Tom Geiger

Wait wait wait!!! We'd do much better by joining forces! You get west of the Mississippi and I'll take east! Then we franchise out Europe and the rest of the world!

I notice that a lot of us take pictures outdoors. I know I do just for the lighting. When I'm taking progress shots, I'm not all that concerned about the background, so I place a box on my deck and the back ground is pretty much the trees in my back yard. Back when I lived in New Jersey, quick shots were done on my side door deck rail. So those shots had my back door neighbors house in some of them. When taking final photos, I used to do so in my front garden. I had a spot I liked, and when one of my model friends came over, he wanted to see "Photo Rock" so that's what it then got called. Now on to the question... since some of us take shots in public places, or at least in clear view of neighbors, and it may appear weird for grown men to be taking pictures of small toys, "Has anyone approached you while you were taking photos?" And how did that exchange go? In my case it was my next door neighbor, a very nice younger lady. She was curious when she saw me at my side door rail. At the time, I was taking pictures of models I was going to sell on eBay, so I explained to her that I collected model cars and taking pictures for eBay. In short order, everyone in the neighborhood was calling me an eBay millionaire!

Welcome Bill, you came to the right place. I know when I started building models again as an adult, there wasn't an Internet so I joined a local club. My model quality jumped amazingly high quickly due to the tips and coaching I received. A lot of what we do is more knowing the tip, than a hard to master talent. So now that we are in the Internet age, you can do that 24/7! Follow the build threads and tips, you'll learn a lot. And you are allowed to ask questions too! Good luck.

I like this a whole lot! It looks great with the Route Master bus too! I wish the Land Rover kit was a bit more available. I seldom see them for sale.

Thank you Vince for this great review. The kit is obviously unique and a great addition for the modeling community, Price wise, it's still cheap. When you consider all the work that went into it's creation, $100 isn't out of line for a hand made product of this caliber. I think people have gotten spoiled by seeing the Jimmy Flintstone $10-20 bodies and R&R kits under $50. But neither of those are anywhere near the quality you are getting here.

I am starting a Pro Modeler Certification.... Send me: + Photos of your last five model car builds. + $50 Application Fee You will get your Pro Modeler Certificate in the mail in 3-4 weeks.

Roger, those police parts would make great trading material.

Very nice build. One of my early cars, and certainly the oldest, was a '56 Chevy 210 2 dr sedan. Mine had the six and two speed auto, along with manual brakes and steering. Mine was originally a blue and white two tone, painted by Uncle Earl a bad beige long before I got it. I primed it gray and it stayed that way through both of my ownerships of that car. Yea, I owned it twice.

Rich! You're back from your world tour?? Started working on anything yet?

I have this one, I believe it was done by Ertl. It's pretty nice and in our favorite scale. I'd rather have diecast than nothing!

From trash to treasure! You hit that one outta da park!

Yup, many of those "Pro Built" models look like they were assembled by a fifth grader! My own pet peeve is the guys who have some bad old built ups and smear a little rust paint on them and try to sell them as "Pro Built Junkers". I think that just gives what I do a bad name. I've had guys that seem amazed when I tell them I start out with a brand new kit. A lot of the built models on eBay are pure junk. But when you do see models you think may be nice, the builder has sold himself short by not presenting it to it's best advantage. I've seen those with two small bad photos, and two lines of description. I've bought poorly described models that I was buying for parts, and got them only to find they were too nice to tear apart. There is one guy on eBay who builds very nice models that has a good following. His stuff sells for hundreds of dollars.

My first car was a '66 Valiant V100 2 door sedan. I loved that car! Back before I had my license there was an old Volvo (the one that looked like a '48 Ford) for sale at a local gas station. The owner wanted $100. I went home to talk to my father about it. He forbid me to buy it and told me he'd have it hauled to the junkyard if I did. So I didn't buy it. Later on I hauled home a '56 Chevy. Next thing you knew he was out in the driveway helping me work on it. So I figure I would have gotten away with the Volvo!

Love your VW! Here's an oldie a friend gave me to restore. Some kid built this back in the day. The cab rear wall is cardboard!

A funny thing. About 30 years ago I started my car brochure collection as a resource file for all things car. When I got into modeling, I saw that as my first line of research and soon found out that they weren't all that trust worthy. For instance, in the earlier days, the artists actually distorted the drawings of the cars to make them look longer, lower and sleeker! Take a look at the late 30s Mopar brochures. I also found that you couldn't trust color etc from the brochures. They would have a drawing of the engines, each one a different color even though in real life they were all Chevy red. Ask me why I have a Jeep V6 painted gold! Today I can put my fingers on very good photos of whatever I need in minutes. And if I can't find it, I use my "ask the audience" card and post the question on the boards.

Nice build of an old favorite. I have that original release box too. I bought it back then for the same reason as you did!

eBay has actually driven DOWN the price of collectibles overall. The fact that so much is so readily available, and competition, has made it easier to find specific collectibles. Once you realize that the same kits are going to reappear every other week, you bid accordingly. It may take you a while to be the high bidder at your price, but it will eventually happen. We all have many models that we would never have found in the old way of going to swap meets. And when you see a high price posted on eBay, that doesn't mean anything but someone wishing to sell it for that much. There are dealers listing fairly common kits for $100-200, but they're not sold because nobody is biting at those prices. The free market will always sort those out. For instance, I've been looking for an early Chevette model. There's one for sale on eBay right now for $90. It's been there for months. I have a search agent for "Chevette" that emails me of a new one available about once a week. I missed out on one that went for $45 a few weeks ago. I was one bid away from the one that sold for $28 this week. And I'll keep plugging and eventually will get one around $20. It becomes a game. But the lesson here is not to believe the high prices!

Like most here have stated, I cannot imagine my life without my computer and the Internet. It's just made everything so easy.. need info... anything from model car research to looking up a local restaurant... just a few clicks away. This hobby has flourished due to the Internet. Guys who have no local model club or sources, can find it here. Research used to be going to your club meeting and asking. Someone would say they'd look it up and bring the book to the next meeting. So you were waiting a month.. then he'd show up empty handed. He forgot! Now, you just post on a message board. Whether you need some reference shots, data or even a part for a rare old kit, you'll have it in a half hour. As far as those who have chosen not to participate. Some don't because of fear, masking it with indignation that they'll never go on the evil Internet. I've seen some of these guys converted, once they see everything that is here, and are coached as to how easy it all really is. Between my two clubs, there are a few guys not on the Internet. Two of them are in their 50s, and are now just getting into it. One is an older fellow with bad eyesight. My clubs were late to convert over to all electronic newsletters, because we wanted to accommodate those few guys, Once we saw many other clubs going electronic, we did too, but the newsletter editors still mail out a few paper copies to these long time members. Should we in the future? Or is it just tough luck? Heck, companies don't accept paper job applications any more, even for minimum wage jobs. The other side of it is that we were paying a fortune between printing and postage. The Tri-State Scale Model Car Club hasn't charged dues in the last two years due to the savings of going electronic. And for NNL East, we used to print up a fairly comprehensive 4 page flyer that went out to our mailing list. Still our phones would ring off the hook during 'show season' with all kinds of questions, requests for turn by turn directions, etc. Now we mail out a simple postcard directing folks to go to our website. The cost is maybe 25% of what we spent previously. And due to the website we get very few phone calls. The website answers most questions. We put on the card that we will provide a paper flyer to those who can't access the website. We mail out less than 5 of those against our post card mailing of over 1500 cards. So most people are on board.

that is a cool build! Thanks for posting it.

I think I paid $12 for this, but even if it was $15, it's worth it. The last can lasted me something like 5 years, you are only painting the chrome with it!

That stinks. But you are young and you ain't seen nothing yet! I had several friends screw me over with cars. Mostly on the end of me doing them a favor, giving or selling them cars I had at a give away price. And take it from me, never sell them a car for payments! I learned the hard way that hard luck friends have hard luck for a reason!

Dan.. I think we all could use a few more pix of that truck! Very cool.

Trio of wire axle Novas... technically Chevy IIs A lineup of Falcons And some Valiants just for fun...

I did the 24 hour build in February. Like others said above, it's really not about the models. It's a fun thing to do with others, much unlike most modeling being a solitary activity. The key is to find a kit that is expendable... that means not valuable and you won't miss it, just to have some fun. I built the '53 Studebaker Miss Deal Funny Car. Why? Because I had three of them and I always wanted to see how it went together. And it wasn't that complicated a kit. Then you just have at it. Don't sweat all those things like body prep like you are going into surgery. Just start spraying, gluing and build like a sixth grader. You'll find out just how much fun we have been missing since we got so serious about a kids hobby!

Neat story Manny!