Tom Geiger

I vote for Cranky! Don't glue down anything and switch it around as the whim hits ya!

I saw these photos of the Promolite 50 Olds fastback. Photos, and I believe the master was done by Ken Kitchen.

Nice project, I'm following along. I'll bet you already know that the taxi cab checkerboards are in the Revell '37 Ford pickup kit, the first release with the Checkers Market scheme.

Impcon reminded me of what happened to my childhood collection. My bedroom was on the lower level of the house and my closet was a long deep one that filled in a void under the stair case along the outside wall of the house. When I moved out at 19 I left most of my stuff there, since it was still my room and I didn't know if I'd be back. My dad discovered termites swarming outside the house and found where they came inside in my closet. They ate the wall and wood molding and got into all the model boxes stored on the floor. They ate the boxes and instruction sheets, and left a muddy mess everywhere. I never got to see it, he just packed it all in the garbage and away it went! Lost were a bunch of early 70s Mopar and Chevy annuals, Tom Daniel customs and a bunch of Airfix and Revell of Germany kits I had brought back to the US from when we lived in Germany. Many of these kits had my juvenile work on them, but we know how to fix that now. So all I have left from my teen years are the kits that were on the top closet shelf. Oh, I do have a Porsche 914 kit that has the box side panel eaten as a souvenir from that episode.

Great story to follow along! Very nice work and I'll be watching!

thanks for the information. I'll bet half of us could figure that out just by what we see around us and on the boards. Everything I see is positive. I'm super happy that Revell and Moebius efforts are being rewarded. That can only mean that more good stuff is on the way!

Very cool. Glad to help and happy you did it. They do look very nice!

Thanks to all who posted! I collect these old customs since they are the folk art of our youth and they make me smile! When I look at them I can imagine the stories they could tell if they could talk! Who built them? Were they ever in a hobby shop contest? How did they survive all these years intact? What happened to the original builder? And, can I reunite one with it's original builder someday? They've survived 50 years and I hope they're safe in my display case for another 50! And since you guys were so nice, I'll do a Valiant post next!

Lucky! I go to the Goodwill store every time I pass by and have only found a diecast car once!

The same question applies to all the model companies. All of them have gone through different periods under different management with different mind sets. The detail quality and complexity of the kit changed with each changing of the guard. Some of the companies have even acquired tools from former companies so the work may not be the same you'd expect from them. Some of the older Lindberg stuff was simple, toy like and poorly molded. Later date stuff like the '53 Fords were done in the modern era by more astute management so those are nice kits.

and half the battle is knowing when enough is enough. It's so easy to overdo weathering and rust. What I hate is the simpleton theory that you can take any old glue bomb a kid built, smear rust and mud colored paint all over it (including the seats etc) and sell it on eBay as an expertly weathered model! I call those "Shake n Bake" cars, since they literally look like you put them in a bag of muck and shook it up. Those are the ones that give our art a bad name!

If you have old kit glass that has turned yellow over time I discovered by accident that if you put it in 90% alcohol it clears it right up! Originally I put glass from an old Valiant in there to get some paint off it. Was pleased when it came out like new.

I had the same problem with decals on this project! Mine were made on the Xerox machine and looked just fine until I hit the model with clear coat. Then bits of the black print just dissolved! You can see it on the word "SECURITY". I looked it over and decided it fit into the project and left it. I wasn't going to strip and repaint this car at that point!

I think it's more the absence of light in the depth of the panel line. I just went outside and checked my Tracker. The gasket is on the inside lip of the door, which wouldn't be seen in a side view. None of the other panels in my picture have gaskets at all.

I'm with Cruz! Here's a photo of my 1:1 Geo Tracker. Note the panel lines are pretty distinctly black.

The Japanese companies are focusing on their home market. It's a different culture (as you can see from some of their van creations) and people still build models there. It's also a culture that focuses more on new cars than old, and conforming more than individuality. They really don't see the US as a market, note that they don't include US versions or even LHD dashes in most of their kits.

It's come up a few times recently. I just love the '61 Ranchero kit. Round 2 announced it's coming back as a race support vehicle that has a 6 in it. I'm hoping they actually follow through the right way! Time will tell. This is an old tool going back to 1961. The original release was curbside and that's my favorite version. Chassis is one piece with an engine showing underneath, and a single exhaust. Later on, probably early 1970s, the hood got opened and the V8 from the original '66 Chevy Impala kit got stuck into it. That's how all the releases have been since. Also, the original version had a two part tail light, with a red lens. The 1970s release onward just has a chrome one that you need to paint red. In 1962, AMT didn't follow through by updating the kit to that year, but turned it into a customizing kit. This was the vogue of the times and most of the kits were probably built this way. I've collected a lot of those old relics as folk art. I find interesting examples and preserve them as best I can. With most it just involves cleaning them up, polishing and adding missing parts like spot lights and lenses. I try not to 'improve' them, I want the flavor of the era to be there. So here's some of the collection... Here's a very mild custom, using what looks like a Comet grill. I actually bought this one sight unseen from someones mail order list (prior to the Internet) and it was described as a rebuilder. I was pleased to get it and it's been in my case ever since. The primer buggy behind it is a 1960 Ranchero that I built from a really beat up kids toy. All the emblems etc were shaved off so I went with the primer, ready for paint theme. I had the 1960 grill from a totalled promo. One of my favorites. It was built very nicely using the kit's custom parts. Probably an adult build since the putty work is very nice for the era. Here's a neat pair. The red one uses the same front and rear treatment as the purple car above. I hadn't seen one with the convertible treatment before, so I grabbed it. The green one is fun because it doesn't use parts from the customizing kit. Here's a face only a mother could love. This one uses the kit's nose, but adds the custom piece from the Falcon kit in the center. Bizarre! Here's the kit's custom rear that a lot of my cars used.Tail lights do vary! And here's one I restored. I received this from a friend, literally in a brown lunch bag. It was all apart and someone removed the several coats of paint by scraping it off. The body was broken in several pieces and was missing the A pillars. Somehow we both looked at it and decided it deserved to be restored! The original builder reshaped the wheel wells and shortened the back, then added the custom rear. It's not exactly perfect, but charming in it's own way. Here's the rear view. And how do we keep those unruly customs in line? The Covington Police. I built those one from an original Craftsman kit, again played to death and needing a ton of work. Police accessories and decals courtesy of Johan. I hope you've enjoyed seeing my little collection.

Those were the days! Back around 1979 I put a lot of miles on a company car and had a CB in it. It was great for getting warned where the cops were. Sometimes a couple of people would ride together and chat as we went. There were people with land base stations that would talk to everyone who passed on the major road and had info on conditions etc. Every time you passed a certain mile market you would just say hello to that person. It helped pass the time. There was also the aspect that you could call for help, but that's been surpassed by cell phones.

Casey's probably right, I don't think there were any famous cars of that body. If you want to do a generic car, or one of your own imagination, go through your kits and find different decals that would work. Some of the Model King kit releases had a few alternate decals for just that. Right now I'm making some decals for a car I'm doing, which isn't all that hard to do. Mine are nothing more than a stock image I found on the web and some lettering I did in Word. That's another option!

I usually use Tamiya acrylic flat black for my washes. For areas like grills, I'll let it get tacky and then wipe off the high areas with water on a Q-Tip. For highlighting panel lines, I thin a flat toothpick to fit in the crack. It does help to clean up the cracks with the back of a Number 11 blade prior to painting. Some guys will apply the black in the cracks prior to primer, or at least prior to paint. Then you don't have to worry about dragging thinner across your nice paint job. I've also done the cracks on my nice paint job, and again, I try to be careful as I drag the flat toothpick with a bit of paint on it through. I then quickly clean up any overage with the Q-Tip and water. I also found I could use regular turps or thinner on my Duplicolor paint jobs without hurting it. Just don't do that with lacquer thinner! Try it a few different ways, find a technique that you are comfortable with!

Thanks Sam! Try the spray adhesive and see if it works for you. That's the whole idea of modeling, take a tip and take it a step further!

You've got the hood! You can build a car around that! Restore it!

I had once lost an entire Ford Falcon parts box. It became a running joke in my club, the elusive Falcon box. One day I emptied the bottom of my closet. I found a box marked "old Matchbox cars" and there were the Falcons! I had marked "Falcon" on the other end. I marked both ends of all my parts box on that day!

If there's a kit I don't buy diecast. For things like 1950s light commercial trucks that don't exist in plastic I'm happy to get them any way! I do intend to pull them apart and build a model from them someday, but they look nice on my shelves the way they are until I get to 'em!

Every time this one comes to the top of the board I look at it again. It gets better every time! Amazing build!