Tom Geiger

As someone who kept half a dozen restorable cars, some for 25 years, you may as well sell a few that you haven't gotten to in a long time. Use the funds to restore the one or two nearest to your heart. I wound up having the great car sell off when I was moving and saw the writing on the wall. I did make near $10,000. I haven't replaced any yet, but when I do it will be with a running and driving car I can enjoy. At my age I'd rather be cruising than working under cars.

I spray everything today. I even put very small parts onto toothpicks or tape to spray. I only brush details, and I use brushes during my weathering process. Back when I was a kid, I had to brush paint everything. Living in Germany and mail ordering all my kits and supplies from AutoWorld, it wasn't possible to mail spray paints. So I had to paint my bodies from small Testors bottles. I do remember instructions from back then about compounding brush painted bodies with Colgates tooth paste. I do own a bunch of old brush painted models in my Olde Kustom Kollection, some good and some downright awful!

I have a great mechanic. Good ole boy that I've become friendly with. Over the summer my wife saw an ad offering an a/c recharge for a bargain price. The place was right near her work so she took it there without telling me. They charged the system and put dye in it. Then they told her she need $1000 in front end work! She called me and I told her to get out of there. I took it to my guy, he went over the whole front end... no problems! The next weeks she took it back there for the dye test results. They told her she needed an evaporator and wanted $800. Um, nope!

VW split window. Surprisingly, nobody has ever done one in 1/24 or 1/25. ROG did one in 1/16 so they have good reference!

I like the flames too. A good eye, you did just enough but not too much. Hope the wheels go well. I spent an entire morning getting the right combo of wheels / wheel back and tires on the Volare so they fit in the wells and it sat flat.

A 1966 Chrysler story... back in the summer of 1976 my friend picked up a '66 Chrysler 4 door sedan. It was that dark green that many of them were, but it had a red hood on it. His father soon after got a '66 Chrysler 2 door hardtop, dark green and irony was that it also had a red hood. I had an accident with my '66 Valiant, which was silver, and I wound up putting a red hood on it. So we formed "The Red Hood Club", a secret society. People would ask why we both had red hoods and we'd tell them that it was a secret and they'd have to have one to know about it! We still kid about this today!

Pretty elementary. Styrene tires are part of the kit pressing, add no labor and the amount of plastic pushed through the mold is at a minimal cost. Vinyl / Rubber tires are a separate tool, and add an extra process to producing that kit. There is labor in producing those pieces, then integrating them into the box for the finished product. Same reason some early kits didn't include glass, and why red lenses were eliminated on some kits that originally had them.

Al, will you join us on the 24 Hour Build on FaceBook?? It's this coming weekend, Saturday noon to Sunday noon!

Very nice work!

Never saw that one before. Wish I hadn't!

And I managed to finish the Volare. Life is good!

Thank you everyone! This Volare has been an interesting saga for me. It started out with a junk body that I practiced weathering some 25 years ago. So this is where my specific style started. The body was given to me by a friend who passed away this past year. It wound up on the bench every five years or so, getting a bit closer to done each time. This time I decided it was time to finish it and right now it's sitting in the place of honor next to the TV in the den. It's finished, but one night this week it will be back up on the bench for some minor touch up, but it's essentially finished. The end of an era! The next time I'm home during daylight, I'll take the glamour shots for Under Glass! Thanks to everyone who has followed this build, some of you for 20 years!

The funny thing is that if I'm on the computer or watching TV, I can put a few beers down! Working on a model, I get mesmerized, tune out everything else and that beer winds up warm!

Back before eBay had user names, you could see everyone's email address. I bought a lot of 4 nasty old promos to get one I wanted for $20. I got lucky and nobody bid on them, probably due to lack of write up and poor photos. Turns out even the one I wanted was a bit nasty so I decided to resell them all. I wrote nice descriptions and took good photos. I listed each of them in their own separate auction. What do you know? Each one sold for over $20! The guy who sold them to me saw that and sent me a nasty email that I ripped him off and he was turning me into eBay! For what? Being a capitalist? LOL Nothing wrong with that old Pontiac promo. Someone took the time to list it instead of throwing it away. Someone is happy to buy it. Two happy people. End of story.

BMF really brought it to life! This is turning out really nice Rich, can't wait to see it at a certain little show!

I think RMR pops that in resin too

Wow! That Power Wagon is gorgeous! And a fresh restoration, I wouldn't mind having that in my garage! And that would make a great kit, with military cross over. There is a nice diecast already.

John, that kit has the nicest slant six that was ever done in a kit! You gotta use it. I wired that slant six, in fact I did a lot of wiring! As said, that distributor is so buried, just hollow it out and put seven wires in the middle.

It qualified him as an idiot!

So sorry to hear that Scott! I lost my dog Ted a few months ago and miss him dearly.

Looks great Steve, especially working within the constraints of an old school interior tub!

Many years ago I asked a hobby shop owner why they didn't have the model car magazines. He rolled his eyes like I was an idiot and said, "Modelers want to build models, not read magazines!"

I'm off for the holiday today. My wife is not. I'm spending the day up in the model room. Left over Chinese food for lunch. It should be a good day.

Hmmm... retro? What was that perfume my grandmother used to wear? Kinda smelled like whiskey and cigarettes?

Tony Bennett from Down East Dickering? Did he bring Spike along too?