Tom Geiger

Yes and it does capture the essence of the original Mustang. It was the first retro car!

Yes Casey those are the end of the line kits. The same if we got a Volare, it would be the square headlight 1980 version. I don't think I have any of that square headlight Pinto wagons. I have a few of the earlier issue. The Pinto sedan delivery was sold as the Cruisin' Van but also was in the commercial catalog. There was a survivor in a recent issue of Vintage Truck magazine. I believe it was originally sold to a utility company. I also remember my local post office in NJ had some, I don't remember if they had side glass or not. But I do remember they had one bucket seat for the driver and a sorting tray mounted along side. And New Jersey Bell once had a fleet of Gremlin service vehicles. No back seat, just a flat bed for tools and such. Around 1978 a local used car lot had a bunch of them.

Charlie - Did you try to pull the decals off with tape? I've been successful doing so (even when I didn't want to remove the decals!). I'd try stickier tape like duct tape. Let it sit over night, then let 'er rip!

Agreed. The experience you have at your local IPMS group or show will vary by group and region, depending on what interests their membership.

I got this really cool R&R 1960 Valiant station wagon body as a gift from Al (aka porscheman) at our club meeting, He got it as part of a lot of models at a garage sale. Like I ever have that luck! The kit was built by a modeler of limited talent, but was then put into the hands of a numpty who sanded it to death, pretty much ruining the body. Looking at it, I may take a 1962 4 door body and mount the green house onto it. I can redo the drip rail detail since I pretty much bought the entire Evergreen catalog of round stock. I do already own an unbuilt copy of this resin, that will eventually become the 1960 model build. So it would be cool to create a '62 out of this mess. And that silly auction place has provided another interesting old custom based on the 1961 Ranchero original issue. I swore I wouldn't buy any more of these, since I had about a dozen different vehicles, but the color was so close to my latest restoration (and the price was right) that I couldn't resist that "Buy It Now" button! So another 50 year old build enters into the protective custody of the Olde Kustom Kollection!

You must've left a trail. We disappeared overnight! LOL Actually we left the invite open. Both daughters had good jobs and lives they wished to continue in NJ. They visit often. Probably because we have a pool.

Absolutely right! I've gone to IPMS shows just to see the level of detail and to see what would translate to my own building. I did find people who were willing to share their expertise.

Thanks for all the information. I do love this kit and plan on building more. I recently noticed that all the kits I had in my stash were the fleetside versions and I didn't have a step side. I saw one at a show and grabbed it so I want to build a step side next! I'm very pleased with the way mine came out:

I once got to drive a Pinto wagon for a summer. My bro-in-law asked me to sell it for him and gave it to me with plates and current insurance. I drove it as my daily driver for a few months with the FOR SALE signs on it. It was a decent driver that always started and ran well. It was easy to drive and handled well. I was actually sorry to see it go when someone finally bought it.

You talkin' 'bout me???? LOL

Stock reply email number 3 sent!

Watch eBay for a parts lot of tires. They come up all the time. I have a shoe box full of tires I got the same way, but bought in a large plastic bag at a show. Most of us wouldn't mess with the half tires or the styrene tires because there are so many good tires out there.

As said above, all these exist in scale. I'm working on getting some Chevettes on the shelf right now. Look up "Vauxhall Chevette" for the British version, which looks 100% possible. And a Pontiac T-1000 is something I want to convert with minor effort. Don't forget there's some interesting diecast too. Recently we got Dodge Omni and Plymouth Horizon 4 door sedans, Dodge Aires, and Dodge Diplomat 4 door sedans as well as an 80s Chrysler T&C. These are cool shelf pieces as they come, but can be made into models by blowing them apart and rebuilding them your way.

I remember you saying that! And then you can create an entire man level to your house! Look at the bright side, I had to move to another state to shake my kids from the nest.

Overall, hobbies attract colorful people. The very smart, the very odd. Those who march to the beat of a different drummer, and those who refuse to march at all. That's what makes it interesting.

That looks great Rich! You are building quite a collection of cool 50s cars! You will need to renovate your basement into a model car museum before long!

I thought that about the Japanese models in the "American Violence" series. My first thought was, "Man, is what they think about us!'

Since you mentioned it... I have been astounded by the lack of respect for automotive subject builders at IPMS events that embrace the fantasy builders, the Star Trek and movie monster figure guys.

I agree! I use Micro Kristal Kleer on all my gauges, and I even give chrome headlight lenses a coat. Great stuff. I like your printed gauges too. It's worth the few dollars to get that detail. I've gone to eBay Motors to look for gauges to scale down. I found I'm better off going to the parts section and looking for the gauges by themselves since they get obscured behind steering wheels in car photos. I've taken the photos, scaled them down and got the result I needed. Also, check out car magazines. I found a full color page of gauge sets for sale that I intend to scan and scale when I need one. One thing I noticed is that when folks use the photo etched belt buckles. The male end is always right on, with scale thickness but the buckle itself looks awful thin sitting on the seat. Would you be up to adding some plastic behind them to give them depth?

True, from the perspective of the military modeler, we're just kids playing with toys! But the truth is that there are probably as many amateur military modelers as car modelers. I used to belong to a club for all kinds of models. There were a bunch of guys who displayed glue bomb aircraft with glue on the bodies and windows. There were a few who would show up with several new completions each month that looked like little kids built them. Still they were arrogant and ignored the car guys. One time they asked me to remove my cars from the display table so a new arrival could put his glue bomb planes out. I packed them up and I don't think anyone even noticed I left. I never went back.

If the glass is glued in really tight, especially if it's glued around the window frames (as opposed to just on the runners on the bottom of the roof) you may be better off just leaving it be and masking it off for paint. You still need to fix the melt on the roof, but can hide the glass runners under a headliner.

Very nice work, especially on the fruit and boxes! I need to get one of those kits!

My Scamp from back in the day,,,

My neighborhood had an optional 3 car garage. That was the one option the original owner of my house didn't buy!

There was an article a while back that said that car builders had it lucky because our kits came with much detail right out of the box. The armor guys had to create their own detail to build convincing replicas because their kits (especially aircraft) were just a few parts. Personally I build automotive subjects because they are in my soul. I grew up on army posts as a military dependent and the armor and such never grabbed my attention at all. And being creative, I always build models with my own personal touch. That's not possible with military subjects since you are trying to achieve a perfect replica.