Tom Geiger

A small vehicle like this will not pass the US crash testing. We don't have any secondary class of registration for small city vehicles. The small pickups like these are sold for use on private property. The one above is used as a maintenance department vehicle on the Rowan University campus. DisneyWorld in Florida has scores of these on their property as utility vehicles. I've worked for 3 companies that had 100 plus acres of property that we used electric vehicles (like golf carts) to get around.

I'll throw another log on the fire.... Paul Hettick build just closed at $750

My Uncle Dan died a few years ago at 93. He was a tinkerer and handy man, but most of all he never wasted anything. When we cleared out his house we found he had a recent flat screen TV, but it sat on top of a cabinet that was familiar... yea, when his old TV died, he pulled it out of the wood cabinet, put a shelf inside and put wood doors on it. He made a piece of furniture out of it. That gave a whole new meaning to TV stand!

When I was 12 I wanted to play the guitar so my parents got me a folks guitar for Christmas. They hired a teacher and the first day she asked me to hold out my hands. She shook her head and said, "Short stubby fingers, you'll never play a guitar." And the sad fact was I believed her and never tried again. I still have that guitar though!

I love these threads where people arbitrarily access value without any concrete information. The price of any product is based on the cost of producing the product, packaging, labor to package, shipping cases, shipping (at least 3 different trips!) and all the handling through the wholesalers (labor, facility and profit) who eventually get that product onto the shelf of your local hobby shop. Add in royalties to the tire manufacturers. I'd suspect that the cost of everything I've listed beyond the cost of producing the tire, is much more than the cost of that tire! It's the same principle that the can cost more than the Coke inside it. And there's a big difference in the cost of throwing these tires in a kit, and offering them as a separate product. The guys at Round 2 are pretty savvy marketing guys. They assessed market need for this type of product, estimated the quantity the market can absorb based on the sales record of their other products, and brought the idea to reality. They no doubt know to the fraction of a cent what each and every cost associated with this product is, and have priced the product to their best estimate... that rather fragile balance of the price the market will bear VS the cost of providing this product. They haven't over priced these because they think we're all idiots. They sincerely want to provide cool product to our market. And most important, they have invested their money in the belief that they can sell this product. The price represents the real costs of getting that product from rubber pellets in China to your work bench. Certainly they cost more than a dollar a set. Nothing cost a dollar today. The sad part is that a big part of their decision to offer these wheel sets is that we, as a consumer group, liked them in the kits and campaigned to get them separate! And if we don't respond by buying them, well there won't be any more products like this in the future!

Al, use that found time to work on models! You can join in my Holiday Model Car Amnesty Build, where we challenge folks to complete an old unfinished project during the time we have off over the holidays! http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=96581#entry1317729

I've been doing this on the udder board, and thought I'd expand it to the Model Cars Magazine community ... It's The Fifteenth Annual Holiday Model Car Amnesty Build! The idea is simple. Every year the president grants Thanksgiving Amnesty to a turkey. So I do the same to some long languishing model on my unfinished build shelf. I try to take some downtime between Christmas and New Years and it's an ideal time to get some model building done. I realized early on that I didn't have time to build an entire model in that week, but I did have time to finish a model that was maybe 50% done. So the Annual Holiday Model Car Amnesty Build was started back in 2000! Man that's a long time ago! It all started here. The Dodge Ramcharger was the year 2000 build. I didn't like the toy-like chassis so I had scratchbuilt an underside to it and put it away. So it came off the shelf, and got it finished. The 2001 car is the Fiat 500, another model that I did a few steps and walked away. I liked the idea of getting a model built during this special week, but also breathing life into those promising unfinished projects. So I kept at it. This has worked out great for me since it's gotten at least a model a year done! The only years I didn't complete my task was 2007, when I failed to complete the Volare Messenger Car, and 2010 was the year I moved to Pennsylvania and didn't have my work bench set up. Otherwise, I've been up to the task. Note that the Volare is currently on my workbench and I'm hoping to finish it this week. I have included a link below to all the vehicles I have done over the years. As I posted on the board, soon other folks decided to join in! I was honored, the more the merrier! Time frame - Some folks take off Christmas week forward with their last day of work being this Friday (the 19th), so figure our builds start on December 19th. The first workday of 2015 is January 5th, so that concludes our project! But don't despair, the rule is that if you haven't finished but consistently keep at it, you can work until completion. I think my 2012 1934 Ford went all the way until February, but most important, it got finished! And that's what this is all about. Now the big question on everyone's mind.... "What is Tom building this year?" Drum roll! The Trailblazer! This is an old Lindberg kit that many of you have probably looked right past at shows. But I was collecting little dune buggies and quickly realized this was pretty much 1/25 scale. These are so over looked that I have bought 3 of them mint in box for less than $20 each. It was also sold as the Tiger Shark, with different artwork. When I got my first kit I thought it was just something Lindberg made up. Then Norman Veber sent me scans from a 1961 Hot Rod Magazine. It really existed and was supposed to go into production. I don't think they ever got that off the ground, but per the photos in the article, they had at least one finished car and one driving chassis. It had a Corvair engine up front, driving the front wheels. I thought the Lindberg kit chassis was toy-like, but it duplicates the 1:1 pretty well. How cool is that? By the time Norm emailed, I had already conceived this project as a custom buggy on a Jeep chassis. I have a second kit to build one stock too. I spent Thanksgiving week getting this one just so far in 2004, making this project 10 years old. So it certainly deserves to be finished! Please post your project here, then you can post your progress in your own thread in the Workbench categories. Mention there that this is your Holiday Amnesty Build! So what are you guys going to finish this year????

Cool. Welcome to the hobby. You are in a good area, we have at least three different PA clubs within an hour drive of you! PM me for details.

I'm surprised we haven't seen this one back! Figure that it could be sold as Revell of Germany throughout Europe too! I don't even have one. You just don't see them for sale.

Dean Milano builds strictly stock vehicles. I know he's done a stock Henry J and Anglia. I've seen stock Willys. Many years ago Joe Cavorley (long deceased) did a stock US Navy '41 Willys pickup. I also remember a Fiat Topolino street rod that the builder used 1930s Fords fenders on. If you go through all the show photos people have in online albums, you will find them. And since the next question is "where are these on-line albums... here is the link to the NNL East albums. http://public.fotki.com/tssmcc/nnl-east-photo-albums/

If you don't have a local Hobby Lobby, Michaels and AC Moore also have those coupons. The selection isn't the greatest. As you asked... club meetings and shows. I'm on the East Coast in the PA/NJ/NY area and we have a lot of shows and swap meets throughout the year. There are dealers who work these shows that sell new release US kits for $16-20. I like the smaller swap meets where builders (vs dealers) are selling off extras. They seem to have cheaper prices. And I belong to two clubs where members will bring a box of extras to sell off for $5-10 a kit.

Since we're talking monks... At the ancient monastery the monks spent their days scribing new hand penned copies of ancient manuscripts. One day an elder monk asked, "I've been doing this work all my life. I see we're working from recent copies, has anyone ever checked the original to make sure we're accurate?" The head monk told him the original documents were in the cellar and he was free to check for himself. A short time later the monk comes back, visibly shaken. The elder asks him what is the matter and he replies, "It says CELEBRATE!"

You could always use the logic that it's too heavy to mail out economically!

Interesting! How are these legal to drive in your state? I know you can't license them for the road here in the East. They are used for work within large facilities here. Within the past 6 months I saw a Suzuki Carry pickup for sale here in PA for $2500. The ad did say it wasn't legal for registration. Still, it was low mile and perfect! I was tempted even though I could only drive it up and down my driveway!

Planning on it! Yea, I've been working pretty intense on the Volare Messenger Car and have been enjoying that project. I'm hoping to get that finished soon, then I have a few ideas for the Amnesty Project! Then again if I work slow, the Volare could be the Amnesty Project!

The most expensive for me was a 1966 Plymouth Valiant Signet promo. This is the rarest Mopar promo and since I owned a few 1:1 Valiants I needed it. I have an eBay search agent on that and they only come up once a year or so. I paid $450 for it. Then again, I've paid more than that for a rare item for my stamp collection!

Joseph, take care of yourself and your family. That stuff comes first and you have a lot on your plate for a young guy. But when things are tense, this is a great place to get away from life's troubles. So please do check in, read the threads and you'll feel a little better!

what pleased me today? Finding out that I'm done for the year! I don't have to drive back to the office until January 5th. Yea, I will do some work from home, but I'll be getting some rest and some model work done.

Very cool! I love a well done old commercial truck! Especially an idea I haven't seen before.

She actually had no idea what cars you owned. That's just a company selling generic service plans. I wouldn't want to try to collect on one though!

My question.... who sleeps in the "head in use" spot? You or her?

Amen

Guys have tried to pull that stuff in the past. Signing a statement doesn't stop a cheater since they have no morals to begin with. In fact a name builder once outed a guy who approached him to build a model for the buyer to compete with at GSL. But those would be hollow victories, cheating for a plaque! It would be a lot harder these days with the Internet, since excellent models get coverage on boards and photo albums. And those wagons are well known enough that someone would recognize them at a contest!

Cool! I'm so happy that the stripes worked out for you! You will have to let us all know his reaction! This is one of those gifts that confirms that it's better to give than to receive!

Always wondered how long it would be before the NASCAR guys figured out it was the same kit over and over!