christmas party each year. It was a same kit contest, AMT 1957 Ford. I ran to the hobby shop and bought one. As I built it and brought it to the club meetings every month, people were giving me tips. What glues to use, canopy cement for the glass. My favorite new tool... Bare Metal Foil! How to mask off a two tone, and a load of other dos and don'ts. Aha! I had sucked as a modeler not because I didn't have any ability, but because I hadn't learned a lot of the basics on my own! And I completed this! I even went back to the hobby shop and bought a second kit for parts I had screwed up the first time! It was no trophy winner, but I was really excited. I had completed a credible model that was eons ahead of what I ever thought I could achieve! I was on my way. And along the way I met Joe Cavorley. I was instantly drawn to the light commercial weathered vehicles he built. We became fast friends and he was a great teacher and encouraged me along. It did take about 5 years before I actually won awards at shows, working harder on every model. With Joe's encouragement and instruction I was able to build the Christmas Tree Truck. He taught me to look at life through his eyes, and see everything around me. He taught me how to look at an assembly and to break it down to a set of basic shapes to scratch build. He showed me the tools and materials to do so. And he was ever so pleased to have a student who listened to all of his advise! Joel Naprestek did a demo on hand lettering at a club meeting and I was able to letter the doors. This was when I started placing in shows. I won a lot of first and second place Light Commercial awards! And the following year I built the Pyrite's Paddler, again taking Joe's advise. The Paddler is a replica of a real truck. I was amazed that I was doing this as it took shape in front of me. It wasn't easy, that's the third work box I built on the truck. That year I swept through the Light Commercial categories with first place trophies! I was approached by Don Banes, who was writing for Car Modeler at the time, about an article on my trucks. That became the centerfold in the magazine around 1995. Soon after, I stopped building models with the idea of winning at contests. I had proven to myself what I had set out to do and then some. From that point on, I continued to build my skills and listened to advise. I had decided I was done chasing the leading edge. I didn't want to work in metal, or buy a lathe. I still don't like to use an airbrush. Today I still use the most precious gift that Joe Cavorley had taught me. How to look at life around me! I build for myself and the few odd folks I call my friends. I'm pleased if the models come out like I saw them in my head and am blessed that I'm able to do so. I like to restore old built ups and build things from sad junk. I still seek out new skills and will build things just to see if I can do it. I enjoy showing off my work on the boards as well as at shows. If I win something at a show, so be it. If not I had a good day out with friends. Things I've built recently... Mostly I'm having fun. I'm spending a lot of time finishing old projects. Some of them aren't the greatest but I've pushed myself to work past the mistakes, things that would've shelved projects years ago. If it's not perfect, so what? I am getting wiser as I get older!

We are off to a great start with some super models! Let's see them all done! Okay, I'll offer up one Trabant 600 Universale Panel Wagon. Last saw light of day in 2014. Geoff Brown got me back looking at it with the completion of his kit. He had messaged me to inquire about it's status... that was enough to pull it off the stagnant model shelf! And it currently looks like this. Primer gray, about 3/4 done. And our goal is one little East German postal van.

Click -- Refresh! Click -- Refresh! Click -- Refresh! I have a project all ready to go. In the meantime I'm restoring the Blue Beetle! Play on..

America was a couple of guys who were air force brats whose father's were stationed in England. When I was an army brat living in Germany they played our school dance. Ah history! There was that Horse With No Name.... recent TV commercials suggest the horse's name was Antonio! ?

I take back my 6 years and realize it was when I first moved to PA maybe 8-9 years ago. They advertised it as a warehouse fire sale, but we saw it as the Lindberg sale... Just to grasp the size of this I looked it up. Ollie's has 330 stores across 23 states. Founded in Harrisburg, PA in 1982 by Morton Bernstein and Oliver ROsenberg. Yea, that's Oliver on the logos So figure a pallet or two per store... where to we find 500 pallets of model kits?

It makes you wonder where they are getting this stuff! This is a very small market. Back when they had their first big sale, some 6 years ago it was all Lindberg. We surmised that Frank had a warehouse full of slow movers and sold it off to finance the latest kit releases. Since then they've had a mix of all manufacturers. People said it may have been from Hobbyco, again slow movers from their big warehouse. And now they are gone... where is there an entity that would have quantities of these kits? Remember Ollies is getting larger as a chain. Their sale represents a huge load of models! Intellectual curiosity is killing me!

That is one neat model... never say never! Who would've ever thought we'd get this in 1/24 scale! And surprised nobody mentioned that this is the Titanic movie car!

Funny Dave! I saved that picture a long time ago. That is one very cool rod!

So profoundly sad! Bless everyone!

Thanks Ken! That's the "Scary Little Rod" ! It has an Under Glass thread of it's own!

My chuckle of the day... I saw this on Facebook. My response, "My friends and I didn't yell "car", we identified it by make, model and year!" I bet you all identify with that! ?