Tom Geiger

I used to have a 1:1 tear drop trailer back around 1981. I towed it behind my '65 Barracuda. I didn't keep it that long because my girlfriend, now wife, didn't like it, and it really wasn't all that safe on the road. The trailer was home built so the center of gravity was wrong, putting too much weight on the tongue. That led to having air shocks fully loaded, just to get the car to sit straight. The Barracuda 6 cylinder brakes weren't good enough for this load either!

Happy Birthday Anne! Take the day off and fiddle with some plastic!

I don't add it up. I'm pretty much building from my hoard, so my expenses are mainly supplies that get used over many kits. I don't think about the money as I'm building. A model doesn't become "red" because I have a can of paint handy. I will go out and buy several shades of a color to test before I agree upon the perfect one. The other cans wind up in my collection to be used later on. My latest builds have been pretty darn economical. The Dodge van camper was pretty much free, being built from junk parts and bass wood and Evergreen plastic I already had. There are a few kitchen items from a photo etch sheet that has to be 20 years old. I even had all the right paints, due to spending $30 on Ollie's $1 a can Duplicolor sale a few years ago. My '34 Ford rat rod started out as a $20 kit from the 'bay. Add in one Plymouth flatty six from a $5 '41 Plymouth kit. The wheels are off an old $5 builtup, and I'm sure I had all the rest of the supplies. My biggest expense this year so far has been two hobby store runs. I spent $50 on BMF, decal paper and Testors Metalizer spray paints in NJ. Then I spent $75 splurging on buying up every pack of Evergreen I didn't have, as well as some bass wood for stock.That number also included a new set of drill bits and a pin vise. The last set of bits lasted me 10 years. I mostly buy my kits at shows, so I never pay retail, and I've always got my eyes out for cheap kits at those events.

Cool model! That's one I though to do, but never got around to! So it will be fun to watch the build. I've never seen a 4 cylinder Nova in person (other than the 1980s Toyota built Novas) but I understand they were marketed as fleet vehicles, and not all that successfully. Gas was cheap and nobody really cared back in those days. When I was in high school in 1976, the local gas and electric utility sold off a bunch of '66 Nova 2 door sedans, but with 6 cylinder automatics. Bare bones cars, rubber floor mats, no radio, manual steering and brakes. They were all painted gold, but dulled out due to years of never being washed or waxed. My friend Carlos bought one for $75. They sold a lot of them so you'd see them around town. In short order we figured out they were all on a fleet key, so my friends would see one in a parking lot, use Carlos' key and move the car to a different spot.

Very nice. I have two of those, molded in bright taxi yellow, that I have had for as many years. Someone had swiped the chassis out of them, put both remainders in the same box and sold it to me for $3. Price tag is still on the box. I need to figure out what chassis would work under the Chrysler.

and pink bugs are only a problem if you don't have any paint! That's actually a nice body with the flairs on it. I have one, could always use a few more.. wait, that's what got me in trouble in the first place.

Hey, it's often custom for the procession to pass your house so why not have them pass your favorite hobby shop too! I think you hit upon a few things. First, my building habits have changed a lot over the years. I joined the formal hobby to build Mopar muscle cars. Then I was into factory stock cars, the first model I did was a '57 Ford, being followed by a '57 Nomad. I was going to build all the classics in order. Then I met Joe Cavorley and he got me to veer off into light commercial. I got into buying obscure Japanese kits for a while. Don Banes persuaded me to collect dune buggies and other small 4x4s. And now I'm building rat rods and such. So many of the kits I bought many moons ago no longer interest me. Still, I will go through a box and find stuff I swear I never saw before!

Richard a few details about this kit. This is the last issue of an annual that had appeared, and was modified every year since 1971. It went through many changes. The early kit had a drag option with two hemis in it.There was a police version. Later on there were work benches, and a custom van interior. Those seats are from that interior. I found that they are a perfect fit into an old pickup truck. And the diamond pleat is cool for that use. So they are useful! The big problem with this van is that the grill doesn't represent a real truck. I think they were trying to replicate an ambulance. There are older grills you could substitute in, or you could make a custom one, which was done very often during the van craze. AMT has reissued a number of vans, so we're all hoping the Dodge makes a come back, hopefully with a restored grill! Here's the last stock grill that appeared in that kit. It represents the high end van. The lower end for the last few years either had a single square headlight, or a single round headlight on each side. This is my shortie pickup and the section I cut out of it. That section is my Dodge van camper today. Here's the original 1971 issue. The first two years were a window van. 1977- One of the issues with the full custom interior during the custom van era. Those are your benches. You should also find a curtain divider that sat behind the front seats in your kit. The Gold Rush was the most custom version with custom non-stock grill and flares all the way around. I have an album that had 17 photos showing all the different versions, but Fotki is holding half of those hostage right now! Have fun with the van. It is a simple but fun kit with a lot of history!

Very cool. I will have to follow this project! I really enjoyed scratch building the elements in mine. It won't be the last, I have more ideas! And I'll be watching you for more details!

Boxes of show stuff for NNL East is showing up at my door daily! Just got enough of these to go around. We hadn't done a button in a few years so we went back so folks could complete their collection. Grab them up at the show!

I believe I cut panels and doors out differently than most folks. I have a small eXacto brand battery power drill. I use a very small drill bit and drill a series of holes... Trunk coming out of the '34 Ford... view from inside the body. Same car - View from outside body. Note that I have drilled the holes in the panel line from the outside of the body. Once the holes are complete, I carefully scribe the holes from behind with an eXacto knife. No real pressure, just create a line between them. Then carefully apply pressure on the part from both inside and outside. Scribe again as needed, look for a spot that's weak and ready to give. Once you have a start, the rest of it just breaks away like separating postage stamps. And here we are with the panel removed. Note my eXacto drill on the bench. I don't know if these are available, I haven't seen one in years. Now just sand the edges flat and the gap should be right. I believe I used a 78 or 80 bit to do this one. I also cut apart panels this way for body sections and other surgery. In those cases, I don't sand down the edges but assemble the parts using those edges. It gives the Zap-A-Gap a good area to grip and sands down well.

Very cool. My grandfather and father had a long line of LTDs / Crown Vics and that was one of them. Very nice job on that cruiser for your dad!

Thanks Dan! This was my very first ambitious conversion as an adult. I can remember like yesterday, having both of those new kits on my bench and thinking "now or never" as I cut into them! And that was before I had a hoard so the few kits I had were dear to me back then. In doing that conversion to fit onto the Mercedes chassis, the body had to be shortened. Only once I went to install it on the chassis, I discovered that the one side was longer than the other. So part of the work will have to be shortening the right side to match by taking out a micron or two of plastic and gluing the seam back together. The doors really didn't fit either, but I now see the solution of splitting them back apart and adding a shim of plastic . I hadn't accounted that the Mercedes greenhouse was narrower than the Stude's . I have been working on getting old projects to the display case this year so this one has been on my mind lately. So it needs to get done.

Not quite finished but a bit further along than in this photo.. but it's the last photo of I took of it mocked up.

I had a box of Falcon and '61 Ranchero parts disappear. It even became a running joke "The Elusive Falcon Box" in my model articles. Then after two years it showed up. It was marked "Falcon" on the end of the box inward, but was still marked "Matchbox Car Restorables" on the end showing. I only found it when I went looking for a Matchbox car. I have a Renault Dalphene body that's been missing going on ten years now.

Sounds like you need to build yourself a little spray booth. The above one has served me over 20 years. It's a 24" plastic recycling bin with a bathroom fan mounted in the back, and two lights attached to it. Everything is plugged into the same power strip so I just flip a switch to turn it on. I toss the hose out the window and paint in any weather! In fact I think that's snow on the roof outside the window in that picture.

The fun of buying models is almost as much fun as finishing a model! You get to open it and grok the contents, hold it up to the light and imagine the things you are going to do with it. Research it on the Internet, talk about it on the boards. All without actually putting glue to plastic! And building up a collection is harmless fun. You've bought a lot of stuff lately, but I'll bet you haven't missed a meal or mortgage payment because of it. Have fun. Life is short. And the best part is once you have a sizable collection and have forgotten half of it. Going through the model room is like Christmas morning! You find stuff you never saw before!

Nice work! I like the bikini top you created!

Tulio or anyone who may know... there are so many neat varieties of South American versions of US cars. How come we don't see them here at car shows? They're certainly within shipping distance, we see Aussie cars at shows here. Is there a trade issue of some sort that prevents the export / import to the USA?

Me? I'm more of a parts box build kinda guy! I remember when I was a bit younger and someone would describe parts on their model as "from the parts box" and I'd wonder how they didn't remember what kit that the parts were from... now I get it!

Brad, as different as they are, I want to give you credit as the inspiration for my Dodge van camper. Watching you build the Carney Wagon showed me technique and gave me ideas that led to the above modern interior!

Some guys have done theirs on sticker stock ahead of time. Pretty clever

Rules vary with the demolition derbies. I used to compete at Wall Stadium in NJ. We could leave the windshield too, but no other glass. We couldn't use station wagons either, although I see them used at other derbies. We could run with the stock gas tank but no more than 2 gallons of fuel in it. You could add a gas tank in the back, but the gas line had to run under the car and not through the interior. I had my batteries (2 of them) on the front passenger side floor in a closed box. You don't want one exploding. You couldn't run with any lenses, headlights or bright work. You would radius your wheel wells so your tires wouldn't get jammed in when you got hit. You wouldn't remove the inner fender wells in the front because you need all the metal you can get!

It hit 90 in Philadelphia today. My wife got home from work and put the air conditioning on in the house. Now it's raining like gang busters, the storm that will push out the hot weather and give us 60s for the rest of the week.

Hey Rich! Did you know that you can fill out your registration form on our website and print it out now? First year for that.