Harry P.

Gee...too bad you couldn't get the paint to shine...

Hello Kunal...nice to see you and your RR here! Welcome aboard.

Looks like you guys were on to this one...it's REAL! Next ROM coming Monday!

Take 2 aspirin and call me in the morning...

Actually, my latches are not exactly prototypically correct. The real car's latches are rather small and delicate. I didn't think I could reproduce them accurately in scale and still have the sturdiness needed to actually operate more than once or twice before breaking...so I "imagineered" my own. They work on the same principle, but they're a bit larger than the real thing, scale-wise...but still close enough not to appear too much out of scale, I think. And at this size, they are strong enough to withstand repeated openings/closings...I hope! We'll see...

I don't know much about those types of cars, so pardon the stupid question... But aren't the graphics on the real cars vinyl stickers applied on top of the paint? Or are they painted on? If they're stickers, wouldn't it be more accurate to NOT clearcoat the decals?

Looks cool. I like the wheels and wide whites look.

Gold body and bed, black fenders.

A medium metallic blue...you can see it in the engine photos. Not a correct Jaguar color, but hey...it's my model!

Real or model? The answer: REAL!

...and here they are! Made of lengths of Evergreen rectangular strip bent over a candle flame, sheet aluminum hinge arms cut from a pie pan, and straight pins as hinge pins. They're temporarily pinned to the outer window frame for these photos. I'll paint them silver before final installation...and they'll work!

A bit of progress... Here's a close-up of one of the scratchbuilt throttle linkages, using my "low tech" (no tech??!!) approach...paper clip wire and sheet aluminum cut from a pie pan! The hatch hinges are made of sheet styrene and a bit of sprue. The size, shape and placement is based on reference photos in my Jaguar restoration books. I managed to make wire hinge pins for the rear windows. The hard part was drilling the matching holes in the body, as there is no clearance to use a pin vise and drill at the correct angle. Also, how would I get the window frames into place? I trimmed the hinge pins so that they extend only about 1/16" or so. That way I can insert the bottom pin into its hole, swing the window frame into place and gently snap the upper pin into position. This was a tricky operation, because I had to make the pins short enough to allow for the "snap fit", yet long enough to extend into their holes and allow the window to pivot. Next step: creating working swing-out latches to scale!!!

The undying admiration of modelers everywhere.

Well...by a slim majority, you guys were WRONG! It's REAL! Thanks to all for playing along. Next ROM coming Monday!

A new ride is always fun. Have a ball!!!

(In my best Cowardly Lion voice) Shucks, folks...I'm speechless! Thanks to all for your comments. It makes the whole thing worthwhile! And now on to the next one...

What are you using as references for all the detailing? Do you have a source for good photos?

Beautiful beater. And nice produce! Is that doll-house stuff or what?

A model can't get much cooler than that!

Pretty cool! And it's nice to still have one of your old models around...I wish I still had even ONE of the models I built as a kid...

That's right...I MAY alter the background if I think it gives things away, scale-wise...but I don't change the car. If I did it would be impossible to determine if it was real or model! So...the car in this photo is unretouched. And I see by the vote so far that you guys are split right down the middle...

Hilarious! I always knew you were the funny one of the group...

Did you ask Mick and Charlie what they thought???

ok...looks like it's working! BTW...in case any of you recognize this car from a past ROM...it's because it IS from a past ROM. I have a huge stash of photos that I used in the old ROM series...but most members here have not seen them yet. So if I use a picture that I may have used in a previous quiz elsewhere...don't give away the answer. Most folks here would be seeing them for the first time, and re-using previous images from old ROM quizzes saves me a huge amount of search time!!!

You can still vote, even if you know the answer for sure...just don't TELL us the answer!