Harry P.

I don't know anything about cars like that, but I do know a well-built model when I see one. That is spectacular!

Interesting story. I don't think I've ever heard that before.

It doesn't get much better than that.

Alyn, you should be very pleased when you see the October issue...

Jairus did a magazine how-to on building a model a lot like that once. Can't remember which issue.

I'm asking exactly what I'm asking. You posed the "what if," so I'm asking you what you think of your own "what if." What if GM made the Model T instead of Ford?

So what do you think would have been if GM made the Model T?

Then I guess GM would have made a lotta money instead of Ford! Or... there would have been a Chevy Model T, and a Buick Model T, and an Olds Model T...

The last thing I'd expect to see from a New Zealander living in Switzerland is an Arkansas Razorbacks license plate!

Not that there's anything wrong with your model, but I think your strong point is definitely interiors. Your interiors really shine.

Mercedes-Benz likes to claim in their advertising that they invented the automobile, but they didn't. Depending on what you believe to be the first "real" automobile, it was either Gottlieb Daimler or Karl Benz, who were working concurrently only a few miles apart but were largely unaware of each other's efforts... (or even the Frenchman Cugnot in the 1700s with his dorky steam tractor if you want to expand the definition of "automobile"). In either case, M-B didn't even exist at the time that Daimler and Benz came out with their respective machines. Same with the Model T. GM didn't exist when Ford came out with the Model T. (Excuse me for being a "know-it-all"... I'm sure I'll be hearing about it soon enough... )

How can something be so uplifting and yet so depressing at the same time?

Holy carp! That is absolutely freakin' beautiful!

Ok, at the risk of "kalbert" jumping all over me again for being a "know-it-all," I have never heard this version. I was under the impression that the Viper was conceived at the Chrysler Advanced Design Studios in Carlsbad, California, in the late '80s, Bob Lutz liked what he saw, and being a "car guy" rather than a bean counter, gave the green light to produce it. I have never heard any version where Chrysler engineers were sent to Kenosha and told to come up with something new, or where any AMC designers were involved. Again... not to be a "know it all," just want to hear more about this, as I've never heard this story before.

It's built as a curbside.

Well, you did get Harry ID right!

Very nice!

Beautiful! Did you add the panel retention wiring, and if so, how did you do it?

At least the CIA finally admitted that there really is an Area 51. That's progress!

A "buy one, get one free" deal? I wonder how long Monogram kept that promotion going before they decided they were losing money on it!

Actually there was an existing small stockpile of civilian cars when we entered the war, and like you said, you could qualify for one of those cars if you could prove to the government that you were an "essential driver." As the war went on, that small stockpile of civilian cars was gradually assigned to these "essential drivers" until the stockpile was used up. There was no civilian auto production from early 1942 until the war ended in 1945, when the auto plants were converted from military production back to civilian auto manufacturing. There was one Chevy plant that continued production of civilian GM auto parts (not auto production) throughout the war in order to help keep their existing civilian cars on the road.

Automatic transmissions were introduced in the 1930s, long before the war.

Not so. It wasn't low demand that forced the automakers into military production. Sounds to me like WWII slowed down US auto production big time. In fact, it stopped all manufacturing and R&D. Isn't that why the "new" postwar cars were old pre-war cars, and the first actual "new" models took years to make it to market?

But isn't it true that US auto production came to a dead halt during the war as the car makers shifted to producing military vehicles? And isn't it true that after the war, the "new" postwar cars were the same old models that were being produced before the war because the "Big 3" didn't have the time during the war to develop new models? So isn't it true that US auto production/development was slowed by the war, not accelerated?

But the Manhattan Project wasn't about building better cars or better planes. It was all about building better bombs.