Tom Geiger

and meanwhile near Philadelphia it's 47 degrees and raining. All the snow on the roof is coming down in great explosions. Per the bit about snow plows plowing in your driveway, at my first house I lived on a T corner. directly across from me was Chief of Detectives. The snow plow would do his front right to the curb, take the turn and dump it all right where my cars were parked, plowing me in completely. I don't miss that house!

Hey guys don't get your shorts in a knot... note the title of the thread is "IF I had 4k" so nobody is buying that Mustang. It would be a challenge to build in scale though... hmmm. And I know what it's like to be piled on... A few years ago my credit union had a bright red Dodge Magnum, V6, low miles that they wanted $10k for. I posted a picture of it and got piled on by guys saying they wouldn't take it for free unless it had a Hemi and top of the line performance package etc. Never mind that most of the guys who said this probably couldn't have afforded it anyway. Nor that the high performance model would have suited my commuting needs. Sucked the fun right out of thinking about buying it.

It was in the aisle with the rest of the spray paints. On the shelf with their other special effects paints. There is a Michaels Coupon for 50% off through today.

I was just at Michaels and they had a similar Krylon product. I paid around $5 for the Floquil. The Krylon was $12 for a can about double the size. Use your 40-50% off coupon.

Where was I in '62? Hanging out in style in the back of a brand new Studebaker! Good start on Mels!

Wrong. CarFax collects data from a lot of different sources. They get change of title information from state databases and it usually includes mileage. It has annual DMV inspection data with mileage. They get accident data from state accident reports. I know people who had never reported the accident to their insurance company, but there was a cop on the scene, and an accident report, so it appeared on the CarFax. They also are into the car manufacturers service records, so if a car was serviced at a dealer, that will be in there too. It's not the greatest on older cars that predate computerized systems. For instance I know my '99 Breeze was in an accident when it was a few years old due to some paint issues. But it's not on the CarFax.

I like it! You could pass those photos off for real. The only thing that is out of place is the kit antenna. It's a bit large. And I like your snow shots.

I have Fotki and have always liked their site and interfaces. They did have some issues this past year. They moved their operations to Estonia and there were periods where there were a lot of missing files. It seems we are past that now. You can get a free page there, but I've always had a paid account. There's a bunch of savings when you sign up for multiple years. Every so often they have a sale, and that's a good time to re-up.

We never got Lada products in the USA. I do know what a Niva is, I have a brochure from Europe. I think Canada may have gotten some Ladas.

I went to Michaels today armed with my 50% off coupon. They didn't have the Zap-A-Gap CA I went for, so I looked at the model display. Generally there's usually nothing I need, but I spied a Jeep Rubicon, with the coupon it was $12.50. I think that's only the second model I've ever bought there. Then I went to Hobby Town USA to get my Model Cars Magazine. I also picked up some CA in the thickest variety. I don't like that Hobby Town has their own private label on this stuff, since I don't know what I'm really getting. So I'll try it and see how it measures up to Zap-A-Gap. I also grabbed some Squadron White putty. I've always gotten the green, but hey it's a new year! I had tried the Tamiya putty recently but really don't like the way it spreads and sands.

I was trying to say that diplomatically. It now seems that Art was not authorized to share them. So it's best that people just let it lie.

If Moebius wanted those photos off the Internet, nobody should repost them. The shots no doubt give away some info on future releases they didn't want public right now. Leave it be!

I'd say it would be too coarse. It's real bumpy.

I watched your video all the way through. Your English and accent are better than some of the guys on this board who have English as a first language! I didn't have any problems understanding you at all.

Richard if you keep building dioramas you will run out of display space! I happen to know there's a large room upstairs that could become the diorama museum!

The seat and shifter really work well with the project.

whenever I check eBay for one, that's all I'm finding.. perfect mint ones. And I agree that I couldn't pop one of those apart. I'm having this same issue with my Dodge van camper. I have so much cool detail inside, I can't bring myself to seal it inside, only viewable through the windows and skylight assembly. Maybe yours would be a good candidate to be held together with some pegs, or even magnets. I know this will be a priority on my next camper build.

Just reading through this thread again reminded me of my "Great Model Room Implosion". Here's a photo of my model room back in New Jersey, back before the disaster. Everything you see in the foreground is actually sitting on a small folding table. Remember the shelves above the bench. The critical thing that may not be apparent in the photo is that the top shelf is loaded with magazine file boxes of Scale Auto and other model references. We went away one weekend and came back to... Kapow! Sometime during our absence, the shelves decided to let go. It seems that I didn't have them secured all that well. They had lasted up there for years, but came down hard. So hard that the chair I had at the bench was completely bent back and destroyed. And across the room! Magazines everywhere, project boxes everywhere. When we got home from our trip on a Sunday evening, I didn't even go into the room so I had no idea. My wife discovered it the next day while I was at work. That day happened to be our anniversary, so she didn't tell me until after we went out to dinner! She knew I'd be devastated and it would ruin the whole evening. And thank God for little miracles! Here's my 1950 Ford pickup just as I found it. The bottom shelf was a narrow one that I had paint and supplies on. It came straight down and was caught by a couple of exacto wood boxes! That perfectly protected the cars stored under that shelf like a little garage shelter. I glued the perfectly severed bumper back on the pickup. Next to it, that body is my Ranchero police car, which was just in primer that day. And the big circumstantial miracle... my Pyrite's Paddler '53 Ford pickup had been front and center on the bench. I was in the process of fixing a broken antenna when we left on our trip. We got as far as the kennel to drop off TJ and there was a note on the door that they weren't there but would be back in two hours. So we went back home. Having some time to kill, I went up to the model room and finished that repair, and put the truck safely back in my show case. The interesting part was that I lost nothing during this event. No models were smashed. The unfinished projects on the shelves seemed to float down as the shelves tilted and ran ahead of the crash. I just had to sort a lot of stuff back into boxes. There wasn't even paint, glue or thinner spills. Nothing. I got very lucky! The shelves did go back up on the wall. This time the screws were all very long and secured tight. I used to joke that the screws were straight through and could be seen from the outside of my house! And the big lesson was that the heavy books and stuff are no longer on the shelves. Just model projects and such. These are the same shelves that are over my bench here in PA. And very well secured here too!

This one! I built it back in the early 1980s and it took me beyond what I then thought were my limits. We used to have a club contest at our December meeting each year and I wanted to build the AMT '53 Ford Pickup. I wanted it to be a bit different so when I was sorting through some photos, I came across a set of the real truck that I took in the parking lot of a car show. My original intent was just to scratch build the plumbers work box. I had some Evergreen and the Don Mills slam locks. I even had the AutoWorld bendable rod to make the rack. Once underway, this was the build where I could do no wrong. I got the box done, so I thought I'd try to make the cap. That went well, so I took it to a club meeting and a buddy got excited and offered up the canoe from the old Pontiac kit. Next thing you know I'm opening up the doors and scratch building the grill bar! The funny part was that I didn't have a model room at the time. My original model room was unfinished shell space in an addition we had done. Time came to finish that off into a bedroom, so I was working on that project. That left me to building on the kitchen table. I found a pink and yellow board that was scrap from my house renovation. It was originally the side of a cabinet. I used that to build on to protect my kitchen table. Each evening I'd set up on the board and clamp a light to the table. When finished for the night, I'd put everything on the board and lift it up onto the top of the refrigerator to keep it from little hands. I was rushing to get it done in time for the meeting, and we had a NorthEaster come through. I was off from work that last day, and ept pushing the project to completion. Even when the power went out I just pushed my table against the windows and worked in the day light. And it became the first project I ever got done on time! Of course, with the storm damage, our meeting was cancelled the next day. So the contest was pushed off until January. And I won! I achieved more with this kit than ever before. It cleaned up in Light Commercial categories at the East Coast shows that year. It got in a bunch of contest coverage in the magazines. It caught the eye of Don Banes, who was writing for Car Modeler at the time, who wrote a center fold article on this and another build of mine. We've been friends ever since. The best part was that the owner of the original truck turned out to be a modeler and started to see his truck in the magazines. He tracked me down and we got together at an IPMS show where he was very complimentary of the model and told me the whole story behind the truck. That was really cool!

No polar bears here yet... we have deer, a fox and most recently a lost sheep. This guy probably escaped from a local farm or nativity scene. Cops say he's been out there a few weeks. My neighborhood email chain gives daily sightings. Nobody has caught him yet.

That's an interesting note from msmiteymouse since we really haven't heard anything since Ray's passing. It was rumored a while back that there was a party interested in buying R&R in Europe. So maybe that's the deal. It doesn't seem right that Ray sold the company while he was alive. For years every time I'd see Ray he'd tell me this was his last year, that he was retiring. Then he'd be back at NNL East the next year. Then he discovered that he could wholesale the kits for others to sell on the Internet and he said he couldn't make the product fast enough. The last time I saw him he came to NNL East as a spectator, and brought us about a dozen R&R kits to give away as prizes. I never saw him happier. He said he was going to quit the business because he was tired of being on the road and going to shows, but that he enjoyed making the product and would do so as long as he could. And he died later that year, so I don't think he sold the company. If Steve has 1100 pieces and Missmiteymouse is still selling product, there are a lot of R&R kits out there. I not only bought them direct from Ray at shows, but I've bought them second hand from others. I'll bet there's enough R&R product that it won't be in short supply for a while.

You'd never survive in Pennsylvania. My pool sits in a private spot in the woods. It gets little direct sunlight. It has an electric cover that we use nightly and during the week when we're not using it to keep leaves and critters out. The only way it ever hits 75 is from the heater!

Courtesy of the pool control panel in my kitchen.... That about says it all!

I did that when I was new to the hobby. I'd be at a show walking around with shopping bags in each hand and I'd run into older / more experienced club members who were carrying nothing... "Didn't see anything I needed." I couldn't understand that at all, I mean here we were in virtual toy land! Now I know where they were at!

As others have said, acrylic paint is the way to go. Flat black and dark gray will give you some variations that will work in different situations. The ratio of paint to water depends and is more of a preference thing. One suggestion... instead of 'wiping' it off, blot it off. Weathering and toning on a car doesn't have brush strokes.