Harry P.

Looks like this one was a little too tough, only 5 correct answers. From Wikipedia: The Mastretta MXT is the first high performance sport automobile produced by the Mexican car maker Mastretta, and is notable for being both completely produced and designed in Mexico, as well as the first fully Mexican made sports car. The MXT is a mid-size sports car and its production officially began in January 2011. Who got it right: MIKE THE MANIAC mark taylor trogdor Ryan S Badluck 13

The front grille black detailing looks great.

Are the buttons on the interior upholstery pinheads?

None of that adds up to "conspiracy theory." I'm pretty sure nobody is suggesting that the contest wasn't 100% on the up and up. Just questioning certain aspects (low number of entries, etc.) And in the case of my comment on judging, that was directed at Drew specifically, because he said that he judged the models the way he wanted to, with no "guidelines" from the contest sponsors... which contradicts the rules of the contest that spell out very specific criteria that the models were supposed to be judged by. I wasn't questioning the contest's legitimacy, I was questioning Drew's statement.

Is there any "politically correct" way for the judges to verify a hunch? I mean, say that there's a model entered in a junior class that's clearly better than all the rest. Flawless paint, PE, correct detail, etc. It almost looks too good for a 12-year old to have built it. But it is possible that the 12 year old is just that good. How do you ask the kid (or parent, if present) in a diplomatic and non-accusatory way if the kid really built the model or if he had "help?"

Hmmm, I must have missed that part of the conversation. When was a conspiracy theory mentioned?

But not in the car business. They stopped producing cars in 1999, today they only produce trucks.

Very nice weathering/rusting. Nick, you are getting better and better all the time!

I don't remember the specifics, but there were 4 or 5 categories that the models were supposed to be judged on.

Well, now... that's odd. Because the official rules have a very specific list of criteria that the models were supposedly going to be judged by.

Before UPS and Fedex came along, there was only one: the Post Office. And for years THEY demanded whatever price they wanted and people had to pay it. There was no alternative. Now UPS and Fedex compete with the post office. Who knows... as the post office dies its slow death, there may be more new companies springing up to grab part of the business. Competition is a good thing.

UPS and FedEx will gladly pick up the slack.

6.25% is astronomical? You should try the Chicago area. I'd take your 6.25% in a heartbeat.

I wonder about the whole "we need kids to enter the hobby or the hobby will die" argument. If you believe that to be true (that the hobby will die unless we "recruit" kids into it), you are making two assumptions: That these new kids will stay with the hobby and not just try it out and quit soon after, and that no adults ever pick up the hobby. Sure, it's a good thing in general for the hobby to attract new, young participants. Every kid who gets into model cars is a potential lifetime builder. (I say potential, because there's no guarantee that the kid will stay with model building throughout his lifetime). But who's to say that adults don't take up the hobby, too? Many adults take up a new hobby, why would model building be an exception? If a kid wants to get into model cars, that's great. But I don't think we necessarily have to "restock" the model building ranks with kids in order to keep model building alive. I have a feeling it's going to be around for quite a while. As long as there are cars, there will be that percentage of the population that's interested in them and enjoys building scale replicas of them... kids or no kids.

Yep! If I didn't know it was a model, I'd never know it was a model...

Yes, you're right. Even in an "in person" contest, there's no guarantee that the person who entered the model actually built it. I guess at some point you just have to trust that the people who entered any given contest are honest.

Building models is fun. But we're talking about entering a contest. People don't enter contests to "have fun," they enter contests to win. Anyone who claims that they "don't care" if they win or not is kidding themselves. If you really don't care, why are you entering a competition? Seems to me that if you really don't care about winning, entering a contest is completely pointless, isn't it?

Very nice work so far!

Don't know that story. Details, please...

I didn't mean to imply that the price is inflated or based on greed... I assume the price is based on a fair return based on your production investment/costs. And I don't doubt your sincere motivation. Like I said, making a profit is no crime and I wish you all the best. I really do. I just question how many people out there will be willing (or able) to lay out two grand for a model kit. It's like building a super-premium car. The price may be very fair based on the cost to manufacture the car... but realistically, how many potential customers do you have? As I understand it, you'll be creating these on an "as needed" basis and not have to make the initial investment of creating an inventory... so you do have that going for you.

With looks like that, I sure hope so...

I can't hold enough beer to make that thing good looking...

Sure the average guy wouldn't be able to do it. But I could. And so could a lot of other people. So the question is... how does the sponsor of a photo-only contest make sure none of the entries have been doctored? Imagine the embarrassment to the contest sponsor if it comes out that the winning entry of a photo-only contest had been retouched?

I (or anyone who's good with Photoshop) can take a photo of a model with sloppy BMF, an orange-peel paint job and glue smears on the glass, retouch all the flaws and make the model look pretty much perfect. And if I didn't tell you, you would never even know that I did it.

Wrong! Anyone who's good at Photoshop can make a lousy model look like a contest winner. It's easy if you know how. I wonder how the photo-only contests deal with retouched photos? If done skillfully you'd never even know it was done.